Smart City Business | January 2022 by PSI Media

CERTIFICATION

SECURITY

January 2022

STATE OF PLAY

A PIVOTAL YEAR FOR SMART CITIES Rising energy costs, levelling up opportunities and devolution - why 2022 could prove to be the defining year for the smart cities agenda in the UK

PLUS: COP26 | LIGHTING | NEWCASTLE

DATA

Comment

Smart city success from north to south Following a great first issue of Smart City Business, we are excited to bring you this supplement which is again full of some great content. Firstly, Localis have provided a ‘State of Play’ analysis of where the smart city agenda currently sits, three years on from their Smart Cities: Fair Investment for Sustainable Growth report. You can read that on page 8. This issue also takes a more in depth look at two cities which are utilising smart city technologies perhaps better than most. Eddie Copeland, from the London Office of Technology and Innovation, writes on page 10 about innovation in the capital in light of the coronavirus pandemic and the next steps needed to create a smarter London.

Follow and interact with us on Twitter: @GovBusiness

Meanwhile, on page 18, the NewcastleGatehead Initiative write about the investment success and tech cluster opportunities in Newcastle, following on from being named the highest-ranking UK city in the global Smart City Index at the end of last year. Michael Lyons, editor

P ONLINE P IN PRINT P MOBILE P FACE-TO-FACE If you would like to receive 6 issues of Government Business magazine for £150 a year, please contact Public Sector Information, 226 High Road, Loughton, Essex IG10 1ET. Tel: 020 8532 0055, or visit the Government Business website at:

Business Information for Local and Central Government

www.governmentbusiness.co.uk | www.governmenttechnology.co.uk PUBLISHED BY PUBLIC SECTOR INFORMATION LIMITED

226 High Rd, Loughton, Essex IG10 1ET. Tel: 020 8532 0055 Web: www.psi-media.co.uk EDITOR Michael Lyons PRODUCTION MANAGER & DESIGNER Dan Kanolik PRODUCTION CONTROL Lucy Maynard ADMINISTRATION Amy Hinds WEB PRODUCTION Victoria Casey ADVERTISEMENT SALES Patrick Dunne, Neil Haydon PUBLISHER Karen Hopps

© 2022 Public Sector Information Limited. No part of this publication can be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system or transmitted in any form or by any other means (electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise) without the prior written permission of the publisher. Whilst every care has been taken to ensure the accuracy of the editorial content the publisher cannot be held responsible for errors or omissions. The views expressed are not necessarily those of the publisher. ISSN 1470-0735

Government Business is a member of the Independent Press Standards Organisation (which regulates the UK’s magazine and newspaper industry). We abide by the Editors’ Code of Practice and are committed to upholding the highest standards of journalism. If you think that we have not met those standards and want to make a complaint please contact Michael Lyons or Angela Pisanu on 0208 532 0055. If we are unable to resolve your complaint, or if you would like more information about IPSO or the Editors’ Code, contact IPSO on 0300 123 2220 or visit www.ipso.co.uk

BUSINESS SOLUTIONS FOR THE CITIES OF THE FUTURE | www.governmentbusiness.co.uk

Contents

January 2022

Contents Smart City Business 08

05 News

21 Electric vehicles

Government unlikely to meet targets for ‘gigabit’

The best and worst cities to drive an

broadband; smart hospitals to deploy over

electric vehicle in 2022 have been named

seven million IOMT devices by 2026; and Arrival

in exclusive research by Forbes Advisor

begins proving ground trials of its electric bus

08 State of Play In January 2019, Localis published Smart Cities:

Fair Investment for Sustainable Growth. The report was written over 2018 and examined the readiness of the UK for Smart Cities. Three rather eventful years after its release, this

23 Lighting New research has been carried out which will shed some light on how street lighting could be used to pave the way for autonomous vehicles in the future

article looks at the change in the state of play

24 Telensa Q&A

since the report’s publication, looking towards

Smart City Business talks to David Orchard,

what could be a pivotal year for the agenda

Global Sales director at Telensa, about smart street lighting systems, the pandemic impact

10 Data

and what next for the lighting industry

Eddie Copeland, director at the London

Office of Technology and Innovation, explains how London boroughs have used data to respond to the coronavirus pandemic and how smart city technologies are creating new opportunities to tackle age-old problems

12 ClimateView Q&A

26 Security Guidance from the National Cyber Security Centre seeks to help authorities build awareness and understanding of the security considerations needed to design, build, and manage their smart cities

Smart City Business talks to Marek Birchley, CMO of ClimateView, who last year launched the ClimateOS platform - the world’s first SaaS to operationalise Climate Action Plans to help cities manage their entire climate transition

15 Certification

Building in protection from online attacks becomes vital as technology designed to create

21 Printed on recycled paper

resilient and sustainable smart cities could create a playground for digital criminals, writes the BSI

18 Newcastle Paul Keenan, from the NewcastleGateshead Initiative, details Newcastle’s development as a smart city, following the city’s success in the recent global Smart City Index

Government Business magazine

www.governmentbusiness.co.uk SMART CITY BUSINESS | JANUARY 2022

News

BROADBAND

Government unlikely to meet targets for ‘gigabit’ broadband

The Public Accounts Committee is not convinced the Department for Digital, Culture, Media and Sport will meet its downgraded targets for the rollout of super-fast, ‘gigabit’ broadband, and is relying too heavily on commercial contractors for the progress that has been made. Good internet connectivity is now crucial to more than economic growth and the UK’s position in the global marketplace: it is essential to almost every aspect of everyday

life, from work and education to accessing public services and benefits and personal lives and family connections. In 2020, DCMS accepted that its original plan for delivering nationwide gigabit broadband across the country by 2025 was unachievable and revised that target down to 85 per cent coverage by 2025. The proportion of premises in the UK with access to gigabit broadband leapt from 40 per cent to 57 per cent between May and October 2021 but this is largely due to Virgin Media O2 upgrading its cable network and the Public Accounts Committee says DCMS ‘has made little tangible progress in delivering internet connectivity beyond that achieved by the private sector’. The committee argues that DCMS’ goal of full coverage by 2030 ‘does not cover the very hardest to reach areas, which include around 134,000 premises’ and it has no detailed plan in place for reaching communities where it is not commercially viable to do so.

Dame Meg Hillier, chair of the Public Accounts Committee, said: “DCMS’ planning and project management show all the signs of the previous rollout – that the focus will continue to be on the easier to reach areas and there is still no clear plan for the hardest to reach communities. It couldn’t really explain how broadband has got as far as it has in this critical national strategy, beyond “thanks to Virgin Media”, and incredibly it still doesn’t have a real plan for getting the rest of the way to its own downgraded targets. “What DCMS does know full well is it can’t rely on the private sector to get fast broadband to the hardest to reach, excluded and rural areas, and despite its repeated promises to do exactly that we are apparently little nearer to closing ‘the great digital divide’ developing across the UK nor addressing the social and economic inequality it brings with it.” READ MORE

CYBER SECURITY

New laws to strengthen UK’s resilience from cyber attack The government has said that new laws are needed to drive up security standards in outsourced IT services used by almost all UK businesses. Under new proposals, the government has said that it is making improvements in the way organisations report cyber security incidents and reforming legislation so that it is more flexible and can react to the speed of technological change. The plans follow recent high-profile cyber incidents such as the cyber attack on SolarWinds and on Microsoft Exchange Servers which showed vulnerabilities in the third-party products and services used by businesses can be exploited by cyber criminals and hostile states, affecting hundreds of thousands of organisations at the same time.

The government is aiming, through new legislation, to take a stronger approach to getting at-risk businesses to improve their cyber resilience as part of its new £2.6 billion National Cyber Strategy. Julia Lopez, Minister of State for Media, Data, and Digital Infrastructure, said: “Cyber attacks are often made possible because criminals and hostile states cynically exploit vulnerabilities in businesses’ digital supply chains and outsourced IT services that could be fixed or patched. The plans we are announcing today will help protect essential services and our wider economy from cyber threats. Every UK organisation must take their cyber resilience seriously as we strive to grow, innovate and protect people online. It is not an optional extra.”

SUNDERLAND

Sunderland continues to build on smart city excellence Sunderland City Council has announced the deployment of a new Integrated Smart City Platform (ISCP) to enhance services and cement its position as a UK smart city leader. The council has signed a contract with Connexin, which will see the IoT and smart cities provider implement its ConnexinOS platform. The solution will pool data sets across Adult Social Care, Council Tax, Anti-Social Behaviour, Environment Incidents & Health and Child Services from both the Council and will include third party data.

