7 hot smart city projects and 8 top smart cities in the world

Smart cities are increasingly coming into people's field of vision. With the popularization and development of Internet of Things technology, more smart cities will appear in the future, bringing convenience to people's life and work.

At present, smart cities have a very strong positive image on a global scale. Therefore, governments of various countries are sparing no effort in promoting the construction of smart cities. With the improvement of living standards, people are more and more concerned about the convenience of life and the earth's ecology, and their willingness to smart cities is also getting stronger and stronger. Even in third world countries that lack support and resources, people still Willing to make some positive contributions to changing the living environment and protecting the earth.

Smart City Overview

The future has come, and smart cities are no longer a future scene in our minds, but actually appear in reality and affect our lives.

According to McKinsey's research, it is estimated that by 2020, the scale of the smart city industry will reach 400 billion US dollars, and 600 smart cities will appear in the world by then. These smart cities are expected to account for 60% of global GDP by 2025. By 2050, 86% of the population in developed countries and about 64% in developing countries will live in smart cities.

Today, cities around the world are collaborating with big data experts, designers, and innovation leaders to make urban life better. Whether it's optimizing traffic light times or other smart projects, things will only get more powerful as smartphone penetration continues to increase. Big data and Internet of Things technologies have improved the efficiency and sustainability of public transportation, effectively meeting the travel needs of urban residents. In addition, public safety and public services are also key areas of smart cities. Smart cities allow government departments to operate more efficiently. While improving operational efficiency, they can save a lot of human, material and financial costs.

In addition to government departments, social forces are also actively participating in the construction of smart cities. Tech giants like Cisco and IBM are now partnering with universities and city planning departments to develop data-driven systems in transportation, waste management, law enforcement and energy to improve the lives of residents. Schneider, Siemens, Microsoft, Hitachi, Huawei, Ericsson, Toshiba, Oracle and many other big companies are contributing to the construction of smart cities. Alibaba Group established three subsidiaries in Xiong'an New Area in October 2017. Ali and the government of Xiong'an New Area will cooperate to use artificial intelligence to assist urban planning decision-making and operation.

Ali will also promote the construction of a new smart city in Xiong'an New Area, and help Xiong'an New Area to innovate in social governance in the fields of medical care, transportation, energy, and environmental protection. In the future, Xiong'an New District will realize smart meter reading, sensorless parking, dual offline ride payment, medical service first-serve and pay later, etc., making full use of digital technology to make the lives of residents in the new district smarter.

Seven Hot Smart City Projects

The construction of smart cities is blooming all over the world, and various smart city projects are promoting the development of this industry. The following are some projects that are currently widely used in smart cities around the world. They have changed people's lives and made the world a better place.

1 Waste Management

Waste management is now a priority in every city's management efforts. Bigbelly is a smart waste recycling system that is currently used in more than 50 countries around the world. Bigbelly offers a compact trash can that is powered by solar energy, and through advanced compression, the capacity of the trash can can be up to 5 times that of traditional trash cans. Although this function seems simple and not as eye-catching as other projects, it actually solves the pain points of urban waste disposal. This method can reduce the number of garbage bins set up in a city by 70%-80%, which will make the streets more tidy. When the trash can is full, it will take the initiative to remind the sanitation department to empty it in time to ensure that the vehicles that transfer garbage empty the "full" trash can instead of two half-full trash cans, so it can reduce the waste transfer costs and ease traffic congestion.

Another company that is also engaged in waste management, Zerocycle, does something interesting. It collects and analyzes waste collection data to derive the recycling rate for each neighborhood in the city. The company sends the information extracted from the “garbage” in the form of a report to each household in the service area. It's also a great move to inspire others to pay more attention to waste recycling.

