Design Case for Building a Smart City

How we define a smart city today is different for most of us. In this era of smart gadgets and ubiquitous connectivity, most of the times we describe it as information communication technology driven development which will be enhanced by cloud connected devices. Building intelligent interactive environments with embedded systems into physical objects, infrastructures, and the surroundings in which we live, travel, and work.

Artificial intelligence and Internet of Things is the cutting edge requirement in every product development today but if we see the big picture, a Smart City should be really described as a self sustaining city which is not only well connected with public transit, smart buildings with energy management devices but zero waste, uses renewable energy resources, stimulating economic growth, reducing poverty. In nut shell a city with a smaller carbon footprint.

 

Building Components of a Smart City

There are various indicators used to rank a smart city. These indicators as presented by various research groups that measure the city include built environment, mobility, government policies, economic development, education, well being and life style.

We need to remember the real thing is using our resources efficiently – reduce, reuse and recycle items used in our daily life. Purposefully using waste materials for building and manufacturing products. Some examples are use of dual purpose elements like a building integrated photovoltaic glazing which provides renewable energy onsite and reduces material usage, using recycled materials in manufacturing, including the use of water efficiently or passive designing of city infrastructure for less need for air conditioning in summer and winter seasons and a well connected and easily accessible public transit to reduce traffic congestion and reducing GHG emissions. Reducing waste would be a key to reducing landfills in our city to reduce contamination of our water resources and vegetation. Similarly, for growing local agriculture buying more locally grown produce encourages local farmers and builds local economy. As developers and designers we need to think about these best practices when we develop a smart city infrastructure. Well connected urban infrastructure and suburbs designed efficiently which use less energy.

A smart city means a hi-tech intelligent city which can sustain population growth and provide job security for all community members. Transitioning to an automated city is a dream to move ourselves to a space-age era but carefully thinking of an economically well integrated city development plan will make it successful in years to come. Urbanization and well organized suburbs for community development increases the well being of the inhabitants.

A smart city is prepared to restore itself after any disaster. How well a city is digitally able to restore its connectedness, mobility, energy and water services is the most important factor of ranking a city to be an intelligent city. There is a need to provide education to the public to diminish any aspects of creating a digital divide which is an economic and social inequality with regard to access to, use of, or impact of information and communication technologies. We are looking in future for an intelligent environment where every device is seamlessly connected providing user friendly/ accessible experience for all classes.

The more enriched and connected the community the more growth we see. Active community neighborhoods with cultural bonding plays an important role in a city development. A city which makes everything accessible at your fingertips, is well connected, energy efficient and with flourishing community is why we need to build more smart city’s in future.

Social Platforms – A New Way towards Energy Efficiency

Author: Anuradha Munshi

Social platforms are ushering in a new way to promote energy efficiency. By using behavioral principles of goal setting, social comparison (comparing your energy efficiency with your neighbors), customized and personalized reporting, rewarding you for being energy efficient, blogging, trending, letting you share your success stories while following others’ and other incentives, these platforms are defining new inroads towards consumer engagement for achieving energy efficiency.

Leading the way in this venture are companies like Opower, Efficiency 2.0, Simple Energy, Tendril Inc to name a few. While these companies all have different approaches towards creating a social network for energy, yet their goal is the same: capture an audience that can be motivated to being much more energy efficient through online social interactions and engagements. Following the success of social networks like Facebook, these new ventures are aimed at creating the new social platform for energy. Some of their noteworthy aspects are captured below.

Opower – Opower today defines itself as a customer engagement platform for the utility industry. Its online tools are available through the 60 or more Utility providers that it has partnered with and consumers can benefit from them. Opower generates customized Home Energy Reports which are personalized; these give the user an analysis of their energy usage, and provide comparisons with their neighbors’ energy efficiency. Opower also has an online Marketplace that brings together utilities, retailers, manufacturers in the context of reward programs for utility customers. This marketplace allows users to take benefit of personalized rebates and coupons from their utilities which can be redeemed at retail stores, and helps increase customer-participation in the energy efficiency cycle. Their research shows that sharing individualized energy consumption analysis with users results in a nearly 80% increase in participation.

On the other hand Efficiency 2.0 has a unique Personal Energy Efficiency Rewards Program (PEER) which uses sophisticated evaluation criteria and makes use of four key behavioral insights to increase customer participation:

• Personalized Recommendations – As a recommendation engine that analyses and ranks actions and purchases based on factors like popularity and payback periods, PEER uses this data to send its customers personalized energy recommendations and savings estimates without any surveys or audits.
• Goal Tracking – It sends periodic emails to customers that track their progress in lowering their energy bills and also points out where they are using maximum energy.
• Social Context and Competition – Customers are able to see how energy savings compare to their neighbors and they can also compete for prizes.
• Rewarding Savings – PEER issues reward points to customers based on how much energy they save. These points can be redeemed for discounts at national and local stores.

Yet other companies like Tendril focus on creating the cloud platform, automation control of smart in-home energy devices, and energy social applications that become the backbone for communication for energy based social media. Based on research grounded in behavioral science, Tendril Energize allows energy service providers to meet customers where they are—through home energy reports, a web application, or mobile applications for the iPhone and Android—to spark an ongoing and evolving dialogue with today’s energy consumer.

The power of partnerships – Opower has recently announced a partnership with Facebook in creating a social energy application. Users will be able to compare their energy usage with friends, enter energy saving competitions and share tips on how to save energy. Commonwealth Edison (ComED), the city of Palo Alto (CA) and Glendale Water and Power (GWP) are the first U.S. utilities who will participate in this social app allowing their customers to automatically import their energy data into this app. Similarly Simple Energy and Tendril have partnered together in San Diego Gas and Electric (SDG&E) biggest energy saver campaign in CA and results indicate that on an average consumers were able to save 20% of their energy savings with this program. Tendril also has created partnerships for Electric Vehicles, leveraging their technology into other energy specific domains while still providing a social media interface for the consumer.