ConnexinOS uses artificial intelligence and machine learning to identify trends in data sets and suggests the best course of action, ensuring that no potential issues are missed and the correct pathway is taken. The platform is also scalable, meaning that the council will be able to add and remove new solutions and data sets to it in the future. The project follows the announcement of Sunderland City Council’s 20-year strategic partnership with BAI Communications to

BUSINESS SOLUTIONS FOR THE CITIES OF THE FUTURE | www.governmentbusiness.co.uk

design, build and operate next-generation digital infrastructure including a private 5G small cell network. This, along with implementation of the ConnexinOS, will support Sunderland’s ambitious City Plan, which aims to make Sunderland a connected, international city that provides opportunities for everyone. READ MORE

News

HEALTHCARE

Smart hospitals to deploy over seven million IOMT devices by 2026 A new study by Juniper Research has found that smart hospitals will deploy 7.4 million connected Internet of Medical Things (IoMT) devices globally by 2026; over 3,850 devices per smart hospital. The figure represents total growth of 131 per cent over 2021, when 3.2 million devices were deployed. The concept of the IoMT involves healthcare providers leveraging connected devices such as remote monitoring sensors and surgical robotics to improve patient care, staff productivity, and operational efficiency. Identifying smart hospitals in the US and China as leading the global adoption of IoMT devices, accounting for 21 per cent and 41

per cent of connected devices respectively, by 2026, the research highlighted digital healthcare initiatives implemented during the ongoing pandemic and high levels of existing digitalisation within healthcare infrastructure as key to these countries’ leading positions. The new report, Smart Hospitals: Technologies, Global Adoption & Market Forecasts 20212026, identified remote monitoring as key to delivering smart hospital services. It analysed how adoption of remote monitoring technologies accelerated during the pandemic significantly, due to difficulties associated with delivering in-person healthcare. This accelerated adoption is set to continue over the next five

years, as patients become acclimatised to remote monitoring and benefit from proactively managing and treating health conditions. The paper also identified that the realtime nature of remote monitoring requires low latency, high bandwidth connections to ensure transmission of patients’ health data is not interrupted or distorted. As a result, it encourages smart hospital vendors to develop partnerships with network operators to leverage multi-access edge computing to drive major reductions in lag and latency. READ MORE

SURVEY

HEALTHCARE

Better health top benefit of technology for Brits

MFT joins Smart Hospital Alliance to improve patient care

The vast majority of respondents worldwide believe that technology makes the world a better place, with most people in the UK hoping for better health as a result go technology advancements. Tech Compass 2022, created by Bosch, reveals current technology trends and shows what people around the world think about them. The Bosch Tech Compass is a representative survey of the general population in China, Germany, India, the UK and the USA. A total of approximately 8,000 people were surveyed online for it in August 2021. The vast majority of respondents worldwide (72 per cent) believe that technology makes the world a better place. The positive attitude towards technological progress is most pronounced in China (87 per cent) and India (83 per cent) and least pronounced in Germany (51 per cent). When asked about the benefits they expect from technology for themselves, the majority of people in China said they hope that technology will make their lives more comfortable (66 per cent). Most people in the UK hope for better health (57 per cent), in the US, for more safety (55 per cent), and in India (62 per cent) and Germany (51 per cent) they expect it to make work easier. Aside from these individual hopes, most respondents (83 per cent worldwide) agree

that technology should be used to tackle the major challenges of our time rather than serving individual needs. More than three out of four respondents worldwide believe that the future technological progress will play the key role in combating climate change. Therefore, it is not surprising that the majority (40 per cent) considers climate engineering as the technology with the best contribution to society, followed by biotechnology (38 per cent) and hydrogen as well as AI (both 35 per cent). According to all respondents worldwide, the list of technology trends with the most future relevance is clearly dominated by AI (43 per cent) and 5G (42 per cent). Particular relevance is attributed to AI and 5G in China and India, while — in contrast to Asia — more relevance is attributed to self-driving cars in western countries, which ranked third (with 28 per cent) on the global index. When asked whether they would prefer to beam from one place to another or take the car, around two-thirds of respondents in the West and India said they would prefer to drive. Only in China did the two modes of transportation balance each other out. READ MORE

Manchester University NHS Foundation Trust has joined the Smart Hospital Alliance to drive the expansion of cutting-edge digital health technologies for the benefit of patients and communities. Connected by Health on Cloud, MFT has been recognised as a globally leading hospital for digital health technologies, and has signed a Memorandum of Understanding with the Alliance. As part of the alliance, Manchester has been chosen by Health on Cloud as their first physical centre of operations outside of Asia. Dr Iain McLean, managing director for Research and Innovation at MFT, said: “We are delighted to have joined the Smart Hospital Alliance with our partners from around the world. Manchester University NHS Foundation Trust is commitment to developing new and innovative solutions – such as virtual and augmented reality – for greater patient benefit, and this agreement symbolises an exciting step in that direction. We look forward to exploring further opportunities as part of the Alliance.”

SMART CITY BUSINESS | JANUARY 2022

xxx

News

TRANSPORT

Arrival begins proving ground trials of its electric bus Arrival has begun trials of the Arrival Bus at a testing facility in the UK, ahead of certification and public roads trials next year as planned. The Arrival Bus is creating a new and improved public transportation experience for all users – from the drivers and passengers to the engineers, cleaners, and fleet owners – and reducing costs for operators, making the transition to electric vehicles more economically viable. The vehicle takes advantage of Arrival’s software ecosystem, enabling full connectivity, digital customisation, and deep access to vehicle behaviour and data. The

vehicle can be tailored to meet local cities’ needs with its modular design, which enables configuration of length, range, battery, and passenger capacity. Franck Dessenis, Vice President of Bus Platform, Arrival, said: “This is a key milestone for Arrival and we’re thrilled to have started proving ground trials, where the Bus is currently going through testing, ahead of EU certification and public road trials next year. “We’ve seen a strong interest in the Bus this year, specifically from governments who are looking to upgrade their public transportation networks, in order to achieve their zero-emission pledges. We’re partnering

HOUSING

FLEET

Plans for gigabit broadband in new-build homes move forward

Coventry on road to becoming UK’s first all-electric bus city

New-build homes will come with fast and reliable gigabit broadband under plans being brought forward by the government. Digital Infrastructure Minister Julia Lopez has launched a consultation on proposals for changes to building regulations to ensure new homes have next-generation gigabit broadband installed in them as standard practice. Around one in ten new-build homes are still being built without gigabit connections, mostly in smaller developments, where the cost can be higher or broadband companies have not had the time they need to install connections before houses are completed. The changes to the law will mean home developers will be legally required to build gigabit broadband into new homes in England and make it a priority as part of building work. They will also need to bring broadband network operators on board to consider gigabit broadband installation when construction plans are submitted to local councils. Lopez said: “We are moving rapidly in our national mission to make sure everyone can benefit from faster gigabit-speed broadband. National coverage has jumped from six per cent to 65 per cent in just two years. “The law changes we are consulting on today will help us go further and faster to make our homes fit for the future with the infrastructure people will need to take advantage of new technologies in the coming decades.”

A fleet of 130 zero-emission double decker buses will be introduced next year as part of a £140 million project to make Coventry the UK’s first all-electric bus city. National Express Coventry has ordered the brand-new British built zero-emission buses to enter into service in early 2023, helping improve air quality and reduce carbon emissions in the city. Last year, Transport for West Midlands (TfWM), which is part of the West Midlands Combined Authority, secured £50 million funding from the Department of Transport to ensure every bus in Coventry is zero-

closely with governments, cities, and operators to build infrastructure solutions and seamless mobility services for local communities to support their clean energy targets.” Following proving ground trials, Arrival will commence public road trials of the Bus with First Bus - one of the UK’s largest transport operators - in Q1 2022. The trials will see Arrival’s vehicles operating on existing First Bus routes in the UK. Arrival is expected to begin production for the Bus in Q2 2022. READ MORE

emission. Now under a deal with TfWM, National Express Coventry is making an additional multi-million pound investment into the All Electric Bus City project with the purchase of the 130 new buses. The company is set to order further buses at a later date. Similar agreements with other bus companies and those running subsidised services are likely to follow, with the aim of putting up to 300 electric buses on the streets of Coventry, guaranteeing an all-electric fleet by 2025. READ MORE

SMART CITY BUSINESS | JANUARY 2022

State of Play

State of Play: Smart cities in 2018 and 2022 In January 2019, Localis published Smart Cities: Fair Investment for Sustainable Growth. The report was written over 2018 and examined the readiness of the UK for smart cities. Three rather eventful years after its release, this article looks at the change in the state of play since the reports publication, looking towards what could be a pivotal year for the agenda

Our evaluation of the prospects of the Smart city projects can easily begin to smart city agenda in late 2018 was mixed. prioritise technological advancements for Firstly, we were told many times that the their own sake above all else and there has energy infrastructure in cities across the UK been increasing acknowledgement of this is simply not ready for the kind of massive in the academic research on the subject. growth in the use of technology required The increased awareness of the need to for a smart city transformation. We also balance sustainability and quality of life with found that local authorities need a more technological improvements is a positive expansive set of strategic powers, particularly result of careful evaluation and around forming partnerships with detailed appraisal of the other local authorities and private agenda. Attempts Poorlyenterprise, for the agenda to are being made to conceiv be successfully delivered. The establish technical key problem here being the standards which and ine ed f f awkward gaps that smart city are beginning e c t ive public-p programmes must occupy, to emerge r i vate partner within the governance and across projects sh ownership frameworks of and allow for a probl ip remains e m the built environment. comparison i n implem We characterised the along these entatio the n of crux of these issues as the lines, a crucial the sma rt risk of a ‘tale of two cities’ aspect of agendacity emerging in smart city locations. transparent policyThis is because investment, if left making which was to the market alone, tends to follow previous investment. Without a long-term strategic vision which is informed by granular data on local inequality, there is a risk of investment into the grid being increasingly concentrated in areas where the underlying digital infrastructure for smart cities already exists. Providing the infrastructure for smart cities cannot, in other words, be left to the market alone. Since we released the report, there has been little change in the conditions we described at the time. However, the research around smart cities has greatly expanded, with gaps in knowledge and understanding being gradually filled in. Furthermore, the current political context may be far more favourable to transformative investment than that in which our report was written. Improvements in the thought behind smart cities Improvements in the intellectual underpinning of smart cities since 2018 have been marked. The smart city agenda has been repeatedly criticised for reliance on fossil fuels and a general lack of consideration for the environment. Ultimately, without being mindful of sustainability and livability,

