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.)
Eli Whitney Elementary School (CPS) 2815 S Komensky Ave	K-12 School	6.6 kg/sqft Highest 47%	712 tons Lowest 42%
DeWitt Clinton Elementary School (CPS) 6110 N Fairfield Ave	K-12 School	6.6 kg/sqft Highest 47%	898 tons Highest 49%
Peter A Reinberg Elementary School (CPS) 3425 N Major Ave	K-12 School	6.6 kg/sqft Highest 47%	605 tons Lowest 35%
Burnham Elementary Inclusive Academy (CPS) 9928 S Crandon Ave	K-12 School	6.6 kg/sqft Highest 47%	541 tons Lowest 30%
737 W Washington Blvd 737 W Washington Blvd	Multifamily Housing	6.6 kg/sqft Highest 47%	5,399 tons Highest 6%
314 West Superior Street 314 W Superior St	Office	6.6 kg/sqft Highest 47%	722 tons Lowest 43%
Hilliard Homes Phase I Limited Partnership (Family) 2031 S Clark St	Multifamily Housing	6.6 kg/sqft Highest 47%	1,152 tons Highest 40%
One Museum Park West Condominium Association 1201 S Prairie Ave	Multifamily Housing	6.6 kg/sqft Highest 47%	4,321 tons Highest 8%
Whitechapel Apartments 4900 N SHERIDAN RD	Multifamily Housing	6.6 kg/sqft Highest 47%	838 tons Lowest 48%
Romanian Village 5161 N ASHLAND AVE	Multifamily Housing	6.6 kg/sqft Highest 47%	459 tons Lowest 23%
StMaryAngels_School 1850 N Hermitage Ave	K-12 School	6.6 kg/sqft Highest 47%	282 tons Lowest 8%
Spertus Institute for Jewish Learning and Leadership 610 S Michigan Ave	College/University	6.6 kg/sqft Highest 47%	948 tons Highest 47%
1104 S Wabash 1104 S Wabash Ave	College/University	6.6 kg/sqft Highest 47%	1,094 tons Highest 42%
Elm Street Plaza Venture LLLP 1130 N Dearborn St	Multifamily Housing	6.6 kg/sqft Highest 47%	2,510 tons Highest 17%
73rd St Apts., LLC 7345 S South Shore Dr	Multifamily Housing	6.6 kg/sqft Highest 47%	702 tons Lowest 41%

Data Source: Chicago Energy Benchmarking Data