At 480 meters tall, North Bund (Lot 91) will be the world’s tallest, and Shanghai’s first, all-electric supertall, creating a new framework for sustainable towers by prioritizing carbon footprint reduction and serving as a model for the city’s responsible growth.

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The New Vertical City

In recent years, the attitude toward supertall buildings has shifted globally, and especially in China. Avoiding the promotion of height for height’s sake, KPF believes in good urbanism, both horizontal and vertical. In China, our nearly 500-meter-tall design for North Bund (Lot 91) is functionally a vertical city, with different uses occupying their ideal height and floorplate. Public civic spaces are drawn from the surrounding park up through the tower and into the crown.

A Public Space in the Sky

A Culmination in the Crown

Located near the confluence of two bodies of water, the Huangpu River and Suzhou Creek, and at the nexus of three neighborhoods, LuJiaShui, PuXi, and North Bund, the project reflects themes of intersection and balance throughout its design. Responding to the curves of the rivers and reflecting the surrounding cityscape, the tower culminates in a triple-arched, publicly accessibly, cathedral-like crown.

Soaring vertical recesses emphasize the tower’s connection from ground to sky, ensuring the supertall remains visually approachable and reminding all that the tower’s highest point is truly publicly accessible.

Column-free, Ultra-flexible Civic Space

The structure is configured through a series of arches to allow for a generous, column-free interior, maximizing flexibility.

Optimizing Thermal Comfort and Views

Integrated fins shade the tower’s high-performance façade and minimize peak heating and cooling loads, utilizing air source heat pumps that are three times more energy efficient than electric boilers. Catching the sun at an oblique angle, the façade also minimizes solar heat gain, while integrated photovoltaic solar panels will capture energy to supplement the building’s needs.

Next Generation Sustainability

To support China’s vision of becoming fully carbon neutral by 2060, the tower is fully electrified, burning no fossil fuels on site. North Bund (Lot 91) creates significant environmental and social impact in the urban realm. Advanced mechanical, façade, and structural solutions will work together with energy-efficient technologies to reduce operational carbon by 40–50% and embodied carbon by 20–30% compared to a typical supertall.

With fully electric MEP systems, the building implements heating recovery districts across mixed-use programs. All heating and hot water from the hospitality floors will be generated by heat recovery from commercial floors. The tower also cuts carbon in materials, using 25% less material than similar supertall buildings and includes low-carbon replacements for steel and cement.

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