Electricity + Control April 2016

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CONTROL SYSTEMS + AUTOMATION
Setting a smart city vision and effectively moving towards it
with a bottom-up, systems-based approach is critical to
ensuring resource efficiency and security, as well
as maintaining socially inclusive growth. Many cities
have already started this process. By the end of
2020, analysts from Pike Research anticipate that
annual spending on smart city infrastructure will
reach $16 billion.
‘The Smart City Cornerstone:
Urban Efficiency’
Schneider Electric’s Smart Cities business foundational
approach is found in its white paper ‘The Smart City Cor-
nerstone: Urban Efficiency’. By continually revisiting this text, the
company anchors each customer project to well-proven principles
that help it to work collaboratively to achieve successful outcomes.
In over 250 completed smart city projects around the globe, this
company has sought to apply these same bottom-up building blocks:
• Set the vision and roadmap for an efficient, livable and sustain-
able city
• Combine best-in-class hardware and software to improve operat-
ing systems
• Harness big data integration for wider city operational and infor-
mational efficiency
• Add innovation to make a holistic and sustainable future a reality
• Drive collaboration between the most well-suited global and local
players, as well as across the entire smart city value chain.
Regardless of which aspect of its infrastructure a city chooses to
start with, these principles can help ensure that the journey towards
a smart future is mindful and holistic at each step. This company
has applied this data-driven approach to help various cities of dif-
ferent sizes across a range of key municipal departments. Often, a
city will choose the most pressing infrastructure issue to begin with,
subsequently widening the scope of projects over time to incorporate
more aspects of citizen priorities. The decision-making herein can
Tapleigh Niethamer is solutions marketing manager, smart cities at Schneider
Electric. Enquiries: Isabel Mwale. Tel. +27 (0) 11 254 6400 or email
take note
Smart city
fundamentals
Tapleigh Niethamer, Schneider Electric
Cities are facing urban challenges of unprecedented scale, and will
continue to do so into the foreseeable future. As populations grow,
so too does pollution, resource scarcity, crime, traffic, emissions,
and more. It is thus becoming a necessity that communities pre-
emptively respond and preserve the integrity, attractiveness, and
competitiveness of their cities by becoming smarter.
• Every city can become smarter.
• Successful smart cities improve their critical systems by
combining the bottom-up systems-centric approach with
the top-down data-centric approach.
• If the fundamental principles are adhered to, the journey
to achieving ‘smart city’ status will be successful.
be shaped by many factors such as staffing, resource constraints,
infrastructural issues or funding challenges.
Carson City, Nevada, USA
A remarkable case in point of a city choosing to make big changes
over a large cross-section of infrastructure is that of Carson City
Nevada’s Public Works Department, which worked with Schneider
Electric’s Invensys subsidiary and Ecosystem partner, Wonderware
PacWest, to deliver a major solution encompassing water, waste
water, transportation, landfill, fleet and renewable power. With a
population of less than 60 000, Carson City’s challenges of
doing more with less are exactly the same as those
of much larger cities; such as increasing efficiency,
reducing waste, and improving the utilisation and
distribution of resources.
Like some of the world’s most progressive
cities, Carson City is blessed with administrators
and public servants who are committed to ensur-
ing their city is providing the best possible service
for its citizens. The city’s Public Works department
delivered an end result that reduced operational staff
hours by 15%while integrating cross-functional manage-
ment capabilities; a huge success for any city in the world.
Conclusion
Whether your city is ready for a city-wide project or simply one pre-
liminary department at a time, focusing on the fundamental principles
when beginning a smart city journey will dramatically increase your
chances of a successful and transformational outcome. The time to
act is now. Our urban populations are growing rapidly and the pres-
sure on infrastructure increases. The need to reduce the impact of
cities on our environment will therefore only become more urgent.
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