Shaping sustainable cities in the Networked Society

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IntroductionThe world population is expected to soar to more than 9 billion people by 2050, with roughly 70 percent living in cities, according to the United Nations.1 At the same time, Information and Communication Technology (ICT) is extending its reach, with rapid deployment of broadband networks and most countries adopting national broadband plans to seize the potential of new technologies. Ericsson envisions that by 2020 there will be more than 50 billion connected devices globally.

These two parallel trends—the explosive growth of cities and the rapid uptake of broadband and ICT—are intersecting at a time in which the world faces serious eco-nomic, environmental, and social challenges to achieving a more sustainable development. In the Networked Society, future cities can thrive without taking a huge toll on already scarce resources.

Continuous transformationIn the Networked Society, people, knowledge, devices and informa-tion are networked for the progress of people, business and society. Fresh approaches are leveraged for higher efficiency and richer experiences—in short, a continu-ous transformation powered by

answer that question by describ-ing how the infrastructure in the Networked Society is a key enabler to solve global challenges faced by our cities, which have a vital role in helping to shape a low-carbon economy. We also explore how transformative ICT solutions are being deployed across industry segments as diverse as transport, building, utilities, health, banking, and the public sector.

Just getting startedWe are only on the brink of the Networked Society, which will have a major impact on how our cit-ies evolve. Ericsson has launched the Technology for Good program to reinforce how technology can be a force for good in the world, good for business, and to create an engagement platform with our stakeholders in order to develop the initiatives that will play a major role in redefining how we live our lives in the world’s future cities—connected as never before, but with a much lighter footprint on a fragile planet.

collaboration and creativity. Cities are a major source of global inno-vation, and increasingly provide the solutions to help make the world more sustainable. Solutions from e-health, telecommuting and video-meetings, to mobile applications can support citizens to choose a sustainable lifestyle. These new ap-proaches address negative trends such as climate change and social inequity, but have been limited in their uptake, partly because exist-ing policies and incentives lock us into traditional, non-sustainable patterns of doing things.

What elements need to be in place for sustainable cities in the Net-worked Society to deliver on their full promise? This paper aims to

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Sustainable development is widely regarded as “development that meets the needs of the present without compromising the ability of future generations to meet their own needs”2.

At Ericsson sustainable develop-ment involves the simultaneous pursuit of economic prosperity, environmental performance and social equity known as the triple bottom line and is a continually evolving process where the ‘des-tination’ is a set of characteristics of a future system.3 These charac-teristics include employment rates, business investments, innovation, access to healthcare and educa-tion, tonnes of CO

2 per person,

clean water and air, and access to safe food, raw material usage, waste recycling, data availability, social inclusion, and crime levels.

In the Networked Society, most of the world population will live within a culture defined by increased openness, transparency, knowl-edge sharing, peer collaboration and global self-organization. This will fundamentally change the way we orchestrate capabilities in so-ciety to innovate and collaborate, to create goods and services, to govern, and to sustain. ICT has the potential to converge into a single “creative network” critical for sus-tainable development.

Networked society – the key to sustainable cities In a sustainable city, leaders, policy makers and city officials are guided by the need for a holistic, long-term approach to sustainable development, and they actively work toward this goal.

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Cities have become the engine for humanity and drive development in all industries. Some 50,000 peo-ple across the globe move from rural to urban areas every day. The global urbanization trend makes cities focal points for future invest-ments. With more than US$350 tril-lion forecasted to be invested4 over the next 30 years in providing basic infrastructure, cities have the op-portunity to accelerate investments in projects that tap the transforma-tive potential of ICT to build cities that are more economically, envi-ronmentally and socially sound. 5This requires a bold vision—the difference between taking a giant leap and a small step forward. In a transformative solution, a physical meeting becomes a virtual meet-ing. In an incremental solution, a transportation system is optimized.

Cities at center of sustainable solutions development

So far most cities have taken small steps—missing the chance for reinvention. Too often, increased connectivity has accelerated unsustainable trends or marginally improved existing systems, rather than unleashing the imagination to envision an entirely new way of conducting the life of a city. Now, two changes are turning trans-formative solutions into concrete opportunities.

