Smart Cities and Sustainability Models

Abstract

In our age cities are complex systems and we can say systems of systems. Today locality is the result of using information and communication technologies in all departments of our life, but in future all cities must to use smart systems for improve quality of life and on the other hand for sustainable development. The smart systems make daily activities more easily, efficiently and represent a real support for sustainable city development. This paper analysis the sustainable development and identified the key elements of future smart cities. [PUBLICATION ABSTRACT]

Headnote

In our age cities are complex systems and we can say systems of systems. Today locality is the result of using information and communication technologies in all departments of our life, but in future all cities must to use smart systems for improve quality of life and on the other hand for sustainable development. The smart systems make daily activities more easily, efficiently and represent a real support for sustainable city development. This paper analysis the sustainable development and identified the key elements of future smart cities.

Keywords: Intelligent Cities, Sustainability, Indicators, Regional Development, Intelligent Solution

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1 Introduction

Paper aims to analyze the models for sus-tainability cities development and to high-light the influence of new theologies.

The first part presents information about the sustainability and sustainability development. The second part is the analysis of models for sustainability cities development. The third part will present the necessity of use smart solutions in our society and will highlight the implication of these in sustainability devel-opment. The paper concludes with the pres-entation of the impact of smart solutions and how to use all their facilities for the sustaina-ble development of cities.

Digital devices connected through the Inter-net, are producing a big quantity of data. And all this information can be turned into know-ledge using the computational power. With this knowledge we can improve the efficien-cy, productivity and quality and on the other hand we can reduce costs and cut waste.

Around the world are highlights the potential of smart systems to facilitate sustainable de-velopment, economic growth, societal progress and improved efficiency.

European Commission, Europe 2020 pro-gram - a strategy for smart growth, sustaina-ble and inclusive growth has identified three key factors for the crisis and preparing for the next decade of the European Union econ-omy: smart growth (promoting knowledge, innovation, education and society digital), sustainable (competitive production with ef-ficient use of resources) and inclusive growth (increased market participation, skills and poverty reduction). Given, on the one hand, the key elements identified by the European Commission and on the other hand first priority axis of Regional Operational Pro-grammer 2007-2013 consists of supporting the sustainable development of urban growth poles- think we can say that it is essential to consider the development of cities by adopt-ing innovative, creative and intelligent solu-tion in all economic fields.

In our age sustainability is a major global is-sue that requires urgent attention with the in-tensification of human activities that wanton-ly use natural resources and degrade the envi-ronment. The development of a sustainable community is one of the effective solutions. In specialty research [11], [12], [19], [20] de-finition of sustainability is related to the qual-ity of life and efficiency.

The research will identified the basic areas to implement smart solution in the cities for sustainable development.

2 The sustainability concept

The concept of sustainable development may have different meaning by the context in which it is used. For this reason, we will present several descriptions of sustainable development that would include multiple as-pects of this concept.

In the MACED [19] (Mountain Association for Community Economic Development) sustainable community development is the ability to make developments which respect the relationship between the three elements: economy, ecology, and equity. So, we can say that the city sustainability is a multi-dimensional concept that includes economic, social and political dimensions.

To define sustainable development is better to start from Brundtland commission's report [20], which discus this concept. The main idea is that the sustainable development is the kind of development, which satisfies the cur-rent needs without endangering the future generations to satisfy their own. This defini-tion of sustainable development is the most frequently use in literature.

The sustainable development has in view the economic and social development but with-out disturb the environmental protection. The definition presented in the report of the Brundtland commission contains two essen-tial concepts:

1) the concept of needs for everybody but especially the needs of the world's poor, which should be given priority;

2) the idea of limitations, if we start from the effect of technologies progress we will say that we don't have limits, but on the other hand we must to have in view the ability of the environment to satisfy present and future needs.

In our society is evidence that human activity has caused unprecedented environmental change, and population growth will soon stress the world's natural resources to the breaking point. Global warming, air pollu-tion, land degradation, declining per-capita availability of fresh water, food shortages, and reduced biodiversity are some of the starkest challenges and hear we found some limitations. Top priorities for cities include sustaining water, energy, and food supplies, managing water and reducing greenhouse gas emission.

The sustainable development concept has three urgent goals (Figure 1):

a) to improve quality of life - it is the goal of development,

b) to live in accordance with the limits of the environment - it is the goal of sustainabil-ity,

c) to invest in technological progress.

We can say that the goals of sustainable de-velopment are the same with the objectives of smart cities. We need to invest in our lo-cality for improve quality of life. In smart ci-ties technical progress is the support for a less consume of resources.

