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.

Chicago Buildings by Greenhouse Gas Intensity

Note: Data only includes large Chicago buildings from 2020

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 2020, 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.)
One North Wacker 🚩 1 N Wacker Dr	Office	7.9 kg/sqft Highest 47%	12,683 tons Highest 4%
225 W Washington 225 W Washington St	Office	7.9 kg/sqft Highest 47%	4,186 tons Highest 20%
Eight O Five 805 N LA SALLE DR	Multifamily Housing	7.9 kg/sqft Highest 47%	2,122 tons Highest 47%
10 S LaSalle St 10 S LaSalle St	Office	7.9 kg/sqft Highest 47%	6,859 tons Highest 10%
Domestic Violence Courthouse 555 W Harrison St	Courthouse	7.9 kg/sqft Highest 47%	1,488 tons Lowest 29%
Nightingale Elementary -CPS 5250 S Rockwell St	K-12 School	7.9 kg/sqft Highest 47%	1,111 tons Lowest 8%
Waterford Condominium 4170 N Marine Dr	Multifamily Housing	7.9 kg/sqft Highest 47%	2,642 tons Highest 36%
Juarez Com Academy HS -CPS 2150 S Laflin St	K-12 School	7.9 kg/sqft Highest 47%	2,020 tons Lowest 49%
1310 N RITCHIE CT 1310 N RITCHIE CT	Multifamily Housing	7.9 kg/sqft Highest 47%	1,436 tons Lowest 26%
Federal Railroad Retirement Board 844 W Rush St	Office	7.9 kg/sqft Highest 47%	3,030 tons Highest 30%
3300 3306 W DIVERSEY AVE 3300 3306 W DIVERSEY AVE	Multifamily Housing	7.9 kg/sqft Highest 47%	1,434 tons Lowest 26%
Inland Steel Building 30 W Monroe	Office	7.9 kg/sqft Highest 47%	2,389 tons Highest 41%
Granville Court Condominiums 2025 W Granville Ave	Multifamily Housing	7.9 kg/sqft Highest 47%	1,824 tons Lowest 43%
Winston Towers No. 5 7141 N Kedzie Ave	Multifamily Housing	7.9 kg/sqft Highest 47%	2,265 tons Highest 44%
Lincoln Park Tower Condominium Association 1960 N Lincoln Park West	Multifamily Housing	7.9 kg/sqft Highest 47%	2,624 tons Highest 36%

Data Source: Chicago Energy Benchmarking Data