2 Public Safety

In countries and regions without gun control, guns are undoubtedly one of the most dangerous factors in urban life. People don't necessarily call the police when they hear a gunshot-like sound because they're not sure if it's a gunshot or something else. ShotSpotter is a company dedicated to reducing crime in cities. The company has developed a sound sensor that can detect gunshots, in standalone versions and versions that can be attached to smart street lights. This sound sensor can accurately detect gunshots and automatically report to the public security department, thus avoiding the phenomenon that the above-mentioned residents did not call the police when they heard the gunshots. The sound sensor can also determine how many shots were fired and how many shooters there were, data that can help police deploy police forces reasonably.

3 digital kiosks

Now that we live in a world where almost everything can be controlled from a mobile phone, we don't need to waste time standing in queue to get all kinds of information. We can use mobile phones to find the information we want on various platforms. But today's mobile phones have limited battery life, especially when we are on a business trip, we don't want to waste the limited power on looking for this information, or we don't want to use expensive roaming data, or we don't have much time to study at that time. If there are digital information kiosks at airports, train stations, and bus stops, this problem of "time and power not being available at the same time" can be solved.

The digital kiosk can be networked to provide information about travel, restaurants, shops and local events, and it can also synchronize data with mobile phones to match more accurate information or provide additional services based on the user's information. For example, a map service from a digital kiosk can provide public transit information and provide options for multiple modes of transportation. This also effectively enables passengers to obtain desired information conveniently in a short period of time.

4 Smart Street Lights

There are many benefits of smart LED street lights, one of the main benefits is that it can reduce crime. Because the light will automatically brighten when there are people in the sensing area, and dim when there is no one. Return on investment and energy saving is another important advantage of smart LED street lights. Pay for itself in just a few years and save on street lighting costs every month. In Los Angeles, for example, the city spent $57 million to replace nearly 80 percent of its 215,000 sodium vapor street lights with LED versions, saving the city nearly $9 million in annual utility costs.

Smart LED street lights also have other advantages. For example, the Danish company DOLL has launched a new platform for the development of future LED lighting solutions, which aims to improve energy efficiency and provide smart indoor and outdoor lighting solutions, and create more jobs. DOLL cooperates with scientists to provide technical support for municipalities and enterprises to use advanced lighting solutions.

5 parking sensors

With the rapid increase in the number of motor vehicles, the problem of urban parking has become a "big problem". There are now many companies working on smart parking solutions to solve the parking problem. Mobile applications are currently a popular way to solve the problem of parking difficulties. They can tell you when and where there are parking spaces through the data collected by parking sensors.

European cities were early adopters of the technology. For example, according to Cisco's statistics, in Paris, France, residents spend an average of four years in their lifetime looking for parking spaces. With the widespread use of parking sensors, the difficulty of parking in Paris has dropped dramatically. This technology can really simplify the process of finding a parking space for people by indicating the nearest available parking spaces. It saves time, energy and reduces emissions, while also reducing traffic pressure.

6 air quality sensor

Living in a big city is very convenient, but there are also some side effects, such as air pollution. "The city is smoggy, and I want to go back to the countryside." People living in the city rarely have access to fresh air. TZOA is a wearable environment tracker that uses internal sensors to detect air quality, temperature, humidity, atmospheric pressure, ambient light, and ultraviolet rays around you, all of which can be detected on a wearable device . In other words, TZOA can help you detect your environment and help you stay healthy. It takes data from your environment in real time and turns it into actionable recommendations. With the data provided by TZOA and the app on your smartphone, you can know whether it is appropriate to open the windows at a certain time for ventilation, whether you need to wear sun protection gear when riding a bicycle, etc. These suggestions can help maintain your health and improve your life. quality.

7 Climate Monitoring

EverImpact is a company applying innovative solutions to combat climate change by discovering the sources and data of greenhouse gas emissions in cities. They developed an urban climate monitoring app that measures and visualizes a city's carbon dioxide emissions by combining satellite monitoring data with data from ground-based sensors. Users can get a real-time map of greenhouse gas emissions. This project is really helpful in controlling the environmental situation of the city.

8 Top Smart Cities in the World

In the construction of smart cities and the upgrading and transformation of urban intelligence, many cities have made positive contributions. Today these cities are known for being smarter, making them more livable places to live.

