VOC limits for products with unknown categories

I don't think there's ever a project where you don't have to take some educated guesses about products not directly listed in the various standards. Here's my take, but I would like to see how others interpret them. The Carbothane and Carbozinc are probably anti-corrosive paints with a limit of 250 g/L. However, if the Carbothane (or any other product) is being applied outdoors, you don't have to track it for LEED. I would categorize the Sanitile based on its use. If it's paint for walls or ceilings then it's addressed under GS-11, so would have a limit of 150 g/L. Otherwise, I'd take a look at what you're using it for and try to find the closest match. The Carbomastic is probably some type of Industrial Maintenance Coating, so has a limit of 250. As a side note, I frequently specify metal coatings that are higher than the VOC limits, and use a budget calculation method -- typically there is relatively little used, and the VOCs can all be balanced out with one low-VOC interior paint that you use a lot of. Many of my peers don't think that the lower VOC coatings for metals are as high performing, and performance is the number one criteria for these products. Reference IEQc4.2 for more on this.

If the coatings are going on kennels that are outside, they would have no low-emitting requirement.

That's right -- thanks Karen. I missed the part about this being outside. (These are products that are also used inside in some circumstances, and this is a real issue on some projects.)

We just went through this on a very large project where we have an adhesive that's being used to create the weather barrier of the building. The GC submitted a non-low VOC adhesive, and informed us that if we wanted low VOC (which he said was not required for LEED) it was available for $40,000 more. Upon careful review of the credit, low VOC materials are ONLY considered on the interior of the building AFTER the building has been made weather tight. So, as odd as it seems, the adhesives that create that tightness do not have to achieve the VOC ratings. The point here is that we'd never had to specifically identify "outside"... but it's in the manual, if you read it correctly.