Are Internal Finishes (of External Walls) included in LEED scope?

[Fei Ngeow]

We had a software user who was concerned about including ‘internal wall finishes’ to the target construction scope of their LCA. As eTool I understand, ‘internal wall finishes’ of external/structural walls is within the LEED scope. We sent the following questions to the USGBC to confirm:

Can you please confirm that Internal Finishes of External Walls should be included in the LCA scope?

Also, can you clarify whether a structural internal wall & finishes (i.e. core walls) should be included to the study?

The response was as follows:

Dear Fei,

Thank you for contacting GBCI regarding LEED v4 MRc Building Life Cycle Impact Reduction – Option 4 Whole Building LCA. Our sincere apologies for the delay in this response. We are dealing with a very large number of technical inquires at this time.

You are correct. The scope of the study should include the interior wall finishes that are part of the exterior envelope assembly, but interior structural wall finishes do not need to be included. Additional interior elements may be included at the project team’s discretion if a justification is provided which is aligned with the credit intent.

If you have any further questions or concerns about this inquiry, please feel free to respond directly to this email. For any new inquiries, please contact us at http://www.gbci.org/contact.

Best Regards,

Jessica Gracie-Griffin
Green Business Certification Inc.
2101 L Street NW, Suite 500
Washington, DC 20037

[Rich Haynes]

Great followup Fei.  Learnings for eToolLCD users from this:
1) Internal finishes of external walls is in scope (makes sense as the wall system in it’s entirely should be assessed for a fair comparison)
2) There’s flexibility in the scope in general if the intent of the LCA is upheld (and the proposed scope is justified

[Pat4644]

So to clarify, the leed scope is superstrucutre only plus internal finishes of external walls?

[Henrique Mendonca]

Hi Pat,
You are correct. The scope of the study should include the interior wall finishes that are part of the exterior envelope assembly.