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.) |
---|---|---|---|
The Tides at Lakeshore East
360 E South Water St
| Multifamily Housing | 7.8 kg/sqft
Highest 49%
| 3,775 tons
Highest 23%
|
Chicago Swissotel
323 E Wacker Dr
| Hotel | 7.8 kg/sqft
Highest 49%
| 5,533 tons
Highest 13%
|
222 South Riverside Plaza
222 S Riverside Plz
| Office | 7.8 kg/sqft
Highest 49%
| 9,696 tons
Highest 7%
|
One Superior Place
1 W Superior St
| Multifamily Housing | 7.8 kg/sqft
Highest 49%
| 5,135 tons
Highest 15%
|
Harper Square Cooperative
4800 - 4850 S Lake Park Ave
| Multifamily Housing | 7.8 kg/sqft
Highest 49%
| 4,872 tons
Highest 16%
|
Commonwealth Plaza Condominium Association
330 W Diversey Pkwy
| Multifamily Housing | 7.8 kg/sqft
Highest 49%
| 3,932 tons
Highest 22%
|
33 West Monroe
33 W Monroe St
| Office | 7.7 kg/sqft
Lowest 50%
| 8,344 tons
Highest 8%
|
One Magnificent Mile
980 N Michigan Ave
| Mixed Use Property | 7.7 kg/sqft
Lowest 50%
| 7,871 tons
Highest 8%
|
Max Palevsky Residential Commons/Bartlett Commons
1101 E 56th St
| Residence Hall/Dormitory | 7.7 kg/sqft
Lowest 50%
| 2,297 tons
Highest 43%
|
Saieh Hall for Economics
🏆
(UChicago)
5757 S University Ave
| College/University | 7.7 kg/sqft
Lowest 50%
| 1,172 tons
Lowest 13%
|
Michigan Plaza
🚩
205 N Michigan Ave
| Office | 7.7 kg/sqft
Lowest 50%
| 15,937 tons #36 Highest
|
GX Master Tenant
2545 W Diversey Ave
| Office | 7.7 kg/sqft
Lowest 50%
| 1,744 tons
Lowest 40%
|
5200 5208 S BLACKSTONE AVE
5200 5208 S BLACKSTONE AVE
| Multifamily Housing | 7.7 kg/sqft
Lowest 50%
| 1,146 tons
Lowest 10%
|
Armstrong Intl Studies Elementary -CPS
2110 W Greenleaf Ave
| K-12 School | 7.7 kg/sqft
Lowest 50%
| 1,130 tons
Lowest 9%
|
6250 6258 S PARK SHORE EAST CT
6250 6258 S PARK SHORE EAST CT
| Multifamily Housing | 7.7 kg/sqft
Lowest 50%
| 1,160 tons
Lowest 12%
|
Data Source: Chicago Energy Benchmarking Data