BUSINESS SOLUTIONS FOR THE CITIES OF THE FUTURE | www.governmentbusiness.co.uk

absent from the picture three years ago. Another aspect which has come more sharply into focus is that of cyber security. As the prevalence of AI in daily life has risen and the Internet of Things become more ubiquitous, further thought has been dedicated to the ethical frameworks smart cities must operate in. The rapid onset of the IoT and associated rush to Smart Cities has outpaced developments in cybersecurity, with complex models of deep learning required for effective cyber security. A key problem we heard of often during our original research was the difficulties incurred through local authorities and private companies entering into partnerships which did not suit the goals of either particularly well. Poorly-conceived and ineffective public-private partnership remains a problem in the implementation of the smart city agenda. In the UK’s smart cities, a trend towards corporate governance across multiple stakeholders has been observed, with external funders and investors crucial

Progress in the policy driving smart cities Naturally, things like digitisation of public services and better use of technology in the urban realm have not been the central focus of government policy in the past couple of unprecedented years. Whilst forms of digital governance, and associated efforts from councils to reduce digital exclusion, naturally increased during the period of lockdown, the very real focus of day-to-day public safety during the pandemic pushed the wider agenda down the national priorities list. It is worth pointing out here, however, that there were already complaints of political paralysis raised by stakeholders in our 2018 research. Whilst we wrote the original report, it was a common view among stakeholders that the ongoing turmoil over Brexit was already slowing down the agenda, with Whitehall capacity sucked into the seemingly endless crises of the end of Theresa May’s premiership. The push to ‘Build Back Better’ however, alongside the recent thrusting of the UK’s energy regulation framework into the national spotlight, could be seen as something of a political opening for smart city programmes. There is some hope for the possibility of a renewed focus on the kind of infrastructure upgrades, devolution policy and long-term strategic purview that would enable an acceleration in sustainable, livable smart cities under the policy aegis of Levelling Up and Building Back Better. The Chancellor’s pre-pandemic focus on major infrastructure spend as the key to levelling up, as well as the need to create

State of Play

to the success of programmes . This, along with fears of ‘lock in’ via long-term and inflexible contracts, remains a problem for ensuring accountability to citizens and communities for smart city programmes.

If the Smart City agenda is to come together in the 2020s, we will need a more robust national grid, with a greater proportion of the energy it distributes generated renewably a pipeline of training and employment in the wake of Brexit and the pandemic, could lead to the kind of long-term investment required to make the agenda work. Furthermore, the potential for a root-andbranch examination of energy regulation in the UK from generation to household has greatly increased in light of the current crisis. However, as covered later in this article, there are also major risks to the agenda arising from the energy price crisis. What has not changed since our original report is the dramatic curtailment of the abilities and powers of local government. The devolution agenda remains in a state of constant flux, with the Local Industrial Strategies of 2017 scrapped and the future looking bleak for 2010’s Local Enterprise Partnerships, to make way for the latest new framework. As local government once again waits for a long-delayed white paper to detail its future, with rumours abound of reorganisation and various waves of strings-attached funding to be bid for, the chance of a long-term settlement under which councils could take a strategic view to the development of their place with accompanying powers of investment seems as remote as ever. With the long-term effects of Covid on both the economy and the nation’s health still far from certain, councils have been working on plans for recovery throughout

the past couple of years, many of which hinge on better utilisation of technology to drive policy on the high street and in the town centre. However the capacity for local government to act in a holistic way has been, if anything, further depreciated by the strain of the pandemic. One area where local government could potentially see capacity built and restrictions removed in the coming years is procurement – a major element of smart city programmes. As our 2021 report True Value emphasised, the government’s Procurement Green Paper begins to pave the way for a change in procurement culture, where using procurement as part of a longterm placemaking vision is far easier to do. Challenges to smart cities in 2022 If the smart city agenda is to come together in the 2020s, we will need a more robust national grid, with a greater proportion of the energy it distributes generated renewably. In the current climate, this could be a difficult goal to square politically. Given the huge surge in energy prices – albeit caused by the price of wholesale gas – boosting renewable energy (the cause of the recently much-maligned ‘green levies’) may not be a particularly popular idea. The mix of actors involved – Ofgem, central government, local government alongside the commercial and private consumers of energy – make taking a holistic approach difficult at the best of times, let alone in the middle of a political maelstrom over energy. Yet there are points to rally around. Major infrastructure investment for smart cities can drive Levelling Up in multiple ways. At the front end, it can generate long-term pipelines of training and employment, uplifting local economies. In the medium term, it can provide the kind of solutions to public service provision problems which have been glimpsed through smart city pilots in the UK and across the world. In the long-term, a more robust energy grid which is less reliant on the international gas market is, it surely must be clearer now than ever before, of great importance to our national resilience. A devolution framework which allows local authorities to invest in and steward the development of smart city programmes is essential to achieving this, and the lack of one remains the most significant obstacle to the widespread realisation of Smart Cities in the UK. All eyes on the Levelling Up White Paper… L FURTHER INFORMATION www.localis.org.uk

SMART CITY BUSINESS | JANUARY 2022

Data

Using tech and data for the benefit of those who live and work in the capital Eddie Copeland, director at the London Office of Technology and Innovation, explains how London boroughs have used data to respond to the coronavirus pandemic and how smart city technologies are creating new opportunities to tackle age-old problems Large global cities like London are best of digital and data innovation to challenging to run and manage even improve public services in the capital. in the best of times. There’s always pressure on housing, transport and Innovating in response to Covid schools. Issues like homelessness are The first step to delivering effective public felt acutely where costs are high. services is to understand the nature of the Congestion leads to air pollution - both an problems that face residents. During the first inevitable result of population density. Covid lockdowns, we saw boroughs making It’s fair to say that, with Covid, the last use of a wide variety of different two years have been far from the best datasets they held about of times, creating even greater their residents to LOTI challenges for residents and the rapidly identify has bee public sector organisations which households that serve them. Now more might be most suppor n ting than ever, it’s essential that vulnerable. boroug hs work city authorities have all For example, o n smart c ing the best tools available spotting a ity proje by help at their disposal. family that c t s i n Technology and data receives throughg them think represent two very powerful benefits and th sets of tools and methods. has children principleir key es In this article, I’d like to who rely on outline some of the ways in free school meals which they have proved - and may well point continue to prove - vital in London, to where additional where the London Office of Technology support is required. and Innovation (LOTI) aims to bring the By building up this picture, boroughs

BUSINESS SOLUTIONS FOR THE CITIES OF THE FUTURE | www.governmentbusiness.co.uk

were able to contact families to check what extra help they needed. In Hammersmith and Fulham, this data work was combined with using AI-assisted automated call technology to reach thousands of residents over a single weekend. Later in the pandemic, boroughs were keen to understand how well their high streets were recovering. Relying on traditional government economic statistics was of little use; boroughs needed to know what was going on week by week. In response, the Greater London Authority helped boroughs access datasets from companies such as MasterCard, O2 and Strava, which were able to provide much more granular and current information on economic activity and footfall. Making use of these kinds of corporate datasets has now been formalised with the creation of the Highstreets Data Partnership. And given the importance of balancing economic recovery with maintaining social distancing in public spaces, some boroughs made use of machine learning tools to analyse their CCTV footage to provide a count of how many people were in given areas,

Data

and whether further action was needed to support residents to keep a safe distance. It’s not just local authorities that exist to serve London’s residents. Voluntary and charity (VCS) organisations play a huge role, often supporting some of the city’s most vulnerable people. In light of the Covid experience, we saw how vital it is that they can work hand-in-glove with local authorities. With funding from DHLUC (then MHCLG), LOTI worked with Camden and Central Bedfordshire councils on a project to see how data could be more effectively shared between councils and their local VCS colleagues so that they could share intelligence on the level of need and provision in each area. An offshoot of this has been Camden’s work with the VCS to collaborate on data to support the Camden Food Mission, which aims to ensure that by 2030 everyone in Camden eats well every day with nutritious, affordable, sustainable food. Creating a smarter London So far we’ve looked at how councils have adapted their existing public services using data and technology. Another interesting development has been in the use of so-called ‘smart city’ technologies, which are creating new opportunities. The world of smart cities is typically framed around the use of internet-ofthings (IoT) technologies in public places. This includes areas like high streets and parks, or in publicly owned buildings, such as social housing. Common examples include smart lamp posts that measure air pollution, moisture sensors that check for damp conditions in buildings, and smart river sensors that monitor and help predict when flooding may occur. London boroughs are increasingly making good use of such tools. Westminster recently launched an Innovation Challenge to get residents directly involved in shaping their smart city approach. Areas under

The world of smart cities is typically framed around the use of internet-of-things (IoT) technologies in public places. This includes areas like high streets and parks, or in publicly owned buildings, such as social housing consideration in the borough include using technology to give residents a greater voice in their communities and tackling food waste, encouraging more sustainable travel and supporting biodiversity. Meanwhile, the South London Partnership (made up of Croydon, Kingston upon Thames, Merton, Richmond upon Thames and Sutton) has been running Innovate, a programme to use IoT technologies to ‘obtain new data insights using internet-connected sensors, with minimal human intervention to support and drive economic growth across the subregion’. One specific example is their work in Sutton to install cutting-edge sensors to tackle future flooding in the borough. Surface water from heavy rainfall has previously damaged homes and businesses and disrupted transport, causing misery for thousands, including some of the area’s most vulnerable residents. Sensors allow early warning and point to where more preventative measures are needed.

