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.)
1169 S Plymouth Condominium Association 1169 S PLYMOUTH CT	Multifamily Housing	6.7 kg/sqft Highest 46%	808 tons Lowest 47%
Franklin Building Condominium Association 720 S DEARBORN ST	Multifamily Housing	6.7 kg/sqft Highest 46%	542 tons Lowest 30%
2510 West Irving Park Road 2510 W IRVING PARK RD	Multifamily Housing	6.7 kg/sqft Highest 46%	218 tons Lowest 3%
Commonwealth Plaza Condominium Association 330 W Diversey Pkwy	Multifamily Housing	6.7 kg/sqft Highest 46%	3,368 tons Highest 11%
AG 300 South Wacker Owner LLC 300 S Wacker Dr	Office	6.7 kg/sqft Highest 46%	4,074 tons Highest 9%
One North Franklin 1 N Franklin	Office	6.7 kg/sqft Highest 46%	4,810 tons Highest 7%
150 North Michigan Avenue 150 N Michigan Ave	Office	6.7 kg/sqft Highest 46%	4,742 tons Highest 7%
Hyatt Regency Chicago 🚩 151 E Wacker Dr	Hotel	6.7 kg/sqft Highest 46%	13,614 tons #39 Highest
Eleven40 (lv002) 1140 S Wabash Ave	Multifamily Housing	6.6 kg/sqft Highest 47%	1,960 tons Highest 23%
1550 N Wieland (Chicago) Manager LLC 1550 N Wieland St	Multifamily Housing	6.6 kg/sqft Highest 47%	386 tons Lowest 16%
Clybourn 1200 454 W DIVISION ST	Multifamily Housing	6.6 kg/sqft Highest 47%	868 tons Lowest 50%
Prete Apartments 5801 N Pulaski Rd - Bldg E	Residential Care Facility	6.6 kg/sqft Highest 47%	369 tons Lowest 15%
Beach Point Tower Condominium Association 5801 N Sheridan Rd	Multifamily Housing	6.6 kg/sqft Highest 47%	1,057 tons Highest 43%
Emiliano Zapata Elementary Academy (CPS) 2730 S Kostner Ave	K-12 School	6.6 kg/sqft Highest 47%	720 tons Lowest 42%
Chippewa Apartments 5050 S East End Ave	Multifamily Housing	6.6 kg/sqft Highest 47%	491 tons Lowest 26%

Data Source: Chicago Energy Benchmarking Data