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The Race to Reduce was launched in 2011 by Civic Action, an organization that brings business executives together to respond to challenges facing the GTA and Hamilton. Office space accounted for 20 per cent of the GTA’s carbon emissions at the time, according to research by Chris Kennedy, professor of civil engineering at the University of Toronto.

Between 2011 and 2014, businesses and landlords of 196 buildings covering more than 69 million square feet — or 42 per cent of commercial office space in the GTA — participated in the challenge. Toronto City Hall and the TD Bank Tower were among 21 buildings that reduced their energy use by 20 per cent or more over the three years by upgrading heating systems, installing more efficient lighting and other conservation measures.

‘We’ve got to do something. It’s the right thing to do. It’s not only good for our business, but it’s good for our tenants’

Seventeen buildings, including offices in Vaughan, Oakville, Mississauga, Burlington and downtown Toronto, topped the list for using the least amount of energy. The buildings had an average score of 95.5 out of 100 on Energy Star, an international standard for energy efficiency, which is 37 points above the national average for commercial space.

But the Royal Bank of Canada, which has almost 4.5 million square feet of office space in the Toronto area, stole the show by winning three team excellence awards in partnership with three of its landlords. Its projects involved electronic sensors that lowered lighting levels by taking advantage of daylight and arranging for cleaners to do more work during the day in order to reduce lighting at night, said Nadeem Shabbar, global head of real estate at RBC.