LOTI has been supporting boroughs working on smart city projects by helping them think through their key principles. We believe it’s crucial that smart city projects are driven by achieving outcomes that meet the needs of citizens, not the desire to use a specific technology. There are far too many examples of global cities seemingly using flashy new technology for its own sake. Projects must be conducted openly, transparently and ethically to be worthy of public trust. With cyber attacks on boroughs growing, smart city installations must be secure by design. Finally, it’s important that the systems and data used in any one part of London are interoperable with those used in other parts. If every borough works in isolation, there’s a real risk we end up with 33 different flooding, population and congestions maps, for which no Londoner would thank us! Tech is not yet for all Before I conclude, it’s important to remind ourselves that data and technology don’t benefit all Londoners equally. Many continue to be digitally excluded, lacking a device, connectivity, skills or the support they need to get online. Digital exclusion has always been an issue, but as a result of Covid, it’s more acute than ever. Being online is now all but essential to engage in work, education, socialising and shopping. LOTI has received £1.3 million from the Greater London Authority to launch the Digital Inclusion Innovation Programme. Through this programme, we’re working to develop better methods to understand who is digitally excluded and in what ways, and design better initiatives that help. Our latest projects have included using data to map where digital exclusion is taking place, exploring how to tackle digital exclusion for those living in London’s temporary accommodation hostels, and making it easier to get second-hand devices into the hands of those who most need them. A tech and data-enabled future London, and indeed all major cities, will continue to face a wide range of challenges over the coming years. A key lesson from the Covid experience has surely been that we need to be ready for the unexpected. Mastering the way we use technology and data to respond to resident needs would be a great place to start. L FURTHER INFORMATION http://loti.london/

SMART CITY BUSINESS | JANUARY 2022

ClimateView

Post-COP26 Q&A: What next? Smart City Business (SCB) talks to Marek Birchley, CMO of ClimateView, who last year launched the ClimateOS platform - the world’s first SaaS to operationalise Climate Action Plans to help cities manage their entire climate transition SCB: How important a feature was the future of smart cities in the COP26 conversation? Cities have come a long way since COP21. In six years, the number of cities disclosing their emissions has more than doubled, totalling 812 in 2020. Yet, 51 per cent of these had no climate action plan in place in 2020, only 18 per cent had set targets aligned with 1.5°C and just six per cent had interim targets, attesting to the meagre state of climate planning globally. The increasing importance of cities and their yet unfulfilled potential was acknowledged at COP26 last year when it for the first time included cities and local governments in its official programming, making it an important point of focus and allocating it one full day in its packed programme. United Nations Secretary General Antonio Guterres said prior to the conference that: “Cities are where the climate battle will

The role of cities in the transition is a nolargely be won or lost. The choices that brainer. There is a symbiotic relationship will be made on urban infrastructure in at play between cities and their national the coming decades – on construction, governments. Moving forward, cities’ housing, energy efficiency, power generation success is contingent on national and transport – will have tremendous governments stepping up their NDCs and influence on the emissions curve.” providing them more funding and leeway This really set the stage for cities to to be more ambitious. Equally, national be front and centre and to act where governments need cities to achieve National governments are slowed and their full emissions reduction often stuck from in-fighting and potential in order to achieve lobbyists. Examples from cities their NDCs. This is like Nottingham are evidence something that has of local UK governments When c i t been anchored into taking responsibility, setting i e s w ork wit the Glasgow Pact, ambitious science-based h the same fr as it emphasises targets and working a m eworks and too multilevel furiously to build their cooperative action zero carbon economy. from th ls, they benefi e collab t and the role of We see Newcastle and orative intellige local government Dundee Councils as n in advancing other driven organisations platformce of all and implementing methodologically driving users climate goals. change in their cities.

BUSINESS SOLUTIONS FOR THE CITIES OF THE FUTURE | www.governmentbusiness.co.uk

The pandemic gave us a glimpse of the future. Streets were empty of cars. Biodiversity in our cities flourished. For a very brief moment, we saw a drop in emissions in many parts of the world. It also gave cities the chance to invest and capitalise on the reduced pressure on transport infrastructure and to think about ‘building back better’. Paris has done well to install bike lanes, change traffic routes and shift more car trips to greener alternatives. But all this was short-lived. And as much of the world was coming out of a second wave, emissions were back to pre-covid levels, reminding the world the challenge ahead remained unchanged. And COP26, and the IPCC report that preceded it shone a very bright light on the reality of inaction. While some concessions were made at the outcome of the conference, a critical step moving forward was the agreement in the Glasgow Climate Pact that governments were to return in 12 months with a verifiable ambitious pathway to net zero emissions, as opposed to the original five years agreed upon at the Paris Agreement.

SCB: How can technology enable cities to live up to their promises of becoming carbon neutral?

While some concessions were made at the outcome of the conference, a critical step moving forward was the agreement in the Glasgow Climate Pact that governments were to return in 12 months with a verifiable ambitious pathway to net zero emissions Technology is both the key to planning the climate transition and to delivering low carbon services to citizens for a sustainable future. Sustainability officers around the world are tasked with coordinating the effort to solve one of the greatest challenges in their city’s history. The rapidly declining global carbon budget is putting pressure on teams and organisations to deliver more, faster and more efficiently while delivering an inclusive and equitable future for their cities. The fact that City Climate Action Planning has historically been relatively low-tech has been a shackle that has to change. Transforming planning into progress means equipping local government organisations with the means to collaborate at scale, manage complex interconnected systems and monitor and adapt as plans unfold, which often means having recourse to smart and digitally-based decision making tools.

SCB: Cities account for more than 70 per cent of the world’s CO2 emissions, but progress is being stalled due to a lack of standardisation and clear

ClimateView

SCB: 2019 saw a number of local authorities, particularly in the UK, declare a climate emergency, before 2020 was dominated by the outbreak of the coronavirus pandemic. Following two years of a health emergency, how has COP26 redirected attention back to the climate crisis?

guidance on how to reach net zero. How does ClimateOS help to navigate this obstacle? ClimateOS is a collaborative decision-making platform for the entire city organisation. An end-to-end climate planning tool that integrates data, modelling and visualisation. It consolidates the world’s climate planning best practices with advanced agent-based modelling to guide the city’s journey from target setting and pathway optimisation toward action planning and deployment. It makes it faster and cheaper for cities to deliver an easy to understand, cocreated and data-driven climate plan that attracts funding and financing. Importantly, when cities work with the same frameworks and tools, they benefit from the collaborative intelligence of all platform users. Cities can learn and work together to improve data coverage, create new models, and share actions with impact. L FURTHER INFORMATION www.climateview.global

SMART CITY BUSINESS | JANUARY 2022

Certification

Taking a resilient approach to smart cities Building in protection from online attacks becomes vital as technology designed to create resilient and sustainable smart cities could create a playground for digital criminals, writes the BSI Smart cities are built on a foundation rapidly evolving technological landscape of technology – deploying AI, big data, and improve the ways these cities work. augmented reality, the Internet of Things Sustainability and resilience are key (IoT) and BIM (Building Information considerations for authorities running Modelling) – to create well-designed urban Smart Cities as the automation they rely on centres that work for domestic and business is enabled through IoT connected devices inhabitants alike. Ironically, the technology alongside the use of BIM, creating a at their heart could create vulnerability to digital ‘engine room’ of information that is cyber attack. essential for the cities’ day-to-day operating Accelerating investment in smart cities, systems. As smart cities are established with their hyperconnected technology, on a worldwide scale, governments and comes in response to a major global developers will need to ensure information population shift towards living is protected and cyber criminals are in metropolitan areas. This thwarted so that information, demographic evolution is technologies and platforms For prompting governments are safeguarded. o r ganisat to seek ways to The volume of io ns running capitalise on the information created cities to smart in the day-to-day running of smart by their be trusted s t cities is a tempting a k e ho they mu prospect for cyber st be viglders, criminals. Powered with th il a eir digit nt by rapidly developing al operatio new technologies ns and capabilities, smart cities deploy 5G networks alongside multiple public and private cloud services to automate

society, from city traffic flows to emergency services and across every possible industry through IoT. For organisations running smart cities to be trusted by their stakeholders, they must be vigilant with their digital operations, creating trust in cyber security and data privacy safeguards and guarding against hacking or denial-of-service attacks. This is where BSI’s industry-leading experts in cyber security and the built environment can support organisations. Our cyber security specialists create a digitally reinforced world for clients, supporting their teams to embrace digital technology and giving them the right knowledge and skills to safeguard the technological foundations of smart cities. This can be achieved by identifying, detecting and protecting against and responding to, daily data threats and risks that can directly affect operations and financial stability. Smart cities demand smart thinking BSI’s focus is to create a digitally trusted world for our customers, protecting information and people to ensure they are cyber-safe and resilient in today’s fast-paced society. E

