芝加哥《能源基准和透明度条例》的早期结果表明，超过250000平方英尺（23225平方米）的商业建筑在统计上优于商业建筑能耗调查（CBECS）报告的平均商业建筑。芝加哥大型办公楼的能源之星中位数得分为78，这与纽约市、费城和华盛顿特区类似规模建筑的结果一致。这些结果导致我们假设，较高的建筑比低层建筑更节能。然而，由于2014年芝加哥市作为合规第一年的一部分收集的原始数据未公开，因此从私人投资组合经理账户收集基准数据，以分析建筑高度和能源消耗之间的关系。 对基准数据的显著性测试显示，建筑高度和能源之星得分之间存在显著关系，测量的p值小于0.05。然而，对基准数据的分析表明，建筑高度与能源之星得分或建筑高度与能源使用强度（EUI）之间没有线性相关性。论文的第二部分将基准数据集与高层建筑能源模型模拟库进行了比较。模型分析发现，伊利诺伊州办公楼的建筑高度和源EUI之间存在显著的负相关。此外，还发现占用率与建筑能耗性能之间存在显著关系，从而得出结论，未被纳入本分析的其他因素，如运行计划、设备效率、堵塞负荷、围护结构、，建筑运营商的熟练程度可能会对运营建筑的能耗产生重大影响。 尽管如此，办公楼的建筑高度增加可能表明能源之星得分较高，因为该评级体系针对各种因素（包括平方英尺、占用率、天气和设备使用）进行了标准化。引用:2016年冬季会议，佛罗里达州奥兰多，会议论文

Early results from Chicago's Energy Benchmarking and Transparency Ordinance indicate that commercial buildings over 250,000 square feet (23,225 square meters) perform statistically better than the average commercial buildings as reported by the Commercial Buildings Energy Consumption Survey (CBECS). The median ENERGY STAR score of Chicago's large office buildings was 78, which was in-line with the results found in New York City, Philadelphia and Washington DC for similarly sized buildings. These results lead us to hypothesize that taller buildings are better energy performers than low-rise buildings. However, because the raw data collected by the City of Chicago in 2014 as part of the first year of compliance was not made publically available, benchmarking data from private Portfolio Manager accounts was collected in order to analyze the relationship between building height and energy consumption. Significance testing of benchmarking data revealed a significant relationship between building height and ENERGY STAR score with a measured p-value of less than 0.05. However, analysis of the benchmarking data revealed no linear correlation between building height and ENERGY STAR score or building height and Source Energy Use Intensity (EUI). The second portion of the paper compares the benchmarking data set against a pool of tall building energy model simulations. The model analysis found a significant negative correlation between Building Height and Source EUI in office buildings located in Illinois. It was also found that there is a significant relationship between Occupancy and building energy performance which leads to the conclusion that other factors not considered as part of this analysis such as operating schedules, equipment efficiency, plug loads, envelope constructions, and building operator proficiency are likely to have a major effect on the energy consumption of operational buildings. Nevertheless, increased building height of an office building can be indicative of higher ENERGY STAR score given that this rating system normalizes for various factors including square footage, occupancy, weather, and equipment usage.