Global tech firm Cisco and others bring ideas from internet of things for energy savings in Adelaide as Smart City
Adelaide City Council partnered with tech giant Cisco and lighting specialist Sensity to modify more than 60 LED lights along Pirie Street and Hindmarsh Square in the heart of the CBD as part of internet of things trials.
Central to the concept of Adelaide as a Smart City was the internet of things – everyday objects such as streetlights fitted with technology that moved Adelaide closer to its goal of becoming the world’s first carbon-neutral city.
Key players in the Adelaide Smart City project included Adelaide University, the South Australian department of state development, Adelaide City Council and companies including Ernst and Young, Cisco, Microsoft, Oracle, Fuji and Xerox.
Adelaide City Council partnered with tech giant Cisco and lighting specialist Sensity to modify more than 60 LED lights along Pirie Street and Hindmarsh Square in the heart of the city centre to enable greater efficiencies in on-demand smart lighting and conserving energy. The LED lights were dimmed to a safe pre-determined lower level. If sensors detected any pedestrians and/or traffic on the road or footpath.The system resumed normal lighting levels during activity and a few minutes afterwards. The LED lights produced significant energy saving and were virtually maintenance-free.
Adelaide City corporation had reduced energy spending by $800,000 in its own buildings from 2007 through Smart City technologies and using LED lights. Emission cuts of 60% were made from its own operations from 1994 and 20% from the City of Adelaide community from 2007 to 2013. During this time, the population grew by 27%, office floor area increased by 16% and the economy grew by 28%.
Adelaide City Council continued to invest in energy-saving technologies, including in-house IT systems while also increasing smart lighting, smart parking technologies, and changing street lighting to LED lights. It partnered with tech giant Cisco, iiNet and lighting specialist Sensity to modify more than 60 lights along Pirie Street and Hindmarsh Square in the heart of the CBD.
Cisco named Adelaide the first smart and connected Lighthouse City in Australia in 2015, putting it on a global list of 10 cities including Barcelona, Chicago, Hamburg and Dubai as leaders in showcasing Internet of Things (IoT) innovation where everyday devices could “talk” to each other via the internet.
As a Lighthouse City, Adelaide had access Cisco’s infrastructure, as well as our network of partners and global ecosystem, allowing it to bring new strategic business and technology partnerships make the city more efficient for visitors, workers and residents.
Seattle-based Adelaide-listed technology company Buddy Platform, led by South Australian ex pat David McLauchlan, also provided data analysis to Adelaide city based on the internet of things, using info from vehicles, infrastructure and food and company records. The firm’s backers included Microsoft and an investment fund set up by singer Lady Gaga and her manager.
NEC Australia was another global company looking to explore internet of things options in Adelaide such as managing energy and water. For example, NEC has global technologies in relation to detecting water leakages that helped identify failures before they failed.
Myriota, an Adelaide telecommunications startup, won second best startup at the Internet of Things Summit in Silicon Valley (the world’s largest), as well as being the best industrial startup.