This year, the second tallest building in the world will be completed in Shanghai

Dubai - For many years in the 20th century, the tallest building in the world was the Eiffel Tower in Paris (300 meters), followed by the Empire State Building in New York (381 meters) beginning in 1931. The New York World Trade Center (417 m) took the lead in 1972, and two years later, the Willis Tower in Chicago (formerly Sears Tower; 442 m), then the Petronas Towers in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia (452 m) in 1998, and Taipei 101 (509 m) in 2004. Five years ago, the tallest building and structure in the world was opened, the Burj Khalifa skyscraper in Dubai (828 m).
The Shanghai Tower (632 m) is rising in Pudong, close to the Jin Mao Tower (420 m) and the Shanghai World Financial Center (492 m). Construction began in November 2008 and is expected to be completed this year. Its 121 floors will offer a usable area of 380,000 square meters. Due to its aerodynamic shape, 25% of the steel will be saved during construction. A wind turbine at the top of the tower will generate nearly 1 MWh of electricity daily. The double-skinned façade combined with geothermal energy sources is expected to significantly reduce heating and cooling costs for the building. The skyscraper was designed by the American architectural firm Gensler.
In 2016, the height of the Shanghai Tower is expected to be surpassed by the Ping An Finance Centre (660 m) in Shenzhen, China.

The ten tallest buildings currently:
 

	name	city/country	height (m)	number of floors	year opened
1.	Burj Khalifa	Dubai/UAE	828	163	2010
2.	Shanghai Tower	Shanghai/China	632	121	2015 ¹
3.	Abraj Al Bait	Mecca/Saudi Arabia	601	120	2012
4.	One World Trade Center	New York/USA	541	104	2014
5.	CTF Finance Centre	Guangzhou/China	530	111	2016 ²
6.	Taipei 101	Taipei/Taiwan	509	101	2004
7.	Shanghai World Financial Center	Shanghai/China	492	101	2008
8.	International Commerce Centre	Hong Kong/China	484	118	2010
9.	Petronas Towers	Kuala Lumpur/Malaysia	452	88	1998
10.	Nanjing Greenland Financial Complex	Nanjing/China	450	89	2010

Notes:
1) The tower was completed in August 2013, and will be fully completed and officially opened in 2015.
2) The skyscraper was completed in July 2014, and is expected to be fully completed and opened in 2016.