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Electrify Chicago

An independent tool for viewing City of Chicago building data

According to the 2022 Chicago Climate Action Plan(opens in a new tab), 69% of Chicago's emissions come from buildings, making building emissions our biggest challenge and our biggest opportunity as a city to tackle climate change. At Electrify Chicago, we showcase building performance using publicly available data supplemented by community-submitted photographs and building owners.

Start by looking at Chicago's buildings with the highest greenhouse gas intensity i.e. emissions per square foot. Large, efficient, buildings can perform much better than very inefficient small buildings on this metric.

New Article
📰 $30 Million In Missed Fines

The City Of Chicago failed to collect $30 million in potential fines from the building benchmarking ordinance, reducing transparency and accountability.

Read Our Full Blog Post On Millions in Missed Fines.

Legislative update! 🎉

As of late January 2024, legislation is being introduced to require new 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 buildings that end up on this site.

If you're in Chicago, write to your alderman to support the CABO! (opens in a new tab)

Chicago Buildings by Greenhouse Gas Intensity

Note: Data includes large Chicago buildings with data from 2022, unless explicitly stated otherwise.

Note: This data only includes buildings whose emissions are reported under the Chicago Energy Benchmarking Ordinance(opens in a new tab). 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.

The latest year of data is from 2022, but we update the site regularly when new data is available, and some buildings may have failed to report that year, and only have older data available.

Property Name / address Primary Property Type Greenhouse Gas Intensity
(kg CO2 eq./sqft)
Total Greenhouse Emissions
(metric tons CO2 eq.)
311 City Services
2111 W Lexington St
Office
15.4 kg/sqft
Highest 5%
909 tons
Highest 49%
Astoria Place Living and Rehab
🕰️
6300 N CALIFORNIA AVE
Senior Living Community
15.4 kg/sqft
796 tons
2340 N California Ave
🕰️
2340 N California Ave
Multifamily Housing
15.3 kg/sqft
1,468 tons
3630 N Clark St
3630 N Clark St
Hotel
15.3 kg/sqft
Highest 5%
2,833 tons
Highest 15%
South Shore Cultural Center
🕰️
7059 South South Shore Drive
Other - Recreation
15.3 kg/sqft
2,076 tons
3445 S RHODES AVE
3445 S RHODES AVE
Multifamily Housing
15.3 kg/sqft
Highest 5%
1,650 tons
Highest 28%
Lutheran School of Theology at Chicago
1100 E 55TH ST
College/University
15.3 kg/sqft
Highest 5%
1,836 tons
Highest 25%
61480 - Galewood 14
5530 W Homer St
Movie Theater
15.3 kg/sqft
Highest 5%
889 tons
Lowest 50%
Midtown Athletic Club
2020 W Fullerton Ave
Fitness Center/Health Club/Gym
15.3 kg/sqft
Highest 5%
3,190 tons
Highest 12%
California Park / McFetridge
🕰️
3843 N California Ave
Other - Recreation
15.1 kg/sqft
1,630 tons
Sun Plaza
4851 - 4887 N Broadway Ave
Strip Mall
15.1 kg/sqft
Highest 5%
924 tons
Highest 48%
California Gardens Rehabilitation Center
2829 S CALIFORNIA BLVD
Senior Living Community
15.1 kg/sqft
Highest 5%
1,096 tons
Highest 42%
310 E Superior Street
(Northwestern)
310 E Superior Street
College/University
15.0 kg/sqft
Highest 5%
918 tons
Highest 48%
Shirley Ryan AbilityLab
🚩
355 E ERIE ST
Outpatient Rehabilitation/Physical Therapy
15.0 kg/sqft
Highest 5%
13,211 tons
#38 Highest
Kennedy-King College
🕰️
6301 S Halsted Ave
College/University
15.0 kg/sqft
7,464 tons
Page 15 of 226 (Building #211 to #225)

Data Source: Chicago Energy Benchmarking Data (opens in a new tab)