2013 Global Smart Infrastructure - A Future of Smart Cities and Artificial Intelligence

A global transformation of our society is underway based on smart infrastructure

Smart cities are going to be amazing community hubs which will be more sustainable, efficient and supportive of citizens. The concept of smart communities is based on intelligent infrastructure such as broadband (fibre and wireless) and smart grids, which will create connected and sustainable communities. Around the world there are already examples of smart cities emerging and many countries have developed plans for smart infrastructure. However before these smart communities can be built properly; trans-sector policies and holistic strategies should be carefully considered and developed.

The infrastructure systems used in cities around the world to manage water, energy, food supply, transport, communication, economic and social structures are faltering. Cities are the major polluters as they generate the vast bulk of CO2 emissions. Half of the world’s population are already city-dwellers, and this trend towards increased urbanization is accelerating rapidly. The future of the majority of the world’s citizens is undeniably urban – 70% will live in cities by 2050. But how exactly that city of tomorrow will look and how smart living is implemented and experienced remains largely uncertain and will most likely vary around the world.

Due to the many global economic, social and environmental issues – it has become imperative that we must now look at every opportunity to build smarter communities. These should incorporate cross-sector public safety, carbon neutral, state of the art communications networks - linked to a new generation of social services provided by government, such as e-government, e-health and e-education.

Leadership from the top is needed if this is to be achieved. It is called the trans-sector approach and ICT is the glue needed to build more horizontal collaborative structures. Whether we are talking about smart cities, smart transport, smart grids, smart buildings or e-health – what is needed is useful data that can be analysed in real time, allowing people and/or machines to make instant decisions in relation to energy efficiency, traffic situations, weather activities, and personal health issues - as well as commercial decisions. Smart infrastructure and the development of machine-to-machine (M2M) is what is needed to link these sectors together in a dynamic way.

It is becoming clearer that we may have reached a ceiling in our intellectual ability to address the complex issues that society is facing. Society lacks the capacity that is required to address the holistic nature of the current challenges. Without that analytic capacity it will be impossible to come up with the right answers. We have arrived at times like this before in our history and they typically led to collapses of civilisations and the arrival of serious declines in living standards. If we are to avoid similar calamities, we need to break through that ceiling and find new tools to help us to create a smarter society – and developments in Artificial intelligence (AI) may assist this.

BuddeComm’s new report, Global Smart Infrastructure – A Future of Smart Cities and Artificial Intelligence, provides important insights into why smart communities and smart cities are the way forward and will play an important role in the world’s future. This unique report also includes information on smart transport, home area networks and artificial intelligence. In addition it includes valuable examples of smart city developments from selected countries across Asia-Pacific, Middle East and Europe.

Examples of key insights:

• The world is facing a significant number of challenges. The key problem associated with these challenges is a lack of smart government policies that are based on integrated solutions crossing sector boundaries. Political leadership is needed to address these issues.
• It has become increasingly clear that smart grids are able to transform the energy industry, and that a much broader group of industries are also affected by this including IT, telecoms, white goods, renewables, storage, transport.
• ‘Smart’ means communication and many countries are currently addressing their broadband infrastructure. Of course, a smart thing to do would be to roll out fast broadband infrastructure in combination with smart grids and, wherever applicable, other smart infrastructure – leading to the creation of the right environment for the smart societies of the future.
• Ever since cities started to emerge it became apparent that such social hubs are the centre of knowledge, innovation and social and economic interaction. Large cities contain a vast pool of human capital that can be tapped into for solutions and the world is just at the tip of the iceberg on capitalising upon the potential of smart cities.
• There are already billions of dollars being invested each year in smart city technology and infrastructure - and this is expected to continue to rise significantly.
• Broadband infrastructure and technology advancements are leading to intelligent home area networks that can assist in controlling indoor climates and monitoring energy use.
• Across Europe in 2013; governments and telcos are cooperating to create smart cities in a bid to give urban development an economic competitive advantage.
• The eyes of the telecommunication and digital economy world are on Australia where a large-scale integrated national broadband infrastructure is being deployed. This is directed, not solely at supplying high-speed internet access, but primarily at facilitating trans-sector policies aimed at developing smart communities.
• Singapore has made great strides with its ‘intelligent nation’ strategy.
• There are numerous examples of smart infrastructure deployment in the United Arab Emirates.

Data in this report is the latest available at the time of preparation and may not be for the current year