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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.)
The Westin Michigan Avenue
909 N Michigan Ave
Hotel
10.4 kg/sqft
Highest 12%
5,690 tons
Highest 6%
The Thompson Building
350 N Clark St
Office
10.4 kg/sqft
Highest 12%
1,153 tons
Highest 40%
216 E ONTARIO ST
216 E ONTARIO ST
Hotel
10.4 kg/sqft
Highest 12%
929 tons
Highest 48%
Nordstrom #220 Michigan Avenue
🕰️
55 E Grand Ave
Retail Store
10.4 kg/sqft
3,635 tons
Addison Mall
2901 W ADDISON ST
Strip Mall
10.4 kg/sqft
Highest 12%
717 tons
Lowest 41%
Clemente Community Academy HS -CPS
🕰️
(CPS)
1147 N Western Ave
K-12 School
10.4 kg/sqft
3,679 tons
McClurg Court Center
🚩
333 E Ontario St
Multifamily Housing
10.3 kg/sqft
Highest 12%
8,462 tons
Highest 3%
The Renaissance at Southshore / Symphony South Shore LLC
2425 E 71st St
Senior Living Community
10.3 kg/sqft
Highest 12%
833 tons
Lowest 48%
Legacy Charter School
🕰️
3300 W OGDEN AVE
K-12 School
10.3 kg/sqft
650 tons
Hurley, Edward N -CPS
(CPS)
3849 W 69th Pl
K-12 School
10.3 kg/sqft
Highest 12%
570 tons
Lowest 32%
Reid Murdoch Center
315 - 331 N LaSalle St
Office
10.3 kg/sqft
Highest 12%
3,450 tons
Highest 11%
Fannie Emanuel
(CHA)
3916 W Washington
Multifamily Housing
10.3 kg/sqft
Highest 12%
980 tons
Highest 46%
Englewood Health Center
(Chicago)
641 W 63rd St
Outpatient Rehabilitation/Physical Therapy
10.3 kg/sqft
Highest 12%
556 tons
Lowest 31%
Orr Academy HS -CPS
(CPS)
730 N Pulaski Rd
K-12 School
10.3 kg/sqft
Highest 12%
3,137 tons
Highest 13%
Chicago HS for Agricultural - CPS
(CPS)
3807 W 111th St
K-12 School
10.3 kg/sqft
Highest 12%
1,977 tons
Highest 23%
Page 34 of 226 (Building #496 to #510)

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