The dream smart city
Bus tickets can be bought directly from an App while private vehicles are replaced by cars and bikes shared by the public. Buses and cars don’t run on gas or other conventional fuels but are powered by electricity. Charging infrastructures are disseminated all around the city, so there is no need to go to the gas tank anymore! Consequences of all these improvements in mobility are the reduction of energy consumption and CO2 emissions and the reduction of door-to-door journey time. In a smart city, old neighborhoods are not left abandoned but are regenerated. Buildings are thermally insulated and connected to each other through district heating networks. Other than that, they share information as flats and houses understand whether it’s too warm or too cold for residents, thus allowing the buildings themselves to set their own temperature at the right point. People always know how much energy they are saving because they use “interactive energy maps” that give a visual representation of the energy consumption of the area they live in. Also, a smart city consumes less exhaustible energy, such as petrol, because it is being powered up by renewable energy that never runs out, like the sun’s heat. Not only does it use fewer resources but also uses them better. At the end of it all, one can say that a smart city is innately “energy efficient” as it means that the city uses only the needed energy without wasting it. This seems like a dream, but it really isn’t. All these activities mentioned are happening right now in Nottingham, Valladolid, Tepebasi/Eskisehir, Miskolc and Seraign. These cities are all part of the EU-funded project REMOURBAN, which aims at developing a sustainable urban regeneration model by revamping energy, mobility and ICT actions, therefore transforming these European cities into smart cities. Many other cities will be able to follow their good example thanks to the help of all their citizens. This animation video highlights all these advantages of living in a smart city by showing the day, from his awakening, of Paul, a very lucky boy: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XmTWneSY62w
Keywords
education, school, energy efficiency, retrofitting, smart cities
Countries
Belgium, Spain, Hungary, Türkiye, United Kingdom