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Extracted Content

REQUIREMENTS EXPLAINED

Incorporating climate resilience into the design and development of interior spaces helps mitigate the impacts of climate change and enhances the long-term durability of building interiors against key vulnerabilities. A climate resilience assessment supports project teams in identifying and evaluating building-specific climate hazards that could threaten the performance, safety, and longevity of interior spaces and systems. This process provides a framework for embedding data-driven, forward-looking strategies that align with regional climate adaptation plans, building codes, and sustainability objectives while addressing the unique considerations of interior environments.

Addressing climate risks during interior design and construction improves the ability of building systems, occupant well-being, and operational continuity to withstand extreme weather events and climate stressors. These strategies also support broader goals of public safety, economic stability, and community resilience by reducing disruptions to interior spaces. In proactively integrating these considerations, projects following LEED ID+C: Commercial Interiors guidelines can adapt to changing conditions, ensure long-term functionality, and reduce life cycle costs while creating more sustainable and resilient interior environments.

This prerequisite entails project teams conducting a comprehensive climate and natural hazard assessment, including identifying current and projected hazards that may impact the project site and building operations. The assessment must address site-specific hazards such as drought, heat, flooding, hurricanes, wildfires, and other relevant risks. Teams must prioritize at least two hazards and analyze them using the IPCC Shared Socioeconomic Pathways (SSP) emissions scenarios [5], specifying the project’s service life and assessing hazard levels, risks, vulnerability, and potential impacts on-site operations and construction. In alignment with the critical need for designers to design for the safety and welfare of occupants, the findings should be used to inform the project’s planning, design, operations, and maintenance.

Climate and Natural Hazard Risk Assessment for Interior Spaces

This prerequisite entails project teams conducting a climate and natural hazard assessment to identify current and projected hazards that may impact the interior environment and its critical systems. The assessment must address hazards such as drought, heat, flooding, hurricanes, wildfires, and other relevant risks that could disrupt building operations, occupant safety, and interior functionality.

Unlike whole-building assessments in LEED BD+C, the resilience of interior systems and spaces within the larger building context is what projects using LEED ID+C: Commercial

5 “Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, Working Group I, Sixth Assessment Report”, IPCC, accessed March 31, 2025, https://interactive-atlas.ipcc.ch/.

U.S. Green Building Council LEED v5 Reference Guide for Interior Design and Construction, April 2025 Launch Edition 21