• Societyhasacceptedthemag-nitude of the challenges before us. For example, the debate on whether climate change exists has largely subsided; today’s focus is how to cope with it

• Fixedandmobilebroadbandinfrastructure deployment is increasingly ubiquitous. The quality of connectivity is now at a point where we can realize the full benefits of a networked city. The early days of video conferencing were an exercise in frustration; today, telepres-ence and web conferencing are increasingly the norm.

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A study conducted jointly by Ericsson, Arthur D. Little and Chalmers University of Technology in 33 OECD countries during 2011, quantifies the isolated impact of broadband speed. Doubling the broadband speed for an economy increases GDP by 0.3 percent, the study showed. A 0.3 percent GDP growth in the OECD region is equivalent to USD 126 billion. Both broadband availability and speed are strong drivers in an economy. In 2010, Ericsson and Arthur D. Little concluded that for every 10 percentage point increase in broadband penetration, GDP increases by 1 percent6.

In light of these findings, Ericsson has launched the Networked Soci-ety City Index7. This framework pro-vides city mayors, local authorities and decision makers with a tool to measure and assess a city’s ICT maturity and the resulting triple-bottom-line benefits. ICT maturity reflects ICT investment, taking into account network penetration, per-formance and level of use in each city assessed.

The index can be used to inspire dialogue with decision makers on how to use ICT to enable organi-zational and societal success. For example, it looks at how ICT can be part of increasing the access to and quality of healthcare and education, creating jobs, mobile money or virtual banks, reducing CO

2 emissions and other green-

house gases, optimizing resources such as water, reducing waste, and supporting citizens’ sustainable lifestyles.

From an environmental perspec-tive, there are still challenges in developing an index with environ-mental indicators, primarily due to lack of consistent data from cities. CO

2 emissions are however reason-

ably well developed as an indicator.

Boosting the triple bottom line with broadbandBroadband is an engine for growth while helping cities meet the three-pronged goals of sound environmental, social and economic development.

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Cities must therefore tackle the largest carbon reductions. In 2008, the Climate Group on behalf of the Global e-Sustainability Initiative (GeSI), with independent analysis by McKinsey & Company published the Smart 2020 report which found that ICT is a key sector in the fight against climate change and could enable emissions reductions of 7.8 Gt CO

2e in 2020, or 15% of

business-as-usual emissions. In economic terms, the ICT-enabled energy efficiency translates into approximately £600 billion ($946.5 billion) of cost savings. But the ICT industry must keep its own growing footprint in check to deliver on this potential.9

Since the landmark report in 2008, combined with wide-scale broad-band deployments in most parts of the world, many cities have already begun to explore transformative solutions focused on smarter ways to create the cities of the future. Here are just some of the transfor-mational possibilities in the daily life of a city, with the smart use of ICT.

Climate and energy• Smartbuildingsthatutilizecon-

nectivity for security, energy and climate monitoring, and are net producers of renewable energy

• Sensorsthataidinclimatead-aptation, warning, for example, of pending storms, increased water or pollution levels

• Smartenergysolutionsthataremore efficient and can improve currently very inefficient delivery in a fossil fuel-based economy

• Informationmanagementsys-tems to gather, track, control, and reconfigure to optimize and manage resources such as water and energy

Transportation• Integratedtransportationand

communication solutions, to substitute and optimize travel

Public sector• Connectingcitieswithsuburbs,

other cities and regions

• E-governmentservices,thatre-duce need of paper and reduce number of travels needed

Health• Digitalhealthandremotemoni-

toring solutions that support healthier lifestyles and reduce the need for travel and paper

• Foodinitiativeswhereitispos-sible to choose healthy and ap-petizing food with a low-carbon/water footprint and plan meals in order to avoid waste