Cities have become the focal points of sus-tainable development because represents ma-jor consumers and distributors of goods, ser-vices and on the other hand because of a large number of citizens. In our age, many ci-ties tend to be large consumers of goods and services, but they don't have in view the lim-its of resources and technical progress.

3 Sustainability models

In literature we find different type of models, but before start to discuss about it we can split them in economical suitability and eco-logical sustainability.

For the beginning in economical sustainabili-ty we must to say that the key assumption is that natural capital (fuels, minerals, etc) can be substituted by man-made capital in some extent (machines, buildings, knowledge, etc). The analysis is better to start with the essen-tial assumption involved in the So-low/Hartwick approach. According to the de-finition formulated by them, we should think of sustainability as an investment problem, in which we must use returns from the use of natural resources to create new opportunities of equal or greater value. In this theory [10] if, for example, we cut down forests but build factories, we have a good result if the eco-nomic value of the new solution exceeds the economic value of the forests. In this theory the consumption is the most important indi-cator of welfare and on the other hand the amount of investment in produced capital (buildings, roads, knowledge stocks, etc.) that is needed to exactly offset use of non-renewable resources [4].

In ecological sustainability the key assump-tion is that natural capital (fuels, minerals, etc) are not substituted by man-made capital (machines, buildings, knowledge, etc). In this case [15] we must to calculate the area re-quired to produce the resources consumed and to assimilate the wastes generated by the investment in produced capital. But this model has two problems. The first is the dif-ficulty to quantify diverse resources as the unit of land area and second problem is that not all of resources are substitutable.

Using the hybrid model from economical and ecological sustainability models Chang in 2010 highlight that are both individually ne-cessary but insufficient conditions for sus-tainable development. The hybrid model suggests how much should be invest in man-made capital so as to keep consumption per capita constant. But this model shows that economical sustainability and ecological sus-tainability are both individually necessary but insufficient conditions for sustainable devel-opment.

We must to have in view the satisfaction who is one of the base elements of improve the quality of life.

...

where:

* R - is an exhaustible resource like oil;

* á - is the parameter associated with re-newable capital;

* YR - is the marginal productivity of non-renewable capital;

* a - is the cost of using non-renewable capital;

* n - is the higher the population growth rate;

* g - is the rate of satisfaction;

* s - is the rate of technical progress.

This equation suggests how much should be invest in man-made capital so as to keep con-sumption per capita constant and the increase of satisfaction in the same time. While the rate of technical progress and the rate of sa-tisfaction are growing fast, we need to invest less.

If an economy has positive population growth rate, constant level of technology and less satisfaction (n > 0, ???? = 0, ???? <0), then the amount of investment in man-made capi-tal needed to maintain per capita output at the current period level is more than the total Hotelling rents (YR - a)R - the maximum rent that could be obtained while emptying the stock resource [4].

If an economy has constant population, posi-tive technological progress and the positive satisfaction growth rate (n = 0, ???? > 0, ???? >0), then the amount of investment in man-made capital needed to maintain per capita output at the current period level is less than the Hotelling rents.

So we can say that cities with high rate of population growth and slow technical progress often face decreasing consumption per capita and satisfaction and have severely degraded environment. On the other part economies with positive population growth, technological progress and satisfaction progress could be a good solution for our so-ciety.

Having in view these models we can say that for a sustainability development we must to use less the non renewable resources and to produce using the smart solutions new re-sources. All of this will improve the quality of life which is the most important goal of our society.

4 Smart systems

The smart system represents a real support for an urban development which will gener-ate a sustainable development of our cities. To improve the quality and performance of cities is recommended to involve all inter-ested parties to implement efficiently smart systems. The city development depends on the hand by efficiently use of non renewable resource thought smart solutions and on the other hand by efficient use of smart solutions to produce renewable resource. In many countries the telecommunications systems in-frastructure currently exists, but isn't use to the real value.

About 65% of the world population will be urban until 2025 [6], [7], [8]. Problems due to urbanization are becoming increasingly important and require smart solutions espe-cially in the areas that are considered pri-mary. Using smart systems to improve the quality of life of citizens, but also and more efficient consumption of natural resources deemed to be limited.

Research has focused on the study areas (Figure 2): education, health, transport and public administration.

Applications for an intelligent educational system are:

* data systems that collect, integrate, ana-lyze and present information on key per-formance factors such as presence, knowledge and assessment criteria for school transfers;

* education cluster - to involve all stake-holders in the educational preparation of future generations;

* using cloud computing in schools each pupil or student can access the most ad-vanced educational content, software and computing resources and storage.

Changes that occur each time and complexity of electronic technology society that uses a new type of electronic communication de-vices have resulted in continued growth in the volume [14], diversity and service activi-ties carried out in any field.