1 Helsinki - Finland

As Finland's capital, Helsinki's population is expected to grow from nearly 630,000 today to almost 2 million by 2050. The Finnish government takes this issue very seriously and has begun to support entrepreneurs in their initiatives to build smart cities. They have set a goal to overhaul their public transport network and drastically reduce the use of private cars by 2025. A company in Helsinki provides a service that uses a smartphone, enters your current location and destination, and the app intelligently arranges your journey, offering you a range of options for different routes, journey times and prices. In addition, they have also merged the services of Uber and public bicycle companies with public transportation such as buses, trams, trains, and subways into a unified network. In this way, citizens of Helsinki will have a fast, easy, one-stop platform for all travel needs.

In addition to the convenience of travel, Helsinki has also launched many other smart city projects, including automatic garbage collection systems, which can reduce the traffic generated by 80%-90% due to the transfer of garbage; smart grid and real-time energy monitoring, which can reduce energy consumption by 15%; Parking space monitoring and forecasting and smart charging piles for electric vehicles. The government is also working with private companies to tackle the problem of food waste, installing sensors in home refrigerators that can use apps to remind residents of food expiration dates and advise residents to use food more properly instead of throwing it away.

Another major goal of Helsinki's smart city is to enhance the innovation capabilities of the entire urban community by promoting cooperation between application developers and other ICT (Information Communication Technology, ICT) ecosystems in the city. Helsinki is very strong in the field of open data innovation and hosts a large number of hackathons every year. At the same time, Helsinki's schools are also known for their forward-looking education system, shifting from traditional education to inquiry-based learning methods. The future development of Helsinki city reserves talents.

2Singapore

Singapore's "smart city" construction is relatively new. Singapore has deployed a certain number of sensors and cameras in different places in the city, which can enable government departments to monitor the cleanliness of public spaces, the gathering of crowds, and the precise movement trajectory of each locally registered vehicle. Singapore is home to 5.6 million people in an area of 446 square miles, making it one of the most densely populated cities in the world. Under the rapid economic growth of the past few decades, more and more vehicles have increased the pressure on urban transportation networks. Today, Singapore invests heavily in road sensors, smart traffic lights, and smart parking lots. The system composed of sensors, smart traffic lights and smart parking lots has a very good effect in using big data technology to improve traffic, so Singapore's performance in ensuring smooth traffic is also commendable.

In addition, the Singapore government also provides residents with behavioral feedback through smart applications and sensors, helping them reduce waste of water, electricity and other resources while reducing household costs. In turn, the government can also use big data technology to analyze these data to improve the planning, design and urban management of public housing.

3 Barcelona - Spain

As the tech hub of Spain, Barcelona has gone a long way in implementing the Internet of Things, with the government utilizing various sensors to help monitor and manage traffic. By this means, Barcelona traffic has reduced its flow by almost 21%. Similar to Singapore, Barcelona has also adopted smart parking technology and smart street lights, in addition, they have installed sensors to monitor air quality and noise. At the same time, they also vigorously improved the coverage and connection speed of the free Wi-Fi network in public areas, so as to improve the operation speed of the entire IoT system. Barcelona, home of the annual Smart City World Expo, is heavily invested in the theme of smart cities, with more than 100 smart city projects ranging from electric vehicles to smart waste management.

Barcelona is a global leader in the widespread application of the Internet of Things, and their technology is also at the world's leading level. The smart LED street lights are only activated when they detect movement, so they can save energy by 30%, and are equipped with sensors to collect data in the environment; the sensors monitor rain and humidity, and use these data to determine whether the park needs watering and how much water is needed. Watering; municipal smart trash cans can monitor the filling level of garbage, and only when the garbage level is "full" will it send a cleaning notice to optimize garbage collection operations; digital bus stops provide bus arrival times, and provide free Wi-Fi and USB charging ports; smart parking system automatically guides vehicles to available parking spaces, reducing congestion and emissions.