Low-carbon solutions for sustainable citiesGlobal CO

2 emissions will need to drop by some 50 to 80 percent by 2050 compared

to 1990 levels, even as the world economy is expected to triple. Some 70 percent of global CO

2 emissions are estimated to come from cities. Yet national targets don’t

come close to these goals.8

Education• Cloudbasedcomputingsolu-

tions can transform how ICT is applied in formal education (schools, universities) as well as informed, lifelong learning

Sustainable lifestyles• Dematerializationthatallows

for consumption of a service instead of a manufactured prod-uct, for example, an e-book, video on demand, or a virtual meeting

Safety & security• Disasterandmanagementsolu-

tions that use remote sensor alarms alerting people at risk for severe weather or natural disas-ters

• Dataavailabilityprojectsthatprovide, for example, dynamic information to optimize systems while protecting personal integ-rity. This includes cloud services to optimize resources.

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Old perspective, 20th century physical infrastructure approach; Focus on ad-dressing current source of emissions, pollutions and other problems, often one at a time

New perspective 21st century information based infrastructure approach: Focus on smarter ways to provide what we need

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The Ericsson White Paper, Assess-ing the climate-positive effects of ICT, looks at the potential CO

2e

emission reductions of ICT-based services. A life-cycle perspective considers the environmental im-pact of both the ICT-based service and the service it replaces. The method includes analysis of the in-frastructure of ICT systems as well as conventional systems. It intro-duces a figure called the “potential reduction ratio”, the direct emis-sions of the new ICT-based system in CO

2e in relation to the enabling

effects in CO2e, ie compared to

the traditional way to deliver the service.10 Here are two cases.

The power of ICT-enabled transformationEricsson is deeply involved in demonstrating and measuring the transformative potential of ICT to enhance sustainable development.

Smart Work at TeliaSoneraEricsson, Swedish telecom opera-tor TeliaSonera, and the Centre for Sustainable Communications at the Royal Institute of Technology in Sweden, pooled efforts in 2010 to attempt to quantify the ICT sector’s own environmental impact and the difference it could make to other sectors.

Ericsson and TeliaSonera measured the impact of TeliaSonera’s use of ICT-based smart work solutions such as teleworking, flexi-working, virtual or telepresence conferenc-ing and flexi-office. TeliaSonera’s goal was to reduce air business travel, car travel and the need for office space. Using 2001 as a

baseline year, the study found that between 2001-2007:• Smartworkinitiativesreduced

CO2e emissions (CO

2 emissions

plus all other greenhouse gases and effects) by 40 percent per employee –or over 2.8 tons of CO

2e per employee per year

• Scalingtheresultstocountrylevel, the study found that similar initiatives could reduce some 20 percent of Sweden’s CO

2e by

2020

• Scalingtoagloballevelcouldpotentially reduce global CO

2e

emissions by 2 to 4 percent, if reductions of 20 to 40 percent were achieved per employee over a 10- to 20-year timeframe.

SMART WORK

2001

12.6k Employees

2007

11k Employees

200

100

kTonnes CO2e

E-health in CroatiaConnecting 2,400 primary health-care teams in the 20 counties and the capital, Zagreb, the Healthcare Networking Information System provides electronic reporting and booking, updates patient records, and digitalizes prescriptions and referrals, eliminating the need for printouts when sent to pharmacies, hospitals and laboratories. The e-referral and e-prescription ser-vices can potentially reduce CO

2e

emissions by up to 15,000 tonnes per year while the two services only add 330 tonnes of CO

2e/year

from operation and manufacturing activities.The potential reduction ratio over a 20-year period is as much as 1:45, depending on whether infrastruc-ture is included and, to what extent.

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Case studies available onhttp://www.ericsson.com/thecompany/sustainability_corporateresponsibility/enabling_a_low-carbon_economy/incremental_change

case studies

ICT service: CO2

Reduction ratio: Country:

m-Health > 20 Sweden

e-Health > 45 Croatia

Digital delivery Up to 200, -90% Spain

Smart work - 40% Sweden

Virtual presence Up to 200 Sweden, Global

m-Money > 65 Kenya

Field Force Mgmt Up to 100 Turkey

A number of additional cases have used this methodology .

