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.)
150 N Michigan Ave 🏆 150 N Michigan Ave	Office	6.5 kg/sqft Lowest 29%	4,598 tons Highest 18%
Three First National Plaza 70 W Madison St	Office	6.5 kg/sqft Lowest 29%	10,364 tons Highest 6%
150 N RIVERSIDE PLAZA 150 N RIVERSIDE PLAZA	Office	6.5 kg/sqft Lowest 29%	9,684 tons Highest 7%
1212 Lake Shore Drive Condominium 1212 N Lake Shore Dr	Multifamily Housing	6.5 kg/sqft Lowest 29%	2,464 tons Highest 39%
5999-Westin Chicago River North 320 N Dearborn Ave	Hotel	6.5 kg/sqft Lowest 29%	2,866 tons Highest 32%
1400 Lake Shore Drive Condominium Association 1400 N Lake Shore Dr	Multifamily Housing	6.5 kg/sqft Lowest 29%	2,125 tons Highest 47%
North Park Village Apartments - Building H 5801 N Pulaski Rd - Bldg H	Residential Care Facility	6.5 kg/sqft Lowest 29%	1,788 tons Lowest 42%
MiCA 2733 W BELDEN AVE	Multifamily Housing	6.5 kg/sqft Lowest 29%	1,325 tons Lowest 20%
110 W SUPERIOR ST 🏆 110 W SUPERIOR ST	Multifamily Housing	6.5 kg/sqft Lowest 29%	1,016 tons #15 Lowest
Lakeside on the Park Condominium 1250 S INDIANA AVE	Multifamily Housing	6.5 kg/sqft Lowest 29%	1,344 tons Lowest 22%
University Station CA 1550 S Blue Island Ave	Multifamily Housing	6.5 kg/sqft Lowest 29%	1,947 tons Lowest 47%
Sheridan Point Condominium Association 🏆 6325 N SHERIDAN RD	Multifamily Housing	6.5 kg/sqft Lowest 29%	1,008 tons #6 Lowest
1122 N DEARBORN ST 1122 N DEARBORN ST	Multifamily Housing	6.5 kg/sqft Lowest 29%	1,522 tons Lowest 31%
2850 N SHERIDAN RD 2850 N SHERIDAN RD	Multifamily Housing	6.5 kg/sqft Lowest 29%	1,219 tons Lowest 16%
The Pinnacle 21 E Huron St	Multifamily Housing	6.5 kg/sqft Lowest 29%	3,970 tons Highest 22%

Data Source: Chicago Energy Benchmarking Data