Electrify Chicago

According to the 2022 Chicago Climate Action Plan, a whopping 69% of Chicago's emissions come from buildings, making it our biggest challenge and our biggest opportunity as a city to tackle change. At Electrify Chicago we want to showcase some of the best and worst performing buildings in the city using publicly available data and manual annotations to add building photographs and label multi-building owners like universities.

2017 GHG Emissions -
31M metric tons CO2 equivalent
69% buildings
24% transportation
7% waste

Chicago 2022 CAP

You can start by looking at Chicago's buildings with the highest greenhouse gas intensity - this means that they use the most energy when adjusted per unit of square foot, so big buildings could actually perform much better than very inefficient small buildings on this metric.

Legislative update! 🎉

As of late January 2024, legislation is being introduced to require new buildings use more efficient forms of water and space heating, via the Clean And Affordable Buildings Ordinance (CABO), which will reduce the number of highly polluting and inefficient that end up on this site.

If you're in Chicago, write to your alderman to support the CABO!

Chicago Buildings by Greenhouse Gas Intensity

Note: Data only includes large Chicago buildings from 2021, unless explicitly stated otherwise.

Note: This data only includes buildings whose emissions are reported under the Chicago Energy Benchmarking Ordinance. According to the City “As of 2016, this list includes all commercial, institutional, and residential buildings larger than 50,000 square feet.” This dataset is also then filtered to only buildings with reported emissions > 1,000 metric tons CO₂ equivalent.

This data is also from 2021, but when new benchmark data is available, we'll update the site.

Chicago 2022 CAP

Property Name / address	Primary Property Type	Greenhouse Gas Intensity (kg CO₂ eq./sqft)	Total Greenhouse Emissions (metric tons CO₂ eq.)
Kingston Place 7429 7441 S KINGSTON AVE	Multifamily Housing	5.2 kg/sqft Lowest 27%	324 tons Lowest 11%
Infinite Chicago (nf04) 28 E Jackson Blvd	Multifamily Housing	5.2 kg/sqft Lowest 27%	1,110 tons Highest 41%
Baumhart Hall-ID#160412 26 E Pearson St	Residence Hall/Dormitory	5.2 kg/sqft Lowest 27%	1,270 tons Highest 37%
1133 N. Dearborn Apartments 1133 N Dearborn St	Multifamily Housing	5.2 kg/sqft Lowest 27%	2,016 tons Highest 22%
Wellington Condominium 📷 352 360 W WELLINGTON AVE	Multifamily Housing	5.2 kg/sqft Lowest 27%	751 tons Lowest 44%
Wrightwood III LLC 451 W Wrightwood Ave	Multifamily Housing	5.2 kg/sqft Lowest 27%	607 tons Lowest 35%
Alta at K Station 555 W Kinzie St	Multifamily Housing	5.2 kg/sqft Lowest 27%	4,803 tons Highest 7%
Michigan Avenue Lofts 910 S Michigan Ave	Multifamily Housing	5.2 kg/sqft Lowest 27%	2,666 tons Highest 16%
State Place Centre 1601 S STATE ST	Multifamily Housing	5.2 kg/sqft Lowest 27%	372 tons Lowest 15%
2800 North Orchard Condominium Association 2800 N Orchard St	Multifamily Housing	5.2 kg/sqft Lowest 27%	503 tons Lowest 27%
Windy City Fieldhouse 2367 W Logan Blvd	Other - Recreation	5.2 kg/sqft Lowest 27%	303 tons Lowest 9%
The Regal 651 S WELLS ST	Multifamily Housing	5.2 kg/sqft Lowest 27%	517 tons Lowest 28%
Trinity Community Housing Corporation 3939 S CALUMET AVE	Multifamily Housing	5.2 kg/sqft Lowest 27%	264 tons Lowest 6%
LaSalle Private Residences 1212 N LaSalle St	Multifamily Housing	5.2 kg/sqft Lowest 27%	1,908 tons Highest 24%
56th & Kimbark Condo Association 5543 5559 S KIMBARK AVE	Multifamily Housing	5.2 kg/sqft Lowest 27%	321 tons Lowest 11%

Data Source: Chicago Energy Benchmarking Data