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.)
61 E Banks 61 E Banks Street	Multifamily Housing	8.5 kg/sqft Highest 23%	1,137 tons Highest 40%
Niche 905 905 N Orleans St	Multifamily Housing	8.5 kg/sqft Highest 23%	1,520 tons Highest 31%
Center Home For Hispanic Elderly 1401 N California Ave	Senior Living Community	8.5 kg/sqft Highest 23%	637 tons Lowest 38%
William P Gray Elementary School (CPS) 3730 N Laramie Ave	K-12 School	8.5 kg/sqft Highest 23%	1,102 tons Highest 42%
Mildred I Lavizzo Elementary School (CPS) 137 W 108th Pl	K-12 School	8.5 kg/sqft Highest 23%	710 tons Lowest 42%
University of Chicago - Donoghue (CPS) 707 E 37th St	K-12 School	8.5 kg/sqft Highest 23%	639 tons Lowest 38%
Lathrop 1A (CHA) 2000 W Diversey Ave	Multifamily Housing	8.5 kg/sqft Highest 23%	3,154 tons Highest 13%
840 Lake Shore Condominium Association 840 N Lake Shore Dr	Multifamily Housing	8.5 kg/sqft Highest 23%	2,359 tons Highest 18%
3838 North Broadway, LLC 3838 N BROADWAY	Multifamily Housing	8.5 kg/sqft Highest 23%	601 tons Lowest 35%
50 East Chestnut Condominium Association 50 E Chestnut St	Multifamily Housing	8.5 kg/sqft Highest 23%	1,176 tons Highest 39%
Cloisters 5801 5811 S DORCHESTER AVE	Multifamily Housing	8.5 kg/sqft Highest 23%	1,624 tons Highest 29%
180 North Jefferson Apartments 180 N Jefferson St	Multifamily Housing	8.5 kg/sqft Highest 23%	1,940 tons Highest 24%
Armitage Commons 3720 W ARMITAGE AVE	Multifamily Housing	8.5 kg/sqft Highest 23%	728 tons Lowest 43%
Skiritai Bittersweet LLC 732 W BITTERSWEET PL	Multifamily Housing	8.5 kg/sqft Highest 23%	466 tons Lowest 24%
4180 Polo Tower CA 4180 N MARINE DR	Multifamily Housing	8.5 kg/sqft Highest 23%	926 tons Highest 48%

Data Source: Chicago Energy Benchmarking Data