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Top of the agenda for the design and progress of any city is to meet the strategic challenge implied in undertaking an environmental, so-cial, and economic perspective. ICT can support a city’s sustainability objectives, but identifying the road-map raises a number of questions:

• Howcanafuture-proofICTinfra-structure be built and integrated with already existing ICT sys-tems?

• Howcanacommoninfrastruc-ture provide services today and in the future to different stake-holders such as utilities, trans-portation, enterprises, consum-ers etc. in a resource- efficient way?

• Howdoesoneaddressthecomplexity of the eco-system, including designing a services eco-system that can scale and meet the needs of both current and future software and end-user device development?

• Howcanwemeetstakeholders’requirements for separation of services and different levels of security as well as the introduc-tion of new business models?

• Whichpartnersandclusterstoengage with in the eco-system?

• Howcancities,especiallyinde-veloping markets, leapfrog some of the unsustainable consump-tion patterns by utilizing broad-band infrastructure to a range of sectors that provide needed services to society?

A well-conceived strategy can deliver transformative solutions in a number of areas, including transportation, utilities, education, health and enterprises. Ericsson, as a leader in building efficient ICT in-frastructure, is involved in a number of interesting projects to develop future cities.

Controlling the meterIn Italy, Ericsson delivered a com-plete advanced metering manage-ment service to utility ACEA for 1.5 million electricity meters and a customized metering middleware systems integration and managed services. The benefits: a higher level of customer satisfaction, opera-tional efficiencies, increased energy distribution optimization and ef-ficiency, greater end-user/consumer awareness of environmental impact and improvement options and more home energy-management options.

Wireless busesIn Curitiba, Brazil, Ericsson pro-vided a solution connecting public buses to 3G mobile broadband net-works. The electronic ticketing and fleet management systems enable controllers to access a wide range of information about their fleet and monitors the route, stop time, speed, distance traveled, date of departure and arrival. The electronic ticketing reduces the need for pa-per. The fleet management system offers route optimization, reducing the fuel needed to run the fleet.

Innovative approaches to deliver servicesCities are a tremendous source of innovation. When integrated into key strategies and policies, ICT can spark new ways to develop cities in a more sustainable direction.

Virtual workEricsson Business Communication Suite (BCS) is a suite of applica-tions combining voice, data and messaging services with advanced multimedia conferencing and collaboration tools into a Uni-fied Communication (UC) offering towards the enterprise market. The Improved flexible and mobile ways of working heightens the efficiency of virtual meetings and cuts back on the need for onsite meetings, resulting in less travel.

Education, up in the cloudsWith PC as a Service, Ericsson employs a cloud infrastructure, allowing hardware (computing), software, security and storage as a service, an innovation with exciting. possibilities for example, small to medium-sized enterprises and education. Cost of owner-ship shrinks by 40 percent with a lower upfront cost than traditional computing. Low power consump-tion is another plus. All together, the reduced total cost of ownership gives more people the opportunity to get an education. Virtual educa-tion also translates into less paper and travel.

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The sustainable city value chain comprises several interconnected layers relevant to ICT:•Infrastructure–Includinghigh

speed broadband (fixed and mobile)

•Enablers–Supportsystemstoenable infrastructure to work effectively (including smart me-tering, billing, security, applica-tion/content management, and network management systems)

•Devices–IncludingPCs,phones, tablets, in-home de-vices that can be used to deploy smart city applications

•Applications–toprovidebusi-nesses and consumers with solutions to live and work effi-ciently while minimizing environ-mental impacts (e.g. e-ticketing, e-government, e-metering solutions).

