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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.)
Center Home For Hispanic Elderly
1401 N California Ave
Senior Living Community
8.7 kg/sqft
Highest 20%
654 tons
Lowest 37%
Phillip Murray Elementary Academy -CPS
(CPS)
5335 S Kenwood Ave
K-12 School
8.7 kg/sqft
Highest 20%
646 tons
Lowest 37%
Coles Model For Excellence -CPS
🕰️
(CPS)
8441 S Yates Blvd
K-12 School
8.7 kg/sqft
823 tons
Yards Burlington
🕰️
4510 S Damen Ave
Retail Store
8.7 kg/sqft
652 tons
The Versailles
🕰️
5254 S DORCHESTER AVE
Multifamily Housing
8.7 kg/sqft
556 tons
Arthur J. Schmitt Academic Center
(DePaul)
2320 N Kenmore Ave
College/University
8.7 kg/sqft
Highest 20%
1,433 tons
Highest 33%
Target, Chicago West Loop (2781)
1101 W Jackson Blvd
Retail Store
8.7 kg/sqft
Highest 20%
1,468 tons
Highest 32%
2301-2305 S Michigan
🕰️
2301-2305 South Michigan Avenue
Multifamily Housing
8.7 kg/sqft
590 tons
Village Market
333 E Benton PL
Enclosed Mall
8.7 kg/sqft
Highest 20%
915 tons
Highest 49%
Home Depot, #1974 Cicero & Armitage
1919 N Cicero Ave
Retail Store
8.7 kg/sqft
Highest 20%
1,029 tons
Highest 44%
640 644 N WABASH AVE
640 644 N WABASH AVE
Hotel
8.7 kg/sqft
Highest 20%
547 tons
Lowest 30%
Red Roof Inn
162 164 E ONTARIO ST
Hotel
8.7 kg/sqft
Highest 20%
670 tons
Lowest 38%
Water Tower Place
🚨
845 N Michigan Ave
Mixed Use Property
8.7 kg/sqft
Highest 20%
22,501 tons
#10 Highest
Metropolitan Pier and Exposition Authority
🚨 📷
301 E Cermak Rd
Convention Center
8.7 kg/sqft
Highest 20%
80,845 tons
#3 Highest
4532 - 42 S. Drexel
🕰️
4532 - 42 S. Drexel Blvd.
Multifamily Housing
8.7 kg/sqft
545 tons
Page 53 of 226 (Building #781 to #795)

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