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.)
1133 N. Dearborn Apartments 1133 N Dearborn St	Multifamily Housing	5.8 kg/sqft Lowest 16%	2,233 tons Highest 46%
30 W OAK ST 🏆 30 W OAK ST	Multifamily Housing	5.8 kg/sqft Lowest 16%	1,048 tons Lowest 4%
850 Dewitt Place Condominiums 850 N Dewitt Pl	Multifamily Housing	5.8 kg/sqft Lowest 16%	1,514 tons Lowest 30%
One East Delaware 1 E Delaware Pl	Multifamily Housing	5.8 kg/sqft Lowest 16%	2,932 tons Highest 32%
Left Bank at K Station 300 N Canal Street	Multifamily Housing	5.8 kg/sqft Lowest 16%	2,643 tons Highest 36%
3550 N Lake Shore Drive 3550 N Lake Shore Dr	Multifamily Housing	5.8 kg/sqft Lowest 16%	3,937 tons Highest 22%
IL0000FC - Chicago Federal Ctr 🚩 219 S Dearborn	Mixed Use Property	5.8 kg/sqft Lowest 16%	18,413 tons #29 Highest
623 S Wabash Ave 623 S Wabash Ave	College/University	5.7 kg/sqft Lowest 15%	1,172 tons Lowest 13%
Continental Plaza Apartments 1330 1358 W 76th St	Multifamily Housing	5.7 kg/sqft Lowest 15%	1,158 tons Lowest 11%
Xavier Apartments 625 W Division St	Multifamily Housing	5.7 kg/sqft Lowest 15%	1,316 tons Lowest 20%
John T. Richardson Library 2350 N Kenmore Ave	College/University	5.7 kg/sqft Lowest 15%	1,066 tons Lowest 5%
The Madison at Racine/1200 Madison Racine LLC 1164 W Madison	Multifamily Housing	5.7 kg/sqft Lowest 15%	1,435 tons Lowest 26%
GRAND ORLEANS CONDOMINIUM ASSOCIATION 330 W Grand Ave	Multifamily Housing	5.7 kg/sqft Lowest 15%	1,192 tons Lowest 14%
100 W Chestnut 100 W Chestnut St	Multifamily Housing	5.7 kg/sqft Lowest 15%	1,667 tons Lowest 36%
3410 3412 N LAKE SHORE DR 3410 3412 N LAKE SHORE DR	Multifamily Housing	5.7 kg/sqft Lowest 15%	1,092 tons Lowest 6%

Data Source: Chicago Energy Benchmarking Data