A range of stakeholders need to work in partnership to develop, build and operate this complex and interconnected value chain. This includes governments, ICT infrastructure and service provid-ers, content providers, and 3rd party service providers. Ericsson provides support for stakeholders for the different value layers. For example one of the foundations for a sustainable city is the broadband infrastructure. With that in place, a number of services and solutions can be delivered, for example: mobile healthcare, online educa-tion, and e-government. Citizens and officials realize greater op-portunities for increased educa-tion levels, access to health care and to governmental services, and more efficient transportation systems. Finally, many applica-tions can function jointly in order to

Sustainable city value chain

3rd Party Service Providers

Value Layer

Businesses Residents

Stakeholders

Applications

E-ticketing, E-metering, E-Government

Infrastructure

Buildings, Ducts, Pipes

Devices

Mobile Phones, NFC Devices, Touch Screen

Enabling

Metering, NFC Infrastructure, Toll Systems

ICT Providers /Telcos

Content Providers

GovernmentMunicipalities

ICTServices and Lifestyle Applications

BillingPaymentTransactions

ContentProvision

Enabling Platform Management

Network Enabling

Service EnablingBilling,

Accounting,Payment,

(CRM)

Application/ContentMgmt.

System

Network

Today ICT is responsible for 2% of global CO

2 emissions,

but the enabling effect from a well-functioning broadband infrastructure constitutes the backbone of a low-carbon 21st century information in-frastructure. In 2009 Ericsson introduced a five-year target to reduce our carbon footprint (measured per subscriber) by 40 percent, i.e. 10 percent reduction per year with 2008 as baseline. Ericsson uses a life cycle approach (LCA) and Design for Environment (DfE) techniques to identify and minimize our environmental impact.. Our LCA approach includes supplier and operator activities, offering a full picture of the value chain. This covers product use, which represents the lion’s share of our carbon-related impact. The LCA tool can model the impacts of changes introduced today over a 15-year time horizon.

generate more value; for example, combining on-line mobile phone data with positioning information yields dynamic information about the transportation system such as a bus delay or traffic jam.

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Stockholm was the first city to be awarded the European Green Capital title in 2010. The city of Stockholm operates with a ho-listic vision, one which combines growth with sustainable develop-ment for the benefit of its almost 850,000 citizens. Transport emis-sions are relatively low, and all trains and many inner city buses run on renewable fuels. Further-more, greenhouse gas emissions have been reduced by more than 25 percent since 1990, and the city council has the ambitious target of becoming wholly independent of fossil fuels by 2050.11

A new urban district – Stockholm Royal Seaport – is being developed in east central Stockholm near the Royal National Urban Park. Be-tween 2012 and 2030 about 10,000 homes and 30,000 workspaces will be created. Modern architecture merges with environmental think-ing to create a vibrant district for sustainable living, business and recreation. The Stockholm Royal Seaport aims to be an international model for sustainable urban devel-opment. The vision is supported by four overarching goals in the areas of climate change and ecologi-cal, social and economic sustain-ability. Advanced ICT services will be available for those living in the Stockholm Royal Seaport to sup-port these goals, such as reduc-ing CO

2 emissions and changing

consumption patterns.12

The city of Stockholm has initiated Stockholm Royal Seaport Innova-tion, an arena for innovation, learn-ing and cooperation within sustain-able urban development. Several research and development projects have been launched with partners, including the Royal Institute of Technology, the Clinton Climate Initiative/C40, VINNOVA and com-panies dedicated to sustainability including Ericsson.

Ericsson’s contribution to the Stockholm Royal Seaport project is two-fold. The first, within the frame-work of Stockholm Royal Seaport Innovation, is to serve as ICT advi-sor to the city of Stockholm in the Stockholm Royal Seaport project and to lead the work on develop-ing an efficient and reliable generic communication platform as well as leading the project to develop selected proof points . The generic communication platform for fixed and mobile broadband will serve different industry segments and applications in areas such as vir-

Stockholm Royal SeaportAs ICT advisor to the city of Stockholm in the ambitious, world-class Stockholm Royal Seaport project, Ericsson is helping to enable a smart grid to connect the sustainable city of the future.

tual meetings, intelligent transport solutions, e- and m-health, smart grid, education, smart consump-tion. The idea is to demonstrate how different ICT solutions such as substituting and optimizing trans-portation, virtual meetings, and health solutions can contribute to the overarching goals of Stockholm Royal Seaport.

