In St. Petersburg, the center tower of Lakhta is like a crystal needle, towering into the sky. The city's first “super-high” building on the shores of the Gulf of Finland will be a modern business centre and a great venue for people to live and work sustainably. The German-based WILO Pump Company is responsible for many applications in this extremely modern high-rise building – a total of more than 530 WILO pumps have created the “green image” of the Lakhta Center.

Since the end of the 19th century, skyscrapers have become the embodiment of power, a monument symbolizing wealth and new technology. The parallel parallax formed by them has enabled people to automatically reposition themselves in the city. These buildings have also been recognized as a place. value.

Super-high buildings have long been known for using the latest and most advanced construction techniques. The centre of Lakhta is 462 meters high and is the tallest building in Europe and the 13th tallest building in the world. The building broke ground in 2012 and took six years to complete the external construction of the building. The "world's northernmost skyscraper" will also serve as the headquarters of Gazprom, the Russian gas giant, and the company is also the builder of the building.

The unique contour of the main tower exhibits a flame appearance by capturing changes in daylight, echoing the distinctive features of the Gazprom logo. The Lakhta Centre has a total gross floor area of over 400,000 square meters and consists of four different building facilities. The skyscraper is rotated 90 degrees from the foundation to the top. In addition, the complex also contains a multi-purpose building. The separate arch is both the entrance to the building and the architectural pillar that hides the parking lot, warehouse and logistics.

Energy-efficient secrets in the "Star of St. Petersburg"

The WILO pump operates in a number of applications and its energy efficient solutions cover heating, ventilation, air conditioning and water supply systems.

In HVAC systems, WILO's pumps are installed in multiple equipment rooms on different floors of the tower. According to Nikolay Samoylov, a Wiro Russian employee, “One of the main requirements of the project is that all pumps should be equipped with internal or external frequency converters and operate efficiently. For this reason, we offer electronically controlled pipeline pumps and high-pressure centrifugal pumps. Solutions for high-performance products such as Wilo-CronoLine-IL-E, Wilo-Helix and Wilo-Stratos-D."

Wilo-CronoLine-IL-E is an electronically controlled single stage pipeline pump for pumping hot, cold and water-glycol mixed solutions in heating, cold water and cooling systems; multistage centrifugal pump Wilo -Helix can be used in water supply and pressurization and cooling circulation systems; to ensure reliable operation of HVAC systems, the Lakhta Center also uses Wilo-Stratos-D, a shielded circulation pump that optimizes system efficiency through volumetric flow controllers. In turn, the pump energy saving effect is enhanced.

The cooling center is located on four different floors. In order to make the cooling system run as efficiently as possible, the building uses a regenerative cooling system. By pre-freezing the thermal energy storage medium to achieve the purpose of transferring the cooling load, the system can be operated more efficiently and a more favorable energy consumption mode can be formed. In this way, energy is accumulated when the load is low, and the accumulated energy is used when the demand increases again.

A horizontal booster pump (a deep well pump with a horizontal cooling hood) is used in the water supply system to reach the lowest water level in the reservoir. Viktor Russian employee Nikolay Samoylov explained, “The center of Lakhta is a giant building, so there is a water supply system on different floors. By using a vertical high-pressure pump instead of a horizontal pump, the available water can be increased. In addition, the deep well pump also has The lowest noise."

High-tech flagship ace

The building's smart exterior is made up of 16,500 individual glass panes with automatic blinds and valve systems to reduce heat loss. Since the main tower of the center of Lakhta has double façades, the energy consumption of heating and air conditioning systems can be reduced to 50%.

Sustainability is a critical issue, and innovative technologies such as energy regenerators, vacuum collection systems, and water reuse and purification systems are reflected in this 87-story building. In addition, the conventional heating device is replaced with an infrared heat sink, and this technology is applied to other technologies and household equipment, thereby further realizing energy saving. In addition, the tower's buffer zone is equipped with sensors that automatically maintain the temperature of the room based on the number of people in each room.

In December 2018, the building was awarded the LEED Green Building Platinum Certification, and a series of energy-efficient solutions from WILO made a great contribution to the “green image” of the Lakhta Center. This time, the successful completion of the Lakhta Center is another representative super high-rise building in Europe created by WILO following the Russian Federation Building (374 meters), which has made outstanding contributions to the sustainable development of the city.