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.)
Plaza 440 Private Residences 440 N Wabash Ave	Multifamily Housing	7.9 kg/sqft Highest 47%	3,740 tons Highest 23%
Park Place Tower I CA 🚩 655 W Irving Park Rd	Multifamily Housing	7.9 kg/sqft Highest 47%	7,805 tons Highest 9%
Citigroup Center 🚩 500 W Madison St	Office	7.8 kg/sqft Highest 49%	14,397 tons #43 Highest
155 North Wacker 155 N Wacker Dr	Office	7.8 kg/sqft Highest 49%	10,905 tons Highest 5%
303 W Madison 303 W Madison St	Office	7.8 kg/sqft Highest 49%	2,712 tons Highest 35%
018110 - Union Tower, LLC 550 W Van Buren	Office	7.8 kg/sqft Highest 49%	2,585 tons Highest 37%
Gleacher Center 450 N Cityfront Plz	College/University	7.8 kg/sqft Highest 49%	1,672 tons Lowest 36%
One East Scott Condo Association 1 E Scott St	Multifamily Housing	7.8 kg/sqft Highest 49%	1,419 tons Lowest 25%
200 W GRAND AVE 200 W GRAND AVE	Multifamily Housing	7.8 kg/sqft Highest 49%	1,494 tons Lowest 29%
Harlan Comm Academy -CPS 9652 S Michigan Ave	K-12 School	7.8 kg/sqft Highest 49%	1,332 tons Lowest 21%
630 N Franklin Condominium Association 630 N Franklin St	Multifamily Housing	7.8 kg/sqft Highest 49%	1,751 tons Lowest 41%
Paramount Lofts Condominium Association 1645 W Ogden	Multifamily Housing	7.8 kg/sqft Highest 49%	2,131 tons Highest 47%
209 East Lake Shore Drive 209 E LAKE SHORE DR	Multifamily Housing	7.8 kg/sqft Highest 49%	2,015 tons Lowest 49%
(IL610) - 2400 Lakeview Condo 2400 N Lakeview Ave	Multifamily Housing	7.8 kg/sqft Highest 49%	2,289 tons Highest 43%
1720 South Michigan Condominium Association 1720 S Michigan Ave	Multifamily Housing	7.8 kg/sqft Highest 49%	4,110 tons Highest 20%

Data Source: Chicago Energy Benchmarking Data