Amsterdam Smart City is being realized through a partnership among businesses, authorities, research institutions, and the people of Amsterdam (over 70 partners, including CISCO and IBM). The aim of this partnership is the transformation of the Amsterdam metropolitan area into a smart city with the ultimate goal of reducing CO2 emissions. Amsterdam’ s smart city platform connects all of the city’ s stakeholders through ‘˜smart’ collaborations; it brings them together with the purpose of developing and implementing shared ideas and solutions for the city. Currently the program comprises 32 projects that encompass innovative ideas and new business models across Amsterdam’ s neighborhoods. These projects fall within seven ‘˜areas of interest’ : Smart Mobility, Smart Living, Smart Society, Smart Areas, Smart Economy, Big & Open Data and Infrastructure (water, roads, energy, ICT). They are initially tested on a small scale and the ones that prove to be effective will be extended to include other areas. All projects are built around informing citizens, entrepreneurs and the public sector about their energy consumption and educating them about how to manage it more prudently. To achieve this, smart devices and wireless meters transmit information over broadband networks helping citizens and organizations of the city to behave more ‘˜intelligently’ by reducing their energy consumption. Two well-known projects of Amsterdam Smart City are the ‘˜Climate Street’ and the ‘˜West Orange’ project. They are a commercial and a residential area respectively, where smart and energy-saving technologies were introduced along with smart meters and energy displays, with the purpose of encouraging users to save energy and reduce their carbon footprint.
Figure: The conceptual model behind the Amsterdam Smart City program (source)
Access the website of Amsterdam smart city here.
Suggested readings about Amsterdam Smart City:
- Amsterdam Smart City official website (2011). Smart Stories. Available here.
- Baron, G. (2013). Amsterdam Smart City. Available here.
- Šťáhlavský, R. (2011). Amsterdam Smart City project, Accenture. Available here.