In addition to transportation, Barcelona has a lot to learn, they promote the use of electric vehicles and shared bicycles. In addition, citizens of Barcelona can use the Bústia Ciutadana platform to file complaints, report city management problems, such as broken street lights, and make suggestions. This information will be sent to the command center, and dedicated officials will respond in a timely manner.

4 Copenhagen - Denmark

Since the beginning of the 20th century, bicycles have become a symbol of freedom for the Danish people. On the issue of the balance of road rights, the Copenhagen government has always attached great importance to bicycles. They have balanced cars, bicycles, and public transportation through administrative means and scientific and reasonable urban planning. and the right of way for pedestrians, so that everyone has a good peer space. Today, about half of Copenhagen's citizens cycle to work. To achieve such an achievement, it is not only enough for the government to encourage and appeal, but also requires the guarantee of infrastructure and various services. Nowhere is this more evident than in traffic lights. The time of traffic lights in Copenhagen is designed according to the speed of bicycles, not cars, and the 350 kilometers of roadside bicycle lanes specially planned and designed for bicycles fundamentally protect the interests of bicycle riders.

Recognized as the greenest capital in the world, Copenhagen is a hub of clean technology innovation and plans to become carbon neutral by 2025. In addition, Copenhagen has many other initiatives that can improve the quality of life of its citizens. Copenhagen, for example, holds less than 2% of its waste in landfill, nearly half of its waste is recycled, and most of it is used to provide heat for the city's heating network.

5London - UK

London plays an important role in the smart city of the world. At present, London has invested relatively heavily in the field of transportation. Traffic problems are a long-standing problem in major cities around the world. There are always complaints about the crowded subway stations and long queues for the subway. CircleLine, the London subway line, is not only the most crowded line, but also the subway is slow and frequently delayed. From April 2014 to 2015, there were a total of 3,290 delays.

To improve traffic on this line, design firm NBBJ proposed a solution: replace CircleLine's subway with moving walkways.

According to this design, CircleLine's underground passage will be equipped with three moving walkways with different speeds, which are marked yellow, orange, and red respectively. Pedestrians first set foot on the slowest path (4.8 kilometers per hour), and then gradually increase their pace, crossing over to the faster-moving aisle next to it. At the fastest speed, they can move forward at 24 kilometers per hour, which is indeed a very fast speed. .

NBBJ has calculated that with the help of the moving walkway, everyone can travel at least 4.8 kilometers per hour, which is actually faster than taking the subway that stops at every station and is often delayed, and the traffic efficiency of Londoners will also increase. So raise.

6 San Francisco - United States

San Francisco was one of the first cities in North America to adopt smart city technology. The San Francisco government has set a "small goal" to achieve zero waste by 2020. San Francisco's current waste diversion rate is 80%. The government provides an online tool to readily publish policies to reduce waste and increase recycling and composting. For example, a project called RecycleWhere provides the latest and most convenient recycling methods for plastics, batteries, fluorescent lights, household appliances, sofas, etc., while providing a variety of reuse and disposal options. The project uses open source software and an open data model to deliver localized and accurate results. It's a classic case of using technology to help everyone contribute to the city's "zero waste mini-goal" by 2020.

Another issue the San Francisco government is working on is energy management. San Francisco currently has 41% renewable energy supply. In order to achieve the goal of "carbon neutral" in 2030, they developed the "SF Energy Map" project, which can track solar and wind energy installations throughout the city, and all citizens or businesses You can visit this website to see how the solar power installation on your own roof is working.

Cars and trucks in San Francisco account for 40 percent of the city's carbon emissions, so the government is promoting smart commuting, using electric vehicles and biofuels to help meet greenhouse gas reduction goals. To meet the charging needs of electric vehicles, San Francisco is currently tracking the usage and functional status of its charging points, providing real-time status monitoring for chargers and generating long-term reports. Technology tools such as the ChargePoint Network can help city managers analyze EV charger needs and determine where future chargers will be installed. Of course, like other smart cities, smart parking also plays an important role in San Francisco, which has implemented a smart parking lot project so that drivers can easily find parking spaces.