SMART CITY BUSINESS | JANUARY 2022

Certification

BSI offers extensive expertise in IoT infrastructure and connected assets to ensure they are secure and benefit from information resilience  All stages of the smart city development life cycle can benefit from cyber security support: design, construction, manufacturing, facility operation or decommissioning. Events and activities where information are shared across networks requires the need to establish continuous identify authentication, which is one of the many ways in which BSI protects its clients. Outdated firmware with weak identity protocols or passwords is just one scenario that offers an opportunity for information to be compromised. Smart and the city – BSI’s pioneering UK role Britain has had smart cities ambitions since 2014, when the UK Government first began to explore their potential. It quickly became clear that the sheer complexity of technology interfaces would require a clear framework for guidance. The then Department for Business Innovation and Skills (now BEIS – Department of Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy) turned to BSI to produce the first Smart City standard. Since then, a portfolio of standards has emerged to guide innovators through the digital concrete jungle. These standards – which originated as Publicly Available Specifications (PASs) resulting from BSI’s expert consulting work – have gone on to provide feeder documents for international standards. PAS 181 (Smart City Framework), published in 2014, forms the basis of the international standard ISO 37106. Dan Rossiter, Built Environment Sector Lead at BSI, says: “The number of standards produced shows the value of standardisation within a very complex area. The amount of information being shared, and the number of actors potentially involved, makes it necessarily complex. The UK has been in the

vanguard of smart city thinking, especially ways of applying digital innovation. We have a very good track record of not just innovation but documenting procedures in our standards in such a way to make them easy to use.” While more and more cities around the world – from Barcelona in Spain to Hangzhou in China – are creating smart city strategies, the UK has been an enthusiastic adopter with Peterborough, Bristol, Greenwich, Exeter, Oxford, Cambridge, Leeds and Milton Keynes all exploring how to integrate physical, digital and human elements effectively. Navigating smart cities with BSI as your trusted advisor Smart cities are complex technological eco-systems with their smooth-running dependent on tracking interfaces between the different systems. Standards can help by defining terminology, so there is a common

BUSINESS SOLUTIONS FOR THE CITIES OF THE FUTURE | www.governmentbusiness.co.uk

understanding between the different stakeholders involved. Conventional manufacturing standards involve manufacturers, customers and suppliers. With a smart city there are myriad relationships beyond the traditional: citizens, local authorities, urban planners, financial planners, utilities, traffic control and more. As huge, interconnected organisms, Smart Cities create enormous amounts of data with the risk of error around wrong or incomplete data. Standards play a critical role in helping people to identify the data they need and how to structure it as information. Data inevitably raises the pressing need for data security – BSI’s PAS 185 standard provides guidance on that front. BSI offers extensive expertise in IoT infrastructure and connected assets to ensure they are secure and benefit from information resilience. Our consultancy team has years of relevant industry and sector experience to offer insights and an end-to-end integrated cyber security approach. Our five-stage strategy steps clients through: identify, detect, protect, respond and recover to assess, analyse, develop, implement and manage cyber risks. Standards development and consultancy are just two ways in which BSI is supporting the cyber safety of smart cities. We are also experts

BIM – cornerstone of the Smart City Building Information Modelling (BIM) standards have been fundamental to creating a platform for the digitalisation that is essential for smart cities to operate. Dan Rossiter says: “BIM and information management have always been an element of smart cities because both are based on open, shareable data. BIM relies on having this data structured as information to support decisionmaking related to assets. It is this structure that creates the building blocks for the smart city to achieve the advantages presented by digitalisation.” BIM processes around information management can enable an asset to be built in the most efficient, low carbon way. For

While more cities around the world are creating Smart City strategies, the UK has been an enthusiastic adopter with Peterborough, Bristol, Greenwich, Exeter, Oxford, Cambridge, Leeds and Milton Keynes all exploring how to integrate physical, digital and human elements effectively instance, by utilising the information provided to reduce the amount of concrete required for a project. However, the real value of BIM comes after the build has been completed, because an asset designed using BIM can minimise the use of resources such as energy and water and can provide the information about the asset essential to the operation of a smart city. The UK has led the way in BIM standards with the 1192 series (published from 2013). These progressed to become the ISO 19560 series, with additional parts still under development. The fundamental concepts established in the

Certification

in security awareness and training, helping to raise awareness and upskill teams to handle a cyber attack or hacking event. We are well placed to support certification to ISO 37106 – the international standard for sustainable cities and communities. Meanwhile, our complementary Kitemark™ certification (based on ISO 37106) enables policymakers, municipal authorities and other stakeholders to focus on their strategic priorities while providing a process for continuous improvement through regular audits.

PASs have carried through to the ISOs for adoption internationally, underlining the good foundations laid by the UK within these PASs. Although the principles of information management using BIM pre-date the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), the relationship between them is clear. Depending on how the information intended to be used, information management using BIM can support four of the UN SDGs: industry innovation and infrastructure (9), sustainable cities and communities (11), responsible production and consumption (12) and climate action (13). L

SMART CITY BUSINESS | JANUARY 2022

Newcastle

A smart city with a reputation for investment success

Paul Keenan, from the NewcastleGateshead Initiative, details Newcastle’s development as a smart city, following the city’s success in the recent global Smart City Index Newcastle’s contribution to the last environmental challenges, and we want to do industrial revolution is well documented more. Today, Newcastle is home to some of and today it plays an equally significant the world’s best and brightest organisations role in the 21st century digital and tech and businesses when it comes to pioneering revolution underway in the UK. technological research and we are constantly According to the Levelling Up Power Tech striving to implement new technologies, for League 2021, the city is now one of the the benefit of our city and its residents. fastest growing tech clusters in the UK, and “Many of the projects, businesses, and in 2021 became the highest-ranking UK city research that have helped the city gain a in the global Smart City Index (2021), ahead global reputation for smart city innovation of many of the world’s best-known cities, and are showcased on the NCLEUS website and surpassing both London and Manchester. are based at Newcastle Helix, the city’s The Smart City Index offers a balanced take iconic £350 million global centre for urban on the economic and technological aspects innovation, which brings together academia, of smart cities and more humane dimensions the public sector, communities, business and of urban living, such as quality of life industry in the heart of the city. It is a and inclusiveness. The Index unique public and private sector surveys approximately 120 partnership between Legal In 2021 residents from each city & General, Newcastle City on how technology has Council and Newcastle Newcas tle improved their lives University.” became t h The Digital Leaders Since 2020, Newcastle e highest ranking Award praised Helix has been home U K city in the glo Newcastle for to three National its collaborative Innovation Centres Index, abal Smart Cit y head o approach and on Data, Ageing f many of the w innovative use of and Energy Systems o r technology across the Integration. known ld’s bestcity to deliver services Also based on site is cities more efficiently and Newcastle University’s make life more liveable. Urban Observatory, which Nick Forbes, leader of maintains the largest set of Newcastle City Council, said: publicly available real time urban “Newcastle is now recognised as a world data in the UK and their computer class, smart city, where technologies are science department that is top ranked being used to help solve economic, social and in the UK for research impact.

BUSINESS SOLUTIONS FOR THE CITIES OF THE FUTURE | www.governmentbusiness.co.uk

Equally important, Newcastle Helix is home to LightOx, a company developing oral cancer treatments; they have joined the vibrant life sciences cluster along with Nanovery, who are using nanorobotic technology to improve the diagnosis of some of the world’s most serious diseases. The Defence Science and Technology Laboratory (DSTL) is based in The Catalyst in offices alongside the National Innovation Centre for Data, which specialises in AI and data science, with its close proximity to the city’s universities allowing the organisation to tap into the region’s talent pipeline which includes a high proportion of STEM and computing students. Newcastle’s position in the smart city rankings is testament to its willingness and ability to go out and compete on a world stage, with the ambition of making the region a leading destination to live, work and invest. Jen Hartley, director of Invest Newcastle, whose team have secured much of the significant inward investment for the city, said: “Our strengths lie across video games, e-commerce, software development, data analytics and immersive technologies. Tech networks like Dynamo North East and Digital Union are accelerating the development of these clusters, including our games cluster–the fourth largest in the UK. “Our £2 billion plus industry employs over 40,000 people in 3,000 plus creative and digital businesses. We’re future-proofing this vibrant sector with initiatives from the North East Futures UTC, which teaches a specialist

Newcastle

Newcastle’s position in the smart city rankings is testament to its willingness and ability to go out and compete on a world stage, with the ambition of making the region a leading destination to live, work and invest

Number of jobs new to the region’s creative and digital sector in 2021

digital tech curriculum to 14–19-year-olds, to The Centre for Doctoral Training in Cloud Computing for Big Data PhD facility.” Accenture, Epic Games, HMRC, RedHat, DWP, Sumo Games, Atom Bank, Tombola and Zerolight also operate in the region. Newcastle also has the highest proportion of STEM and computing students in the country. Developing tech cluster The city is the centre of one of the fastest growing tech clusters in the UK, being home to FTSE 100 company Sage PLC, Ubisoft’s largest UK Games Studio and just last autumn (2021) the BBC announced its biggest investment in the North East of England for decades, as part of a new partnership with the region. There has been an influx of digital and tech businesses moving to the city, creating hundreds of valuable jobs, and making a significant contribution to the economy. Recent investors include Tokyo-based Monstarlab, Chicago- headquartered Thoughtworks, and Leeds-based BJSS, with further announcements due. Confidence remains high that in2022, investor confidence in Newcastle’s tech sector will reach new heights with further steady and lasting growth that will benefit the whole region. In autumn 2021 the BBC announced it will spend at least £25 million over the next five years, right across the North East, to fund network TV production, talent development and support for the creative sector. It’s part of a deal with local authorities in the North East, who will work with the BBC, and with independent producers, to

invest in talent, skills, and infrastructure to support the production industry in the region. The partnership is part of the BBC’s commitment to do more across the UK by moving departments, commissioning power and resources out of London. The BBC’s North East plans include: • A new BBC Daytime & Early Peak factual series produced from the North East. • A new creative partnership between BBC Three and BBC England to find and develop new factual TV ideas. • Award-winning BBC One documentary series Ambulance will follow the region’s emergency staff on the frontline for two series. • BBC Comedy will host a series of masterclasses and events across the North East to develop new talent and skills, while Newcastle will be the BBC’s first City of Comedy and will host this year’s New Comedy Awards. • In total, BBC TV will spend at least £25 million in the North East over the next five years. • In addition, the BBC will create 70 digital jobs based at a new tech hub in Newcastle. Jen Hartley of Invest Newcastle says the team will continue to seek out quality investments for the region in 2022 and beyond: “Despite our successes, we don’t rest on our laurels and will always look to secure further quality, inward investment, in key strategic and emerging sectors to add to the region’s growth and with it, secure many more, highly-skilled jobs for the region.” L FURTHER INFORMATION

•

860 new jobs in the Creative & Digital sector in 2021. The jobs come from both new investments into the city and expansions from companies already here.

