CHICAGO—After hearing passionate oratory, both for and against, the Chicago City Council approved Mayor Rahm Emanuel's controversial energy use benchmarking ordinance at yesterday's council meeting by a 32-17 vote. The new law will require municipal, commercial and residential properties with more than 50,000-square-feet to track and publicly disclose their energy usage by 2015. The June proposal inspired spirited critiques over the summer from groups like BOMA/Chicago, the Chicago Association of REALTORS® and condo owners living in high-rises along Lake Michigan.

“We support the notion of the benchmarking itself, but what we object to is where they want to post, probably on a city website, the scores of each building,” Michael Cornicelli, executive vice president of BOMA/Chicago, told GlobeSt.com. “Every older class C or class B building can't get a LEED Gold certification.”

The mayor's proposal also found supporters. The Midwest Energy Efficiency Alliance, an advocacy group, endorsed the idea. And large commercial real estate companies like Jones Lang LaSalle, among many others, also voiced support. "U.S. Equities includes benchmarking energy use of the buildings in our portfolio and using that data to drive results," said Bob Wislow, U.S. Equities chairman and CEO, earlier this summer. "Our buildings see better financial and leasing performance as their environmental performance improves."