Smart City Bonn – What is it good for? What does it cost?
VHS Bonn Panel Discussion
Smart City Bonn – What is it good for? What does it cost?
By InteliLight
Growing digitalization covers all areas of life: work, mobility, education, home & living, shopping – everything is transforming. City of Bonn wishes to become a Smart City too, to become more environmental friendly and increase the Quality of Life of its citizens. What has Bonn already achieved in the quest of becoming a Smart City? What does it offer to whom? At what cost?
Speakers
- Victoria Appelbe, Office for Economic Development, City of Bonn
- Dr. Milad Hanna-Kleigrewe, Detecon International GmbH Cologne
- Sven Hense, Office for IT Applications, City of Bonn
- Silja Lorenzen, adunique Köln
- Eva Schweitzer, Federal Institute for Research on Building, Urban Affairs and Spatial Development; Unit I 5 Digital City, Risk Management and Transport
Smart City Tech Examples from Bonn
By telekom.com
At 6th December 2017 City of Bonn together with Deutsche Telekom started rolling out a pilot project to transform Bonn into a Smart City. The first phase included installing smart controllers for street lamps, smart waste containers and air quality sensors. Dr. Milad Hanna-Kleigrewe from Detecon International GmbH Cologne provided information on the current state of the project:
Smart Street Lighting
Bonn’s system of choice to transform the existing lighting installation is Flashnet’s inteliLIGHT® NB-IoT street lighting control system. NarrowBand-IoT is a radio technology standard that emits less electromagnetic radiation than other technologies used for example for Wifi, as Dr. Milad Hanna-Kleigrewe, Detecon International GmbH Cologne reports, upon concerns expressed by one attendee. Initially, it will mainly be about collecting data on the usage behavior and maintenance demand of the relevant street lights via sensors. In a later phase, improved scheduling, i.e. dimming or even completely switching off lights automatically by using a fixed timetable combined with motion-triggered adaptive lighting technology, ought to exploit the proactive infrastructure and to significantly reduce energy consumption and Bonn’s environmental footprint. Maintenance optimizations, using an in real time malfunctions reporting system, could optimize repair teams scheduling and lower maintenance costs by an estimated 60%, according to Anette Bronder, head of Digital- and Security Business of Deutsche Telekom.
Smart Waste Management
The same idea, sending out a team and performing tasks only when warranted, underlies the smart waste containers as well. The municipal waste collection service (bonnorange) will be informed via the NB-IoT when the waste containers’ sensors register that a certain fill level has been reached.
By telekom.com
Air Quality Sensors
Deutsche Telekom also uses a sensor mounted to a street lamp to collect data on air quality in Bonn. Throughout Europe they already installed Smart City solutions in 18 European cities and ten countries
Watch how the Smart Street lighting and other Smart City solutions are installed and how they will operate (with English subtitles):
The Future
Offering a smart parking guidance system is the next project on Bonn’s agenda. A smartphone app indicating available parking spaces nearby should reduce the number of people riding around the city desperately looking for a parking lot. Thereby traffic volume and congestion and consequently Bonn’s environmental footprint could be reduced, as Victoria Appelbe from City of Bonn’s Office for Economic Development reports.
Something else to consider for City of Bonn, to further amend their Smart, pollutant detecting and dimming street lighting:
Installing charging stations into street lighting could potentially improve user friendliness of electric cars and as such forward electrification of transport in Bonn. Maybe Deutsche Telekom will take it upon themselves once again, pioneering this idea and convert part of their corporate fleet into electric cars while offering charging stations right in front of their office buildings.
Costs vs Benefits Savings
At this stage of Bonn’s quest to become a smarter city, its mainly about collecting initial data and improving the efficiency of already running services. As such, the project will bring about cost savings for the city right now and actual tangible and practical benefits for the individual citizen in a later phase.
In respect of energy that goes into collecting and storing data, one attendee asked whether the subsequent effect on the ecological footprint, as well as determining which kind of data is actually necessary and useful to gather, is considered. Dr. Hanna-Kleigrewe explained that Deutsche Telekom is indeed taking these issues into account but could give no definitive answer to the question.
eGovernment
Accessibility
Data Privacy Concerns
Despite all benefits of digitalization and Bonn’s endeavor of becoming a Smart City, concerns about data security were raised. Not least because collected data containing sensitive information that could be tracked back to individual citizens, if falling into the wrong hands, could have disastrous consequences. Dr. Hanna-Kleigrewe explained again that Deutsche Telekom is taking their responsibility with regard to this subject very serious and that security breaches are primarily due to human failure and not faults in the system.
Usability & Social Gap
On a different note, Eva Schweitzer, Federal Institute for Research on Building, Urban Affairs and Spatial Development also raised awareness on future challenges for the education system and society as a whole, related to furthering the implementation and change of informational systems and conveying required sociotechnical skills, to not create or widen the social gap between different classes.
Smart City equals Happy City?
In order to make sure that what the Smart City movement initially set out to accomplish is actually accomplished, to create a more sustainable, efficient and healthier and happier city, measuring and quantifying effects of implemented measures is paramount. One ingenious solution guaranteeing a positive Quality of Life-ROI of Smart City tech investments could be Dubai’s Happiness Index that informs politics in its decision making and priority setting, as mentioned by Silja Lorenzen, adunique Cologne.
- Event Website
- adunique Cologne
- Federal Institute for Research on Building, Urban Affairs and Spatial Development
- Unit I 5 Digital City, Risk Management and Transport