•

New investors included BJSS, Thoughtworks, and Monstarlab.

•

Significant expansions included Refract and Opencast Software.

•

Number of new businesses and jobs predicted in 2021-22?

•

30+ new businesses.

•

10+ expansions.

•

more than 1,500 new jobs.

Sectors being targeted in 2022 and beyond: •

Heath and Life Sciencediagnostics/ health tech and digital health

•

Fintech

• •

Cyber security

•

Software development

•

Smart city

•

Games development

•

Clean/ Low carbon Energy

www.ngi.org.uk

SMART CITY BUSINESS | JANUARY 2022

Advertisement Feature

The critical role for local authorities in future-proofing the UK’s EV charging network Electric vehicles offer huge potential to reduce harmful transport emissions - but their adoption will need the support of local authorities and their planning expertise But for fast-charging hubs to be suitable for the local community, they need to be in high footfall areas - and ideally have ancillary services close by, so the charging ‘journey’ becomes part of daily life. Incorporating charging points into planning policies not only shapes the development of our communities, but also grows confidence in EVs among drivers - reducing carbon emissions, costs, and air pollution. For the biggest impact on air quality and budgets, high-use vehicle planning - buses, e-bikes, taxis etc - needs to come first.

Earlier this year the UK government announced the world’s most ambitious climate change target - pledging to cut harmful emissions by 78 per cent by 2035 and aiming to reach net zero by 2050. Among the factors required to achieve these promises, two, in particular, need the help and expertise of local authorities. These are: working to make our urban areas as sustainable as possible - and helping to enable the widespread adoption of private and commercial electric vehicles (EVs) by ensuring sufficient and convenient public charging infrastructure. Local authorities will need to play a significant role in solving these issues - not only because the solutions require forward-planning to future proof the UK’s urban areas, but also because local governments best understand their communities’ needs. But before we get to the solutions, it’s important to understand the wider issues. Transport remains the largest emitting sector of greenhouse gases in the UK, accountable for some 27 per cent of all emissions. With more than 80 per cent of the UK population living in urban areas, it’s clear that reducing transport-related emissions in our towns and cities will have a huge impact on meeting the government’s progressive targets. Today’s EVs contribute, on average, three times less CO2 than conventional petrol and diesel vehicles - meaning supporting the shift to EVs will have a significant impact on overall emission reduction. Yet there is a fundamental problem behind accelerating this transfer - a lack of space for charging facilities. This will become more critical when sales of new petrol and diesel vehicles are

banned from 2030, leading to millions more EVs on our roads. However, the evolution in EV technology, coupled with a change in approach in EV charging infrastructure, could largely address this problem. And it’s here that local authorities can play a key role. New technologies will help local authorities’ future-proof their urban areas Today’s EVs have significantly greater battery capacity compared to even a few years ago leading to greater ranges - now commonly above the 300 mile mark. Given the average daily usage of just 20 miles per car (and 15 miles in urban areas) most users only need to top up their batteries every twoweeks or so. Secondly, as battery capacity has improved, so too has charging power. Ten minutes on a 150kW rapid charger can add 100 miles, while two hours on a 25kW charge will add 200 miles. This matters because it affects which EV charging solutions are needed. One solution lies in public EV charging ‘hubs’ - with multiple fast or ultra-fast-charge points to provide a quick recharging experience, not dissimilar to filling a conventional car with petrol. Just ten mins on a rapid charger can add 100 miles range to EVs These hubs help solve the EV conundrum for people without off-street parking access, and for commercial drivers - allowing them to swing by for ten or twenty minutes, every week or two, to charge their vehicles for the days ahead.

BUSINESS SOLUTIONS FOR THE CITIES OF THE FUTURE | www.governmentbusiness.co.uk

Partnerships are the key to delivering truly Smart Cities Coverage and energy management are key considerations here. Local authorities should collaborate with utility companies to implement smart charging - and to ensure the grid can handle the additional electrical demands. Integrating charge point requirements into future development planning is also essential as installing charging points during a construction phase is far cheaper than retrofitting. Which brings us our last consideration for city planners - how quickly can they scale up with charging infrastructure, how and with whom do they partner, and what support is available? In terms of partnering - EV charging infrastructure needs are best addressed by a mix of solutions, with potential partners able to deliver multiple solutions in an adaptable, scalable way that supports the ethos of providing the most sustainable electricity to power your city. At Mer, this is one of the key attributes we believe sets us apart from other EV charging partners. We have extensive experience building EV charging networks in cities across Northern Europe - backed as we are by Norwegian renewable energy giant Statkraft. We have also installed fast, rapid/ultra-rapid charging up to 150kW with zero carbon and 100 per cent renewable energy from hydro, solar and wind. We are investing in the UK EV charging infrastructure and offer a fully funded solution for all public sector bodies. We promote roaming agreements and multiple payment methods for a simplified EV charging experience. To find out more, or to kickstart your program of EV charging deployment, download our EV charging checklist for public sector bodies here. L FURTHER INFORMATION uk.mer.eco

Electric vehicles

UK’s top cities for electric vehicle ownership named The best and worst cities to drive an electric vehicle in 2022 have been named in exclusive research by Forbes Advisor Forbes Advisor has used four ‘EV metrics’ by manufacturers, more than 40 per cent of to name the best and worst cities to drive models are now available as plug-ins. Indeed, an electric vehicle in 2022, with Sunderland the shift in customer preference for these new finishing top of the pile. According to the technologies continues apace, with December Society of Motor Manufacturers & Traders seeing BEVs take a record market share in a (SMMT), electric vehicles are growing in non-locked down trading month, accounting popularity, with nearly 750,000 new electric for 25.5 per cent of all new registrations. vehicles registered last year. The UK finished 2021 as the third largest Forbes Advisor analysed the cost of charging European market for new car registrations an EV at home, using regional data on the but the second largest by volume for plug-in average cost of electricity per kWh from vehicles and the second largest for BEVs. It The Dept for Business, Energy & Industry, is only in ninth position overall, however, in the number of standard EV charging points Europe for BEVs by market share, underlining per 100,000 people, the number of rapid EV the progress still to be made, despite the UK charging points per 100,000 people and the having among the most ambitious targets of number of rapid charging points per registered all major markets with the end of sale of new EV in the area. petrol and diesel cars scheduled for 2030. Each of the UK’s 20 most populated cities Petrol-powered vehicles, including mild were scored against each metric and assigned hybrids (MHEVs), remain Britain’s most with an overall ‘EV Accessibility Rating’ out popular powertrain, accounting for 58.3 per of 80 to arrive at a top 10 best and worst. cent of all new cars registered in 2021, with Sunderland was crowned the best city in diesel-powered cars including MHEVs making which to drive an EV, scoring 68 points out up 14.2 per cent of the market, followed by of 80, while London came in seventh place BEVs at 11.6 per cent, HEVs at 8.9 per cent scoring 49. and PHEVs at seven per cent. Behind Sunderland, the top five was Registrations by private buyers increased made up of Coventry, Newcastle, Leeds and by a moderate 7.4 per cent, while those Middlesbrough. Also in the top 10 were by businesses and large fleets fell by -4.4 Sheffield, Reading, Brighton and Cardiff. per cent and -4.7 per cent respectively, According to the table, the bottom in part due to supply shortages. 10 places in the UK to drive an Superminis remained Britain’s EV are Portsmouth, Leicester, most popular cars, with Sunder Liverpool, Belfast, Glasgow, 514,024 registrations, land Bournemouth, Edinburgh, followed by the lower has bee n Birmingham, Stoke-on-Trent medium (449,631) and crowne d the b and Manchester. dual purpose (443,632) e city in w st segments. drive an hich to SMMT data d ele 2021 was the most vehicle ctric successful year in history for electric vehicle uptake as more new battery electric vehicles (BEVs) were registered than over the previous five years combined, according to the SMMT. In total, 190,727 new BEVs joined Britain’s roads, along with 114,554 plug-in hybrids (PHEVs), meaning 18.5 per cent of all new cars registered in 2021 can be plugged in. This is in addition to the 147,246 hybrid electric vehicles (HEVs) registered which took a further 8.9 per cent market share in a bumper year for electrified car registrations, with 27.5 per cent of the total market now electrified in some form. Overall, 2021 new car registrations grew by a marginal one per cent on a pandemicravaged 2020, as 1.65 million new cars entered the UK market. Following billions of pounds of investment into new technology

