Innovation: From ENEA a model for the smart city of the future

ENEA has developed a model of the city of the future with hi-tech solutions and tools for homes and urban environments based on energy and water saving, safety, health and living comfort of people, circular economy and environmental monitoring as well as co-governance and involvement in local  community life. Some solutions have already been tested in a few Rome  neighborhoods  and in other Italian Municipalities and subsequently qualified within the Smart Village of the ENEA Casaccia Research Center.

The findings of this roadmap to the smart city of the future stemmed from a collaboration with the main national universities, as part of the project "Development of an Integrated Smart Urban District Model" of the Program Agreement with the Ministry of Economic Development[1].

The model, which directly operates in urban contexts, envisages three areas of application: aggregated services for buildings, energy-intensive public infrastructures and smart communities. At the horizontal level, an ICT integration platform was developed, Smart City Platform, capable of connecting all urban services to the district platform and integrating the prototypes and innovative solutions created.

The technologies integrated into the replicable model of the city of the future include:

• smart home based on a series of low-cost and minimally invasive sensors, capable of conducting energy-environmental monitoring in homes, report security break-ins and monitor people's health.  Among the technologies used,  "Sesto Senso" a multisensory system patented by ENEA and based on specialized algorithms, which allows  to detect the number of people present in an environment and perform acoustic analysis and CO2 levels assessment;

• smart building, an innovative building implemented by a photovoltaic system, batteries for the accumulation and innovative management of energy flows, capable of reducing the need for exchange with the electricity grid, thereby abating costs for the end user;

• smart street; with solutions for parking monitoring , detecting infractions or access in sensitive areas, monitoring noise pollution and air quality, detecting critical situations (e.g. flooding) and charging electric vehicles;

• smart lights equipped with connectivity and sensors to remotely and automatically adjust the intensity of public LED lighting - with costs reduced by up to 80% - and acquire data on traffic flows and environmental condit

• Risk assessment software for  energy and water infrastructures , in the event of extreme weather events such as heavy rainfall, flooding or earthquakes, with damage estimates;
• drone-based system for energy monitoring of energy-intensive buildings, analysis of air quality through video and infrared thermographs, and calculation of heat losses and pollutant concentration;

• management of water and organic waste with solutions to identify water losses in real time both for individual users and urban districts; automated management and control of wastewater treatment plants, thanks to a system patented by ENEA, which allows significant savings in electricity consumption; reducing sewage  spills  in water bodies during periods of rain thanks to Early Warning and Real Time Control systems; energy labeling of waste water treatment plants by introducing appropriate efficiency classes; community composting for the enhancement of food waste;

• national platform for monitoring and evaluating consumption of energy-intensive public infrastructures , based on a standardized and homogeneous map of identity and consumption data for an actual national register

• Social Urban Network, a methodology already tested in the Centocelle neighborhood in Rome for the development of a local smart community and the promotion of co-governance, participation in community life and sustainable behaviour thanks to training and organizational processes, living labs and ICT technologies.

“As part of the project, in addition to developing actual prototypes for real-time management of integrated urban services and to facilitate the operational management of the city, adaptive solutions, performance evaluation systems, diagnostics, optimization and software for real-time data communication were implemented”, project manager Claudia Meloni of the ENEA Smart Energy Division, pointed out.

“Furthermore, with over 31 scientific articles,  workshops and participations in national tables and international networks, activities of dissemination and involvement of operators and local administrations were promoted in order to complement the technological revolution with a parallel cultural revolution, for bringing new technologies and management models to the market, to companies and to Municipalities, also through training and implementation of websites for the communication of research findings ", Meloni concluded.

For more information please contact:

Claudia Meloni, ENEA - Smart Energy Division  claudia.meloni@enea.it

Smart Urban Evolution www.sue.enea.it

Smart Italy Goal http://sue.enea.it/smartitaly-goal-convergenza-nazionale-per-lo-sviluppo-delle-smart-city/

[1] Three-year Research and Development Plan, area "Energy efficiency and energy saving in electrical end-uses and interaction with other energy carriers", research topic "Smart cities and smart communities"