St. Petersburg's construction and architecture committee permitted the state-controlled Gazprom gas giant to build a skyscraper on the Gulf of Finland, the company's public and business center said on Friday. Gazprom owns a plot of land in the area and plans to build a 470-meter tall office and an entire business center, Lakhta Center, nine kilometers to the north of the city center. In mid July, a lower commission for land and construction recommended that the project be allowed. The official limit for buildings in the area is 27 meters tall but the architecture committee said the limit would be extended to 500 meters for the Gazprom project. The new Lakhta Center project will be built on an area of 140 thousand square meters by 2018, and is designed to be a self-sufficient mini-town outside the St. Petersburg residential area. The offices of the Gazprom Neft company, the oil arm of Gazprom, and other Gazprom subsidiaries will be at the center of the project. Earlier, Gazprom wanted to build Okhta Center with a 400-meter tall skyscraper on the Okhtinskaya Cape in central St. Petersburg. The decision caused protests from community and the company withdrew the project late last year and sold the plot of land.

As reported by constructionweekonline.com, Taiwan's Taipei 101 has become the tallest building in the world to receive LEED Platinum status, the top level in the green building rating system. Previously the world's tallest building at 509 meters, Taipei 101 is now the second tallest building in the world after the 828-meter Burj Khalifa. The tower was retrofitted with green technology and processes to achieve LEED EBOM, the accreditation for existing buildings. The retrofit was carried out through a partnership between electronics giant Siemens, interior designers Steven Leach Associates and Eco Tech International. According to another source focustaiwan.tw, Taipei 101's certification has set three records: The tallest green building (509 meters), the largest green building (about 150 thousand square meters), and the highest-use green building (90 tenants). The building has achieved annual savings of 14.4 million kilowatt-hours of electricity- equivalent to US$ 1.24 million, or an 18 percent energy-saving, over three years. The design specification for the CO2 (carbon dioxide) level in Taipei 101 is 600 parts per million, tenants of Taipei 101 are able to enjoy fresher air in the building because of the lower CO2 level. Recall that the Taipei Financial Center Corporation announced plans on 2009 November to make Taipei 101 "the world's tallest green building" by summer 2011 as measured by LEED standards ( Leadership in Energy & Environmental Design - an internationally recognized green building certification system, providing third-party verification that a building or community was designed and built using strategies intended to improve performance in metrics such as energy savings, water efficiency, CO2 emissions reduction, improved indoor environmental quality, and stewardship of resources and sensitivity to their impacts).

Saudi billionaire Prince Alwaleed bin Talal has given the go ahead for the construction of the world's tallest tower in the Red Sea port city of Jeddah by signing a US$ 1.2 billion contract with Bin Laden Group on August 2. As reported by ctbuh.org, at over thousand meters and a total construction area of 530 thousand square meters, Kingdom Tower will be the centerpiece and first construction phase of the Kingdom City development on a 5.3 million square meter site in north Jeddah. The tower's height will be at least 172 meters taller than the world's current tallest building, Dubai's 828 meter-tall Burj Khalifa, which was designed by Adrian Smith. Kingdom Tower will feature a Four Seasons hotel, Four Seasons serviced apartments, Class A office space, luxury condominiums and the world's highest observatory. Design development of the tower is under way, with construction to begin imminently. Foundation drawings are complete and the piling for the tower is currently being tendered. Kingdom Tower will cost approximately US$ 1.2 billion to construct, while the cost of the entire Kingdom City project is anticipated to be US$ 20 billion. AS+GG is leading an interdisciplinary design team. The great height of Kingdom Tower necessitates one of the world's most sophisticated elevator systems. The Kingdom Tower complex will contain 59 elevators, including 54 single-deck and five double-deck elevators, along with 12 escalators. Elevators serving the observatory will travel at a rate of 10 meters per second in both directions. Another unique feature of the design is a sky terrace, roughly 30 meters in diameter, at level 157. It is an outdoor amenity space intended for use by the penthouse floor. AS+GG also designed the master plan for the 230 thousand square meters Kingdom Tower Waterfront District, which surrounds the tower and which will include residential and commercial buildings, a shopping mall, high-quality outdoor spaces and other amenities. The Waterfront District provides a cohesive and pedestrian-friendly setting for Kingdom Tower while creating a pleasant neighborhood experience along the Kingdom City lakefront.