Looking ahead, the latest forecast for 2022 – published in October, before the rise of the Omicron variant – is for 1.96 million new car registrations. Sunderland and Nissan Last Summer, Nissan unveiled Nissan EV36Zero, a £1 billion flagship Electric Vehicle Hub creating a world-first EV manufacturing ecosystem. Centred around the recordbreaking plant in Sunderland, it is hoped that Nissan EV36Zero will supercharge the company’s drive to carbon neutrality and establish a new 360-degree solution for zeroemission motoring. The transformational project was launched with an initial £1 billion investment by Nissan and its partners Envision AESC, a global player in worldleading battery technology, and Sunderland City Council. Comprised of three interconnected initiatives, Nissan EV36Zero brings together electric vehicles, renewable energy and battery production, setting a blueprint for the future of the automotive industry. As part of the £1 billion announcement, Nissan will invest up to £423 million to produce a new-generation all-electric vehicle in the UK. Building on Nissan’s expertise in crossovers and the worldwide success of the Nissan LEAF, it promises next-generation vehicle styling, efficiency and battery technology, making the switch to electric driving even more accessible. L FURTHER INFORMATION www.greenfleet.net

SMART CITY BUSINESS | JANUARY 2022

The smart choice for street lighting PLANet® CMS is the world leader in smart street lighting with over two million control nodes deployed Contact: David Orchard UK Sales dorchard@telensa.com 07500 608 205 telensa.com/contact

ADVANCED MAPPING INTERFACE provides unique ability to view large deployments on one screen. Includes geo-fencing, colourcoding, filtering & tagging functions. Google Maps enterprise mapping system with satellite & streetview SOPHISTICATED DIMMING & SWITCHING programs for any combination of lights or groups of lights: • Timed – at x-minute intervals • Sensor – algorithm-moderated sensor dimming e.g. from traffic sensors • System – algorithm-moderated dimming using data from other systems

FLEXIBLE HOSTING OPTIONS Customer, Telensa or third party INTEGRATION with leading Asset Management Systems (AMS) for automation of fault reporting and work orders ENERGY MANAGEMENT Revenue- grade energy consumption analysis and energy billing system integration SOPHISTICATED FAULT DIAGNOSIS using advanced modelling techniques. Saves money by improving first-time-fix rates MULTI-DISTRICT OPERATION A single area system can be shared and operated by different district municipalities WEB INTERFACE for remote access with multiple devices

Lighting

Using intelligent street lighting to drive towards digital roads New research has been carried out which will shed some light on how street lighting could be used to pave the way for autonomous vehicles in the future New research has been carried out which will near Birmingham. Drivers would have been shed some light on how street lighting could oblivious to the CCTV and communications be used to pave the way for autonomous technology hidden away in the street lamp as vehicles in the future it was installed when the lights were switched National Highways has said that closed to the improved, greener LED lighting. circuit television and wireless technology that The Illuminate trial took place over five enables vehicles to communicate is among months last year and successfully proved the kit that could be neatly stored inside the the concept. The technology was able to lanterns of street lights alongside the National communicate data to office equipment and Highways network. This could enable the tablet computers. Knowledge gained in the trial existing infrastructure to be employed in the will be used to help shape National Highways’ future to push out information on traffic strategy for managing the updates, speed limits and diversions – Connected and Autonomous helping vehicles to plan journeys (CAV) infrastructure. more effectively. National Highways Street Street lighting has is looking for lighting often been viewed as a technologies that has often b standalone asset but can effectively e e n viewed as a sta technology that has support n d but tec alone asset emerged in recent years autonomous could enable wider use vehicles so has em hnology that erged i of this vital infrastructure. they can push n recen years co With the roll-out of and receive t 5G and the Internet of messages across wider u uld enable se of th Things (IoT) infrastructures the network. is v infrastr lighting could be equipped These messages ucture ital with devices such as wireless could be about speed access points and cameras. limits, incidents, updates on clearance times – useful The Illuminate trial information to help drivers A ‘proof of concept’ trial on this intelligent plan their journeys. This would involve a street lighting has been carried out on the large-scale deployment of technology across the M40 junction 15 Longbridge roundabout network and street lights may be the answer.

Lisa Maric, National Highways’ Innovations Lead for the Midlands, said: “These are exciting times as we progress on our Digital Roads journey with the growth of digital technology and the move to electric, connected and autonomous vehicles that will fundamentally change how we use roads in the future. “National Highways is committed to ensuring we are at the forefront of this digital revolution and are preparing the way for the greener and safer roads of tomorrow. Initial trials such as Illuminate will help us identify new innovations, technology and methods to meet our digital goals. We were pleased with how Illuminate performed as a proof of concept and the useful knowledge gained as we continue to plan for the roads of the future.” The trial has been funded through National Highways’ Innovation and Modernisation Fund which is helping to maximise the opportunities offered by developments such as automated vehicles while putting safety at the forefront of emerging technologies. L FURTHER INFORMATION www.nationalhighways.co.uk

SMART CITY BUSINESS | JANUARY 2022

Telensa

Encouraging signs for smart lighting and the public sector Smart City Business (SCB) talks to David Orchard, Global Sales director at Telensa, about smart street lighting systems, the pandemic impact and what next for the lighting industry SCB: In what ways are smart streetlight systems beneficial to both local authorities and local communities? There are significant benefits to the local authority, and the communities they serve, after the move to streetlight smart controls. The overarching benefit is that the level of lighting provided no longer needs to be ‘one size fits all’. Adding connectivity and control nodes to each streetlight means each one can be managed individually, or as part of a small group, and provide differential lighting to that zone. As a result light levels can be tailored much more precisely, cutting energy consumption and making huge savings on energy bills. The software that sits behind a connected streetlight system gives all sorts of insights into the performance of each

light and its status. This makes operating and maintaining streetlights much more efficient and drastically cuts the time it takes to become aware of a fault and get it repaired. Communities feel they are getting better value for money and will notice the results of a more flexible lighting service.

SCB: To what extent have recent increases in the use of LED lighting led the way to higher investment in a smart street lighting system? We find that typically a council will move to smart streetlight controls at the same time as they deploy LED. LEDs are highly energy efficient using less energy for the same light output so a LED streetlight deployment supports council wide initiatives to become net zero and reduce their energy bills. These

We workin are council g with s ‘traffic to provide adaptiv lighting ’ b e c ause lige empty ht r neededoads to the le ing vel w busy is hen they are wastefu l

BUSINESS SOLUTIONS FOR THE CITIES OF THE FUTURE | www.governmentbusiness.co.uk

efficiency and sustainability requirements can be further supported by adding smart controls which will typically add further energy savings of around 20 per cent. We are also seeing examples of councils who previously invested only in LED lighting without any controls now upgrading to a smart lighting system as they can now see the benefits around increased flexibility in their lighting service.

SCB: Aside from the potential for reduced energy consumption, what is the business case for wider benefits when adopting street lighting with controls? Smart controls make it much easier to operate and maintain streetlights. For example each control node, which sits on top of the streetlight, contains a GPS chip giving precise location data. This is then matched with data about

that light’s performance and status which is all captured in the central software system in realtime. Automatic alerts and alarmed thresholds can then be used to improve both ‘mean time to respond’ and ‘first time to fix’ faulty lights. There are many other benefits. One qualitative benefit of smart street lights is being able to employ ‘Dark Skies’ principles to protect wildlife and prevent unnecessary light pollution in sections of the borough or at certain times of the night. The very nature of street lights means they are conveniently located and spaced regularly as well as provide constant power so they are ideal for adding additional sensing features like traffic & air quality monitoring which can be used in conjunction with the lighting to provide enhanced services.

SCB: How has the Covid-19 pandemic affected the roll-out of smart lighting in the UK? During 2020/21 the roll out of street lighting, including smart lighting controls, continued pretty much unaffected. Although we are seeing a renewed focus on energy savings and a ‘build back better’ mentality as we come

out of the crisis there are definitely challenges around funding and resource which is affecting the pace at which these projects go ahead and the energy savings they could provide.