Government and the social energy platform – The Department of Energy is also moving towards social media platforms to educate users about energy efficiency. DOE’s website explains various initiatives that it is taking to orient itself around these ideas. Similarly, Lawrence Berkeley National Lab’s Home Energy Pros is yet another energy-based social media engagement platform which has a large number of registered participants already.

While it remains to be seen how these companies carry forward and translate their ideas into success, it is clear that there is now a new way of using social media platforms for promoting energy efficiency that is slowly and steadily gaining acceptance in the community. By forming strategic partnerships with utilities, with market leaders or with each other, and backed by behavioral research on user acceptance criteria of a platform, these companies are paving a new way of promoting energy efficiency efficiently among the masses.

BIPV – Building the Way to a Renewable Future

Author: Anuradha Munshi

Building Integrated Photovoltaics, also known as BIPV, are photovoltaic materials that can be directly embedded inside conventional parts of the building envelope, for example in a building’s roof, skylights, window overhangs and exterior wall façades. Once these photovoltaic materials are embedded, they can serve as primary or secondary sources of power to the building as they make use of the sun’s energy.

BIPV today offers a very viable alternative to traditional building materials as this
technology is increasingly being used in the construction of new buildings. Existing buildings can be retrofitted with BIPV as well. To the homeowner or the building investor who wants to go solar on the entire building, use clean energy and save on monthly electric bills, this is a very attractive option.

But there is another reason for its popularity: low initial cost. Other than simultaneously serving as the building envelope material and a power generator, a big advantage of using integrated photovoltaic materials in place of traditional materials in a building is that it reduces the initial cost by lowering the amount spent on materials and labor than would have otherwise been utilized with conventional building processes. This single factor alone makes BIPVs one of the fastest growing segments of the PV industry today.

BIPV Design Considerations

A BIPV system’s design has to be carefully planned and must take into account various factors like the building’s intended use, electrical loads, its location and orientation, the relevant building and safety codes, the utility provider’s own costs and issues and PV efficiency among other things. As an example, providing adequate ventilation is important during the BIPV process for maintaining the PV conversion efficiencies. When embedded in a building, PV efficiencies usually get reduced at elevated operating temperatures. To prevent or offset this from happening, the design should allow for appropriate ventilation behind the modules.

Another consideration when designing BIPV is to compare the peak building loads to the peak power outputs of the PV array. The analysis may reveal that an alternative backup should be integrated into the system to offset the most expensive power demand periods for the building. As another option to optimize system efficiency, a designer may also choose to capture and reuse the solar thermal resource that is developed through the heating of the modules. This can be a very attractive option specially when installing BIPV in cold places.

Another important design consideration is planning the orientation of the embedded PV array. Different orientations can have significant impact on the annual energy output of the system. Tilted arrays in a BIPV system usually generate 50% – 70% more electricity than a vertical façade would do. Similarly, shading effects must be considered for the design. For example, the system should be completely un-shaded for at least 3 hours on either side of the solar noon. The impact of shading is directly related to the output of the BIPV array.

Designers also need to carefully consider the impacts of the local environment and
climate to the PV array output.  For example, cold and clear days will increase the energy output of the array, while hot and overcast days can reduce the output. The BIPV arrays must be designed for potential snow and wind-loading conditions. As an example, proper tilt angles can help shed the snow faster. At the same time, surfaces like snow that reflect light can further increase the energy output of the array. This implies that a judicious mix of advantages should be considered when choosing the tilt angle keeping in mind local conditions for the building. Similarly BIPV arrays should also be designed for dry and dusty areas where constant washing may be required to control the efficiency losses.

As a general design practice, all loads experienced by the BIPV system in the
building should be minimized wherever possible. Energy efficient motors should
be deployed and designers should consider other such peak reduction strategies
for the BIPV system. Also, since the BIPV technology is relatively new, all design, installation and maintenance professionals should be properly trained, licensed and experienced in PV systems work.

Aesthetically, BIPV systems can be designed to blend with traditional building materials and designs, or they can be used to create unconventional futuristic looks, based on the choice of the building owner. Semi-transparent arrays of spaced crystalline cells can provide diffuse and interior natural lighting.

BIPV Research and Public Awareness

Solar Decathlon 2009 Home by Team Germany

 The U.S. Government believes that PV should be a widely accepted technology in the 21^st century with increasing number of solar powered homes and business that support and showcase the use of PV technology. The use of BIPV is supported by the Government in two distinct ways, i.e. by research and by raising awareness. BIPV technology is actively researched and improvised in many organizations like the National Renewable Energy Laboratory (NREL) where BIPV researchers investigate how to improve system reliability and reduce costs and utility transmission losses while further improving the market acceptance of this technology.

At the same time, the U.S. Department of Energy Solar Decathlon organizes the Solar Decathlon annual event, where 20 collegiate teams throughout the U.S. are challenged to design, build and operate solar- power homes that are cost-efficient and energy efficient while being attractive to the market. These teams spend about 2 years and design solar-powered homes that showcase technologies like BIPV to the world during these annual events. The decathlons are essential for not only motivating the emerging breed of students and engineers to think more about solar powered homes, but also in raising general public awareness, as people come, see and learn about these houses during these competitions.

BIPV as a technology is a very cost effective way towards building energy efficient homes and business establishments in our communities and societies. With properly guided design, ongoing research and increasing public awareness, BIPV can become a very effective medium to showcase solar technology and to increase its widespread use in the future.

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