The existences of an intelligent educational system - focuses on the efficient use of exist-ing infrastructure and modernize it where is necessary - considered crucial during an eco-nomic crisis when funds are needed for edu-cation [5]. But most importantly, a compre-hensive education should refocus learning on the two key components of any system of education: student and teacher.

Through a smart educational system, accord-ing to the latest data published by IBM in 2010, [21], teachers can analyze student data electronically - from academic results, to in-formation on mobility and presence. This in-formation will help teachers identify individ-ual student needs and to individualize in-struction as to improve the process of their results, while retaining confidentiality. Smart systems are also ensuring that universities do not bear alone the burden of education but al-so to other interested parties.

An intelligent educational [22] system is based on three elements: interconnection (a resource sharing technology education), in-strumentation (accumulation of necessary da-ta) and intelligence (making decisions that enhance the learning process).

Applications for an intelligent transportation system are:

* Intelligent traffic management system;

* Intelligent system for the collection of all fees related to motor vehicles.

In Bari for example, using a smart applica-tion installed on fishing boats, local fisher-men can immediately determine local fish markets. Directly from the boats, using touch screen systems, fishermen enter the type of fish and send it to markets [1].

Other examples for intelligent transport sys-tem [2]: a smart traffic system helped the city of Stockholm reduce traffic by 20%, reduce emissions by 12% and increase public trans-portation, in Singapore was introduced a smart card for all transport payments. So, we have the same card for parking, car tax and transport In Singapore, introducing a Smart Card for all payments were merged which means parking, car tax and transport.

The smarter solution to healthcare is one that uses information to create real insight into patient care and organizational performance. Healthcare providers, researchers and direc-tors can work smarter by creating an elec-tronic view of patient data. They can get real time visibility into how their operations are running. And they can use wider ranging sample data to achieve more medical break-throughs.

Applications for an intelligent health system are:

* Intelligent system for data integration and its focus on the patient, so that each per-son have their own information and have access to a team of specialists who can work across the network. Electronic med-ical record - eliminating paper records made to reduce medical errors and im-prove efficiency;

* Intelligent system that connects doctors, patients and insurance companies;

* Electronic Bulletin of medical;

* Programming visit / consultation to elec-tronic medical.

University Hospital Motol in Prague [13] - one of the largest health institutions in the Czech Republic completed the first imple-mentation of Grid Medical Archive Solution Europe: a system that provides secure storage and archiving solution for the patients' medi-cal records least 10 years.

Sainte-Justine Hospital in Quebec [22] are using automatic procedures for gathering, managing and updating critical data for re-search, often scattered in different depart-ments.

Spain Public Health Service [2] has imple-mented a regional integrated system that al-lows patients to go to several health centers in the region, with the certainty that that doc-tor has access to the complete and updated patient data, thus making treatment faster and more accurately.

For a smart city we have need smart public services which improve the collaborating across departments and with communities. Across an entire world have many examples of smart solutions in public services for im-prove the quality and increases the benefits of citizens.

In the United Kingdom and Singapore, gov-ernments are educating citizens about multiple ways to obtain services and encouraging them to use new technologies [21].

Smarter government means collaborating across departments and with communities, helping to promote economic growth and at the most important level making operations and services truly citizen-centric.

Applications for government services:

* Intelligent systems for processing docu-ments within the government;

* Intelligent system takeover suppliers' in-voices, payment of taxes, public pro-curement tender for access to government services, business forms online;

* Electronic information services for citi-zens.

Through collaborating of all departments with communities the activities will become more transparent and accountable, the g can manage resources more effectively, and to give citizens access to information about de-cisions that affect their lives. Thought smart application each employee can to work with the same versions of documents.

5 Conclusions

The use efficient the resource using the smart solutions for a quality life is the main goal for sustainability development and four fu-ture cities. Our society today is more inter-connected, intelligent and the non-renewable resource is positioned in the middle of it, be-cause everybody tries to don't use this re-source or to use efficiently this. In our age the sustainable development depends on the access to more and smarter solution. For smart and sustainable growth of a city is im-portant to promoting a use more efficient of resource, a competitive economy and an economy base on knowledge and innovation. Having in view the models of sustainability we can say that for cities development we must to use efficiently the smart solutions. This will determinate less consume of non renewable resources and in the same time in-creases the produce of new resources like so-lar energy. All of this will improve the quali-ty of life and the efficiency which are related with the definition of sustainability.

We can resume our research that for sustai-nability development of cities in our day we must to use smart solution.

Acknowledgment

This work was supported from the European Social Fund through Sectored Operational Programmer Human Resources Development 2007- 2013, project number PO-SDRU/89/1.5/S/59184"Performance and ex-cellence in postdoctoral research in Roma-nian economics science domain".

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