7 Oslo - Norway

Oslo has been rated as one of the top 10 greenest cities in the world, although it does not suffer from congestion, pollution and high energy consumption. But the city's government is still working hard on these issues, trying to make its public transport a name card to be proud of in the world, and its subway, tram and bus system is very efficient and very modern.

Oslo is the capital of electric vehicles in the world. Due to the many incentives introduced by the government, the number of electric vehicles per capita in Oslo ranks first in the world. The city utilizes big data technology to reduce energy consumption and greenhouse gas emissions. The city aims to reduce emissions by 50% by 2020 and become 95% climate neutral by 2030 by revamping its transportation network.

Like other smart cities, Oslo has installed sensors to help citizens with parking problems. An intelligent street lighting network has also been established, reducing energy consumption by nearly 2/3. Oslo's smart city plan is of great reference value to the Nordic countries. Its current focus is on sustainable energy issues. Therefore, the government and some companies are considering banning private fuel vehicles from the road in 2020.

8 Seoul - South Korea

Seoul is one of the largest subway cities in the world. The Seoul government invested heavily in the subway before, so now Seoul's public transportation system and emergency warning system are very advanced. As a developed country, South Korea is known for incorporating cutting-edge technology into every aspect of urban life. In Seoul, OLEV (Online Electric Vehicle Technology) has been successfully developed and deployed. This technology can allow electric buses to be charged while driving on the road. The magnetic field generated by the cables under the road can be converted into Electric energy, charging while walking.

For the disabled and the elderly, medical service institutions in Seoul can provide remote health checkups and medical consultation services through remote medical equipment and smart devices.

When it comes to the construction of a smart city in Seoul, Songdo New City has to be mentioned. For many people who are committed to smart city work, Songdo New Town next to Seoul is synonymous and spokesperson for "smart city". After the 1998 financial crisis, "Songdo New Town" was backed by the South Korean government, which invested in infrastructure including a high-speed rail system linking Seoul and the new Incheon International Airport. Many people doubt whether such a "Millennium Plan" project will be unfinished, but the South Korean government's strong guarantee for this project has dispelled people's various worries. The main construction unit of "Songdo New City" - KPF Architects of the United States called it "the only project in a lifetime".

The basic concept of the business model of Songdo New City is to generate revenue by providing in-building facility management services in advance to ensure the provision of public services and business sustainability. Provide value-added services when conditions are ripe in the later stage to increase income.

At the initial stage, enterprises and residents in Songdo can enjoy the following three categories of services: in-building services mainly refer to intelligent building management services such as automation, energy management, and equipment maintenance; safety and security services such as access control, monitoring, and intrusion detection; and smart parking Parking services such as warehouse, charging, parking space guidance, etc.; commercial services include information publishing and display, visual communication such as advertising, community interconnection, IT service outsourcing, data center, cloud computing and cloud storage and other data center services. Global services include city-wide Wi-Fi, public information publishing and services, etc.

In terms of actual operation, Songdao's management model is more flexible. As early as the initial stage of planning and construction, Songdo has already proposed a business model exploration for the operation and maintenance management of information equipment and facilities and information business model in the later stage. Under the guidance of the local government, the model of "operating company + service company" was established to minimize government investment, ensure the operation of information infrastructure in the region, and provide promised standard information services. When it develops to a more mature stage, it will dig out more in-depth information service needs, provide more value-added services, realize value-added profits, and achieve a win-win situation for users and regional operation managers.

Songdo New Town monitors temperature, energy usage, and traffic flow by installing various sensors. There are no garbage trucks on the streets, and there are no garbage bins, all household waste can be sucked directly from the respective kitchens through a huge network of underground tunnels to the waste treatment center, where it is automatically sorted, deodorized and processed... Everything is automated, everything Everything is informatized and everything is intelligent. This is the vision of Songdo's smart city.