SCB: Given the energy consumption of streetlights and the growing awareness of the public towards energy efficiency and climate considerations, where does the industry go next? This greater awareness is leading to a much sharper focus on decarbonisation and energy efficiency both within councils and via pressure from residents. Adding smart controls to streetlights is low-hanging fruit. It’s simple to do and it pays for itself in terms of energy and efficiency savings. Yet there are still over 30 per cent of councils in the UK which are yet to make this move. Those that have already taken the step to smart controls are now looking at how they can build on what they have to add other features for additional benefits. So we are working with councils to provide ‘traffic adaptive lighting’ because lighting empty roads to the level needed when they

Telensa

There are significant benefits to the local authority, and the communities they serve, after the move to streetlight smart controls. The overarching benefit is that the level of lighting provided no longer needs to be ‘one size fits all’ are busy is wasteful. And with the software and connectivity already deployed, councils have an infrastructure onto which they can add other smart systems which will make their communities even more attractive places in which to work, live and play. L

David has extensive lighting experience having spent more than 15 years working in the industry. Recently elected as a member representative on the Highway Electrical Association (HEA) council, David is also the Global Sales Director at Telensa. He has helped many cities deploy their first at-scale smart streetlight system and wider smart city applications. Before joining Telensa, David held positions at Zumbtobel, General Electric & Philips. Recently acquired by global lighting company Signify, Telensa provides smart streetlight solutions helping cities, utilities and local government organisations around the world to reduce their energy consumption and carbon emissions. FURTHER INFORMATION www.telensa.com

SMART CITY BUSINESS | JANUARY 2022

Security

Connected Places Cyber Security Principles Guidance from the National Cyber Security Centre seeks to help authorities build awareness and understanding of the security considerations needed to design, build, and manage their smart cities In May, the NCSC published a set and operated in a secure manner. It is split of principles for local and national into three sections: understanding your authorities outlining how to securely connected place; designing your connected design, manage and build smart cities. place; and managing your connected place. Connected places – which include smart The fundamental aim of a connected cities and connected rural environments place is to enhance the quality of living – use networked technology like Internet for citizens through collaborative, of Things (IoT) devices and sensors to interactive, and connected technology. improve the efficiency of services and The systems that these functions and therefore the quality of citizens’ lives. services rely on will be moving, processing, Examples of smart city technology include and storing sensitive data, as well as the use of sensors to monitor pollution controlling ccritical operational technology. levels to reduce emissions, parking sensors Unfortunately, this makes these systems to offer real-time information on space an attractive target for a range of threat availability and traffic lights actors. A connected place will be an configured to cut congestion. evolving ecosystem, comprising This technology can a range of systems that help councils work exchange data, which will W towards net zero only add further risks. smart c hile i t carbon, deliver a If connected systems i e s o s ffer ignifica more sustainable are compromised, to citize nt benefits environment and the consequences ns, they improve service could impact the are also po efficiency. local citizens. Impacts t e n tial targets While smart could range from for cyb cities offer breaches of privacy to er a t t a cks significant benefits the disruption or failure to citizens, they are of critical functions. This also potential targets could mean destructive for cyber attacks due to the impacts, which in some critical functions they provide cases could endanger the local and sensitive data they process, often citizens. There could also be impacts to in large volumes. The compromise of the local authorities that are attacked. a single system in a smart city could These could include a loss of reputation potentially have a negative impact that could affect citizen participation, across the network, if badly designed. or the financial impacts of dealing The publication of Connected Places with the aftereffects of an attack. Cyber Security Principles is intended to The most important first step in mitigate these risks by helping CISOs, understanding a connected place is to cyber security architects and other gain a clear and complete understanding relevant personnel consider the high level of your connected place goals and security requirements and principles that ambitions. This will help determine which should govern smart cities in the UK. parts are critical and identify. Questions to be asked include: who has overall The challenges of responsibility and accountability for your connected places connected place?; what dependencies The principles highlight key considerations does your connected place have?; what is that you need to keep in mind to ensure dependent on your connected place? What your connected place is designed, built, obligations do you have to the surrounding

BUSINESS SOLUTIONS FOR THE CITIES OF THE FUTURE | www.governmentbusiness.co.uk

area or your citizens?; And what will your sensor and IoT network look like? The risk owners within your connected place will need to determine what impacts they are not willing to accept within their connected place system. Examples could include events such as technology faults or cyber attacks that may cause traffic lights to change, thereby increasing the risk of car crashes, or databases of sensitive data being openly available to the public. The risk owners of the connected place should work out what is most important to the operability of their services (this could be the data your connected data stores or transfers, or the underlying architecture it relies upon) and then understand and make some assumptions about the threats they may face. The NCSC says that risk decision makers could break the impacts down into sections to simplify analysis and decision making, for example using confidentiality, integrity, and availability for data risks. Here is an example of how these criteria might inform decision making. Similar analysis should take place to identify risks around hardware, software and configuration.

Cyber security governance and skills Connected place cyber security needs to be owned, governed and promoted at the top level of the organisation that is responsible for the risk structure for both service resilience and user privacy. This accountability cannot be outsourced to suppliers. Essential tasks such as short and long-term planning need to be facilitated to support the local area and its citizens. Over time, the services and functions of the connected place will become embedded within the everyday lives

of its citizens. Therefore, you need to ensure that the connected place has the resources and funding available for its upkeep such as operational security, and improving future services in line with technological advances. This also needs to include security considerations behind the development, upgrading, and improvement of the technology to be able to deal with evolving threats and new capabilities. Tasks you need to think about incorporating into your governance process include investing in risk management and trusting your decision makers.

Security

The publication of Connected Places Cyber Security Principles is intended to mitigate these risks by helping CISOs, cyber security architects and other relevant personnel consider the high level security requirements and principles that should govern smart cities in the UK

Designing connected place architecture You need to ensure that your connected place architecture is designed securely. Your designs need to take into consideration the logical separation (or ‘zones of trust’) of your connected place network and identify critical security boundaries. This should not be limited to the cyber domain but also the cyber-physical (dual redundant sensors and/or actuators), and the physical space (such as diverse power supplies or communication routes). This ensures that if an incident occurs due to component failure or cyber attack, the impact is localised and failover options exist. You need to assess what protections are needed within your connected place. As with Principle 2, you need to understand and make assumptions about the threats your connected place may face, and analyse and deal with those top candidate threats. You then need to use methods such as threat modelling to identify how your connected place may be exploited (using STRIDE, for example). You will need to model your connected place by: considering the importance of the services available, the operational data it relies on, and the privacy of citizen data that is held within your connected place. You then need to understand what the potential negative impacts may be if these were to be affected; considering the internal or external events or attacks that may take place; considering the threats and potential vulnerabilities over the horizon such as quantum computing; and considering each component within your connected place, how it protects itself from attack by making compromise harder, and how compromise is detected to be able to respond quicker. When designing your connected place’s architecture, considerations should include: understanding of the data that your system will ingest and its originating source; consideration of which elements of your system need to have the highest levels of trust; and understanding of how data that services are responsible for are protected when at rest and in transit. You also need to implement products, protocols and algorithms to enable authentication, authorisation, and the protection of your data in transit. Where practical, you should look to implement: the latest versions of products to close vulnerabilities before attackers can exploit them; products that will give you the right level of confidence of their security ability; operational technology products and components supported by vulnerability management processes including consistent patching cycles; the latest versions of secure protocols, deployed correctly so your data is encrypted to stop attackers being able to view and manipulate it; and strong cryptographic algorithms that provide you the right level of protection required. L FURTHER INFORMATION www.ncsc.gov.uk

SMART CITY BUSINESS | JANUARY 2022

Earning Civic Dollars is a walk in the park

(L-R) Stephen McPeake, CEO of Civic Dollars, Belfast Lord Mayor Councillor Kate Nicholl and NI Justice Minister, Naomi Long launch the new ‘Civic Dollars’ mobile phone app. www.belfastcity.gov.uk/amazingspaces

A new ‘Civic Dollars’ mobile phone app, developed with support from Belfast City Council and the Department of Justice, means that people can now earn rewards for the time they spend in their local parks and open spaces. The Connswater Community Greenway will be the first area to go live, followed by other parks across the city. Funded through the ‘Amazing Spaces, Smart Places’ project, the scheme is part of the council’s Smart Belfast programme, which is exploring how data and innovative technologies can create smart solutions to improve city services.

Lord Mayor Councillor Kate Nicholl said: “Exercising outside and connecting with nature really can help our mental well-being. So it’s fantastic that people can now earn Civic Dollars for the time they spend in our parks and open spaces. They can enjoy rewards including public transport passes and tickets to visitor attractions or support their local community group by donating Civic Dollars to them. “The Civic Dollars app also provides insights that will help us understand how people use green spaces, improve park management, reduce littering and anti-social behaviour and enhance the visitor experience.”

A number of Belfast-based community groups can benefit from donated Civic Dollars, exchanging them for various services such as training, professional advice and activity centre sessions. Naomi Long, NI Justice Minister, said: “Effectively managing public open spaces is a key element in developing a safe community, where we respect the law and each other. The Civic Dollars pilot scheme holds the potential to deliver real benefits to local communities by using technology to improve the safe use of our parks and open spaces; something that is so important for both physical and mental health. Congratulations to all involved in this innovative pilot scheme and I look forward to hearing how it has progressed as more people use it in the coming weeks and months.” Stephen McPeake added: “Our focus is about improving communities, and our own health and wellbeing – Civic Dollars provides the perfect solution with a new community currency!” L FURTHER INFORMATION www.civicdollars.com

ADVERTISERS INDEX The publishers accept no responsibility for errors or omissions in this free service

ClimateView 12,13

Korec Group

Mer Charging

Telensa 22-25

BUSINESS SOLUTIONS FOR THE CITIES OF THE FUTURE | www.governmentbusiness.co.uk

Empowering Cities Enabling MaaS News!

Dashboard Transport network Ticketing MaaS Boutique Settings

Home

157

Users

More details

Help

Search for a route

Shall we go?

Banners

Home

Disruptions

More details

Work Network map General map

Itinerary Timetables

Buy

Manage your mobility policies Promote intermodal travel Reach your sustainability goals

We are part of the Crown Commercial Service Digital Marketplace instant-system.com

Business Information for Local and Central Government

Click here for your FREE subscription and to receive the latest issue and newsletter direct to your inbox Published by

020 8532 0055 www.psi-media.co.uk