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.)
5757 N. Sheridan Condominium Association 5757 N Sheridan Rd	Multifamily Housing	8.0 kg/sqft Highest 28%	1,590 tons Highest 29%
Admirals Pointe Condominium Association 645 N Kingsbury St	Multifamily Housing	8.0 kg/sqft Highest 28%	1,691 tons Highest 28%
Eliot House Condominium Association 1255 N Sandburg Ter	Multifamily Housing	8.0 kg/sqft Highest 28%	2,503 tons Highest 17%
Two East Oak Condominium Association 2 E Oak St	Multifamily Housing	8.0 kg/sqft Highest 28%	2,027 tons Highest 22%
Vision On State Condominium Association 1255 S State St	Multifamily Housing	8.0 kg/sqft Highest 28%	2,200 tons Highest 20%
3314 Lake Shore Drive Condo 3314 N LAKE SHORE DR	Multifamily Housing	8.0 kg/sqft Highest 28%	475 tons Lowest 25%
230 East Ohio 230 E Ohio St	Office	8.0 kg/sqft Highest 28%	605 tons Lowest 35%
The Chicago Building 7 W Madison St	Residence Hall/Dormitory	8.0 kg/sqft Highest 28%	840 tons Lowest 48%
Jordan Elementary Community School (CPS) 7414 N Wolcott Ave	K-12 School	8.0 kg/sqft Highest 28%	532 tons Lowest 29%
1020 W Lawrence 1020 W LAWRENCE AVE	Multifamily Housing	8.0 kg/sqft Highest 28%	1,520 tons Highest 31%
Grand Kingsbury LLC 520 N Kingsbury St	Multifamily Housing	8.0 kg/sqft Highest 28%	3,955 tons Highest 10%
1401 South State 1401 S State St	Multifamily Housing	8.0 kg/sqft Highest 28%	2,299 tons Highest 19%
Michigan - 180 Property LLC 180 N Michigan Ave	Office	8.0 kg/sqft Highest 28%	1,842 tons Highest 25%
CHICAGO MCKINLEY PARK (2078) 1940 W 33rd St	Retail Store	8.0 kg/sqft Highest 28%	1,107 tons Highest 41%
1986 - 47TH AND WESTERN 4555 S Western Blvd	Retail Store	8.0 kg/sqft Highest 28%	825 tons Lowest 48%

Data Source: Chicago Energy Benchmarking Data