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.)
MMS - Chicago - 171 W Oak Street 141 173 W OAK ST	Multifamily Housing	7.9 kg/sqft Highest 29%	1,303 tons Highest 36%
1912 - NORTH AVENUE 1232 W North Ave	Retail Store	7.9 kg/sqft Highest 29%	1,320 tons Highest 35%
1974 - ARMITAGE / CICERO 1919 N Cicero Ave	Retail Store	7.9 kg/sqft Highest 29%	936 tons Highest 48%
HRTL - Harvest Commons: 1519 W Warren Blvd 1519 1525 W WARREN BLVD	Multifamily Housing	7.9 kg/sqft Highest 29%	407 tons Lowest 18%
Carmen Marine Cooperative 5030 N Marine Dr	Multifamily Housing	7.9 kg/sqft Highest 29%	2,046 tons Highest 22%
4600 N. Winchester 4600 4616 N WINCHESTER AVE	Multifamily Housing	7.9 kg/sqft Highest 29%	395 tons Lowest 18%
1000 N. LaSalle Apartments 1000 N LASALLE DR	Multifamily Housing	7.9 kg/sqft Highest 29%	950 tons Highest 47%
20 South Clark 20 S Clark St	Office	7.9 kg/sqft Highest 29%	3,662 tons Highest 10%
181 West Madison 181 W Madison St	Office	7.9 kg/sqft Highest 29%	8,602 tons Highest 3%
Hilton Chicago MM Suites 198 E Delaware Pl	Hotel	7.9 kg/sqft Highest 29%	2,488 tons Highest 17%
Marie Sklodowska Curie Metropolitan High School (CPS) 4975 S Archer Ave	K-12 School	7.9 kg/sqft Highest 29%	3,267 tons Highest 12%
Jane Addams Elementary School 10810 S Avenue H	K-12 School	7.8 kg/sqft Highest 30%	481 tons Lowest 25%
North & Pulaski 3949 W NORTH AVE	Multifamily Housing	7.8 kg/sqft Highest 30%	587 tons Lowest 34%
132, Hyatt Place - Chicago/Downtown-The Loop 28 N FRANKLIN ST	Hotel	7.8 kg/sqft Highest 30%	1,351 tons Highest 35%
5114 N Christiana Ave. 5114 N Christiana Ave	College/University	7.8 kg/sqft Highest 30%	570 tons Lowest 33%

Data Source: Chicago Energy Benchmarking Data