The New York City Council passed several energy code upgrades last week that lawmakers hope will help significantly cut carbon emissions from city buildings. The legislation would expand the number of buildings required to participate in benchmarking, the process where building owners of a certain size report their annual energy and water use publicly. Other measures passed would require buildings of more than 50,000 square feet to sub-meter electricity and mandate owners of mid-size buildings to upgrade their lighting systems to be more energy efficient. The story can be found here.