The second main contribution from Ericsson is the communica-tion enablers in the Innovation Project such as “Stockholm Royal Seaport- Smart Grid Pilot” and “Urban Smart Grid”. This project is aimed at developing a sustain-able electricity system in an urban environment and will be a platform for future business and product development. This will enable con-nected homes, meters, buildings, vehicles and harbours—a prime example of the Networked Society. Since a smart grid also implies new business models, another goal is to build clusters to explore new busi-ness opportunities.

Goals of Stockholm Royal Seaport

•By2030,freeoffossilfuelsandclimatepositive

•Adaptedtoclimatechange

•Highenvironmentalandsustainabilitygoals for all sectors

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• Creatinganintegratedpolicyframework that makes the link between ICT policy and policy in other areas such as education, health, and transportation. Review of current policies that influence the provision of key services such as mobility, housing and nutrition

• Supportingpolicymakersinthecreation of cross-sector ecosys-tems and clusters comprising companies, cities, academia, and other stakeholders. Many of today’s solutions are provided by clusters of companies that have optimized their supply chains and developed their business models in a high-carbon economy. In order to enable transformative solutions, we’ll need new clusters

• Providingpilotprojectsandcasestudies that demonstrate the ability of ICT to realize sustain-able development goals, such as carbon reduction, employment, and education

• Acceleratingtechnologythatsup-ports triple bottom line goals. Cit-ies can encourage connectivity by initiating projects that explore the possibilities of the Networked So-ciety. Leading cities, for example, can monitor use of connectivity, benchmarking against other cities and traditional service to track the triple bottom line impacts.

Creating the framework for the sustainable city Ericsson is engaged in the following areas that we have identified as necessary to enable the deployment of transformative solutions.

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• ICTiscentraltotheabilityofcitiestogrowinawaythatiseconomically, socially and environmentally sustainable—meeting the goals of the triple bottom line. The generic communication platform for fixed and mobile broadband will serve different industry segments and applications, to the benefit of all sectors

• Policymakersandcityofficialshaveapivotalroleinidentifying and implementing strategies that drive ICT as a means to strengthen the triple bottom line and provide transformative solutions for more resource-efficient delivery of services. Planning, developing and governing a city for a sustainable future requires a holistic perspective, measures impacts and adjusts directions as needed

• Recognizingtheneedfornewbusinessmodelsandeco-systems and partnerships is essential to address the needs of the sustainable city

• ICTcanactivelymeetpeople’sneedswhilesupportingmoresustainable urban lifestyles. Strategies need to offer the right incentives to support a change in behavior.

As broadband infrastructure extends its reach in every corner of the globe, we are only on the brink of what the Networked Society can deliver. With its Technology for Good program and other initiatives to shape more sustainable cities, Ericsson, as a leading ICT company, Is excited to be part of this journey.

Conclusion

REFERENCES

1 www.un.org

2 United Nations Brundtland Report, 1987

3 Hasna, A. M. (2007). “Dimensions of sustainability”. Journal of Engineering for Sustainable Development: Energy, Environment, and Health 2 (1): 47–57.

4 http://www.booz.com/media/uploads/WWF_Low_Carbon_Cities.pdf

5 WWF, Booz report Reinventing the city, 2010 (http://www.slideshare.net/itsgowri/wwf-low-carboncities).

6 http://www.ericsson.com/news/1550083

7 http://www.ericsson.com/news/1514402

8 http://www.un.org/wcm/content/site/climatechange/gateway

9 http://www.smart2020.org/publications/

10 http://www.ericsson.com/news/100301_assessing_ict_244218602_c

11 http://ec.europa.eu/environment/europeangreencapital/winning-cities/stockholm-european-green-capital-2010/index.html

12 http://www.stockholmroyalseaport.com/

Images: By courtesy of Stockholm Royal Seaport and Wallenstam / Vera Arkitekter.

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