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.)
Mundelein Center- ID#102408 1020 W Sheridan Rd	College/University	8.3 kg/sqft Highest 24%	1,713 tons Highest 28%
Walt Disney Magnet Elementary School (CPS) 4140 N Marine Dr	K-12 School	8.3 kg/sqft Highest 24%	2,151 tons Highest 21%
150 North Wacker Drive 150 N Wacker Dr	Office	8.3 kg/sqft Highest 24%	2,188 tons Highest 20%
First Praire Shores, LLC 2901 S King Dr	Multifamily Housing	8.3 kg/sqft Highest 24%	2,414 tons Highest 18%
Addison Towers 510 534 W ADDISON ST	Multifamily Housing	8.3 kg/sqft Highest 24%	572 tons Lowest 33%
Hampden Green Condominium Association 2728 N HAMPDEN CT	Multifamily Housing	8.2 kg/sqft Highest 25%	1,148 tons Highest 40%
1767 North Milwaukee Avenue 1767 N Milwaukee Ave	Multifamily Housing	8.2 kg/sqft Highest 25%	482 tons Lowest 25%
Red Shield Center 945 W 69th St	Mixed Use Property	8.2 kg/sqft Highest 25%	411 tons Lowest 19%
400 W. Erie 400 W Erie St	Office	8.2 kg/sqft Highest 25%	607 tons Lowest 35%
1259 - Sonesta ES Suites Chicago Downtown 201 East Walton Place 201 E Walton Pl	Hotel	8.2 kg/sqft Highest 25%	1,453 tons Highest 32%
Peter V. Byrne Hall 2219 N Kenmore Ave	College/University	8.2 kg/sqft Highest 25%	635 tons Lowest 38%
Galileo Math & Science Scholastic Academy ES (CPS) 820 S Carpenter St	K-12 School	8.2 kg/sqft Highest 25%	847 tons Lowest 49%
Munroe Hall 2312 N Clifton Ave	College/University	8.2 kg/sqft Highest 25%	676 tons Lowest 40%
Lofts and Fairbanks at CityFront Plaza 240 E Illinois St	Multifamily Housing	8.2 kg/sqft Highest 25%	4,868 tons Highest 7%
The Residences at Joffrey Tower Condo Association 8 E Randolph St	Multifamily Housing	8.2 kg/sqft Highest 25%	3,365 tons Highest 11%

Data Source: Chicago Energy Benchmarking Data