PITTSBURGH – PPG announced that the Tower at PNC Plaza in Pittsburgh, which features an innovative double-skin façade fabricated with SUNGATE^® 400 glass, STARPHIRE ULTRA-CLEAR™ glass and CORAFLON^® SUNSTORM^® powder coatings by PPG, has earned ARCHITECT magazine’s 2016 R+D Award for High-Performance Building.

The double-skin façade, one of the first of its kind in North America, combines with two vertical thermal shafts and a solar chimney to naturally ventilate the 33-story skyscraper without electricity or fan power for more than 40% of the year. As a result, the Tower at PNC Plaza, which opened Oct. 1, 2015, is expected to consume up to 50% less temperature-control-related energy than comparable buildings of its size.

The inner and outer curtain walls incorporate metal framing finished with Coraflon Sunstorm fluoropolymer powder coating in Mica Gray and Sungate 400 and STARPHIRE^® glasses. 

Coraflon Sunstorm powder coatings meet or exceed American Architectural Manufacturers Association 2605 specifications, the industry’s most rigorous standard for weathering, corrosion and chemical resistance, color and gloss retention, and other criteria. They are formulated without solvents and emit virtually no VOCs.