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.
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.
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.
Property Name / address | Primary Property Type |
Greenhouse Gas Intensity (kg CO2 eq./sqft) |
Total Greenhouse Emissions (metric tons CO2 eq.) |
---|---|---|---|
Aqua
🚩
📷
225 N Columbus Dr
| Multifamily Housing | 10.0 kg/sqft
Highest 29%
| 12,896 tons
Highest 4%
|
2500 N Lakeview Ave
2500 N Lakeview Ave
| Multifamily Housing | 9.9 kg/sqft
Highest 29%
| 2,064 tons
Lowest 50%
|
Home Depot, #1961 Elston/Leavitt
2542 Elston Ave
| Retail Store | 9.9 kg/sqft
Highest 29%
| 1,184 tons
Lowest 14%
|
4180 N MARINE DR
4180 N MARINE DR
| Multifamily Housing | 9.9 kg/sqft
Highest 29%
| 1,078 tons
Lowest 6%
|
Alice B. Sharp Building
37 S Wabash Ave
| College/University | 9.9 kg/sqft
Highest 29%
| 2,257 tons
Highest 45%
|
The Field Museum
🚩
1400 S Lake Shore Dr
| Mixed Use Property | 9.9 kg/sqft
Highest 29%
| 12,647 tons
Highest 4%
|
3110 Sheridan Condominiums
🏆
3110 N Sheridan Rd
| Multifamily Housing | 9.8 kg/sqft
Highest 30%
| 1,175 tons
Lowest 13%
|
Goldblatts Building
1609 W Chicago Ave
| Office | 9.8 kg/sqft
Highest 30%
| 1,570 tons
Lowest 33%
|
Fox Ford Lincoln Chicago
2501 N ELSTON AVE
| Automobile Dealership | 9.8 kg/sqft
Highest 30%
| 1,429 tons
Lowest 26%
|
Douglass, Frederick Academy HS -CPS
543 N Waller Ave
| K-12 School | 9.8 kg/sqft
Highest 30%
| 1,320 tons
Lowest 20%
|
Disney Magnet -CPS
4140 N Marine Dr
| K-12 School | 9.8 kg/sqft
Highest 30%
| 2,543 tons
Highest 38%
|
IL0032ZZ - Chicago Customhouse
610 S Canal St
| Office | 9.8 kg/sqft
Highest 30%
| 2,750 tons
Highest 34%
|
2111 W Roosevelt Rd
2111 W Roosevelt Rd
| Office | 9.8 kg/sqft
Highest 30%
| 4,488 tons
Highest 19%
|
Michigan Beach/Sandalwood
7251 S SOUTH SHORE DR
| Multifamily Housing | 9.8 kg/sqft
Highest 30%
| 1,732 tons
Lowest 39%
|
1000 Condominium Association
1000 N Lake Shore Plz
| Multifamily Housing | 9.8 kg/sqft
Highest 30%
| 3,929 tons
Highest 22%
|
Data Source: Chicago Energy Benchmarking Data