Contact Company
Starting ten years ago, and for the first time in history, most of the global population now lives in cities. And the story of those cities has been a struggle to offer services and handle the infrastructure strain of all those recently-arrived citizens.
This trend is driving interest in and implementing smart cities, and it’s a good thing because urbanization is becoming the rule rather than the exception in modern life. Cities consume almost 80 percent of the world’s energy while producing almost two-thirds of total greenhouse gas emissions, according to C40 Cities. This means that city managers and utilities must manage ever-increasing scale while also reducing emissions and waste.
It has become critically important for cities to get smarter through digitization and wireless technology that allows them to operate smarter, produce and distribute energy more efficiently and reduce waste. Enter IoT. Smart city applications and technology leveraging IoT can enable city managers to monitor municipal assets in real-time and control them remotely. And it’s all dependent on reliable wireless connectivity.
In a smart city, a public Wi-Fi network is convenient for high-speed streaming. Still, it doesn’t address IoT-specific smart city applications like low-power environmental monitors, gas and water meters, smart street lighting, and other devices. A robust and secure open-standard network for utilities and other smart city applications better serves the requirements of a wide range of smart city applications.
The Wi-SUN Alliance says it sees the path forward for smart cities in low-power, wide-area connectivity like its own Wi-SUN standard. Wi-SUN is at its root an IPv6 sub-GHz mesh technology for smart city and smart utility applications. Find out why the Wi-SUN Alliance thinks its solution is best for smart city connectivity in terms of performance and reliability and how it differs from LoRa and other LPWAN solutions in the upcoming Works With 2021 Smart Cities track.
Silicon Labs’ Abhijit Grewal and Mitch Klein recently led a panel discussion at the Smart Cities Virtual Connect Conference, along with partners Pelion/ARM, Landis+Gyr, and the Chairman of the Wi-SUN Alliance, on why Wi-SUN is the preferred solution for smart city connectivity. Check out that session on-demand to get ready for Works With 2021, taking place virtually September 14–15.
Cities are growing faster every day, both in population and physical size. For them to scale without falling into disrepair and to maximize precious resources, they’d better get smart. But we can’t rely on the municipalities themselves to see the way ahead. As city planners are just beginning to discover what they will need, it is incumbent upon IoT solutions providers to bring answers to the market.
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