Barcelona, one of the most beautiful cities in the world where lived and worked a great Catalonian architect Gaudi, won another prize for building's architecture. Prestigious architectural award Emporis Skyscraper Award 2010 won the Hotel Porta Fira in Barcelona. The building is a creative concept of two architecture companies, the Japanese Toyo Ito & Associates and b720 Fermin Vazquez Arquitectos, conceptualised the surreal structure. The second award went to the highest building in the world Burj Khalifa in Dubai and the third presented to the Tower Tour CMA CGM in the south of France, in Marseille. The jury, which includes experts from around the world, valued the building's aesthetics and integration into its urban environment over humankind's fascination with building the tallest structure. The winner was chosen from over 300 competing skyscrapers around the world. A committee annually presents this award to an exceptional building at least 100 meters tall completed within the award year. Five star Porta Fira Hotel contorts to a height of 113 meters, with 26 floors, on the outskirts of Barcelona in L'Hospitalet de Llobregat. The facade of red aluminium tubes form continuous lines enclosing the complex geometry of the building, which twists and increases in size as it rises. By results of another 2010 award conducted by the CTBUH (Council on Tall Buildings and Urban Habitat) the first prize for 2010 best skyscraper was awarded to Broadcasting Place, Leeds, or as it is called "Rusty High rise", and the Dubai's giant Burj Khalifa won another prize from the CTBUH-2010 Global Icon Award.

The PNC (Financial Service Corporation) Financial Group announced this week, that it plans to construct the world's greenest skyscraper. The Tower at PNC Plaza will be located In Pittsburgh, where PNC has been headquartered for more than 150 years. Once completed in 2015, the approximately 40 storey building will serve as PNC's executive Offices. At approximately 75 thousand square meters, the Tower at PNC Plaza would be PNC's largest building in Pittsburgh. Tentative plans call for approximately 300 underground parking spaces, street level retail and green rooftops. Erecting the planned $400 million Tower should create 2,500 construction jobs. Deconstruction of buildings on the site is expected to begin late in 2011, with construction scheduled to begin in the spring of 2012. PNC anticipates completion of the Tower at PNC Plaza in the summer of 2015. The project is being designed by the Pittsburgh office of Gensler, the world's largest architectural and design firm. Pittsburgh-based PJ Dick will serve as construction manager and U.K.-based Buro Happold will be the engineering firm. Paladino & Company of Seattle serves as the green building consultant. The Tower at PNC Plaza will feature a double glass facade to enhance energy efficiency by reducing cooling costs and allowing natural airflow to the building. Using advanced sensors and metering, a state-of-the-art, high efficiency heating and cooling system will deliver conditioned air to specific zones of the building, as needed. The building will be oriented to take advantage of sunlight in workspaces, reducing the need for artificial light during the day. The design team is also currently exploring fuel cells, solar panels, geothermal systems and other alternative power generation sources that will significantly reduce carbon emissions. The building's green rooftops will collect rainwater and channel it for use in other parts of the structure, as well as reduce the heat gain associated with traditional rooftops. PNC, the sixth largest bank by deposits in the United States, opened its first green building in 2000. At that time, the 60 thousand square meters PNC Firstside Center was the largest LEED-certified building in the world. In 2010, PNC opened Three PNC Plaza, one of the largest LEED-certified mixed use buildings in the United States. PNC, which has more newly constructed buildings LEED-certified by the USGBC than any company on Earth, recently completed its latest green office building in Washington, D.C. LEED Platinum certified PNC Place at 800 17th Street sits just blocks from the White House and serves as PNC's regional headquarters in the capital.