Thinking critically about smart city experimentation: entrepreneurialism and responsibilization in urban living labs

ABSTRACT

The proliferation of smart technologies, big data, and analytics is being increasingly used to address urban socio-environmental problems such as climate change mitigation and carbon control. Electricity systems in particular are being reconfigured with smart technologies to help integrate renewable generation, enhance energy efficiency, implement new forms of pricing, increase control and automation, and improve reliability. Many of these interventions are experimental, requiring real-world testing before wider diffusion. This testing often takes place in “urban living labs,” integrating urban residents as key actors in experimentation with goals for broader sustainability transitions. In this paper, I investigate one such urban living lab focused on smart grid research and demonstration in a residential neighbourhood in Austin, Texas. I develop a framework based in governmentality studies to critically interrogate urban experimentation. Findings suggest that the focus of experimentation devolves urban imperatives into individual responsibilities for socio-environmental change. Managing carbon emissions through energy efficiency, renewable energy, and conservation is promoted as a form of self-management, wherein households reconfigure everyday activities and/or adopt new technologies. At the same, sociotechnical interventions are shaped by technology companies, researchers, and policy-makers marking a central feature of contemporary urban entrepreneurialism. This skews the potential of active co-production, and instead relies on the delegation of responsibility for action to a constrained assemblage of smart technologies and smart users.     

Evaluation of groundwater contamination beneath an urban environment: the Besòs river basin (Barcelona, Spain)

The urban groundwater of the central Besòs river basin (the La Llagosta aquifer) has become contaminated due to the infiltration of wastewater from septic tanks and sewage networks, and by industrial activities located in urban areas. The groundwater hydrogeochemistry of the La Llagosta aquifer was characterized using isoconcentration maps, hydrogeochemical diagrams (Piper, Schoeller-Berkaloff) and by analyzing hydrogeochemical changes along a flow-path that crosses an urban and peripheral industrial area in the main alluvial aquifer (the La Llagosta unit). The evolution of cations, anions and heavy metals along the flow path and the use of the PHREEQC numerical code indicate a complex set of geochemical processes, which result from the interaction between the sources of pollution, the groundwater flow and the mineral composition of the aquifer materials. The contaminated groundwater below the urban areas shows high contents of NO(3)(-) (90-100 mg/L) and an increase in the concentrations of Ca(2+) and Mg(2+) which coincides with a decrease in pH. The Eh shows greater variation than the pH along the flow line studied, with values ranging between 56 mV in the industrial area and 370 mV in the urban area. The area with the lowest Eh value coincides with the highest concentrations of dissolved Fe (4.7 mg/L) and Mn (0.22 mg/L).     

Integrated Approaches in Urban Storm Drainage: Where Do We Stand?

Integrated approaches to urban stormwater drainage management are being increasingly advocated as necessary for advancing more sustainable and holistic management of urban water environments. In this paper, the status of integrated approaches in the management of urban stormwater discharges to receiving waterways is summarized. The starting point of the paper is with the recent scientific contributions, revealing that integration is being pursued and implemented predominantly at two conceptual levels. These include 1) integrating the technical system with the receiving waterway environment, and 2) considering the interaction and influence of the human system with the technical system through processes such as stakeholder and public participation. Additionally, it is argued that the evolving shift towards the implementation of water-quality-based strategies advances the need for further development and application of integrated models and approaches. The cases of online physically based models for predictive control and integrated source control and public participation are presented as examples of such ongoing developments in pursuit of integrated urban stormwater management.     

Land Resource Sustainability for Urban Development: Spatial Decision Support System Prototype

Land resource sustainability for urban development characterizes the problem of decision-making with multiplicity and uncertainty. A decision support system prototype aids in the assessment of incremental land development plan proposals put forth within the long-term community priority of a sustainable growth. Facilitating this assessment is the analytic hierarchy process (AHP), a multicriteria evaluation and decision support system. The decision support system incorporates multiple sustainability criteria, weighted strategically responsive to local public policy priorities and community–specific situations and values, while gauging and directing desirable future courses of development. Furthermore, the decision support system uses a GIS, which facilitates an assessment of urban form with multiple indicators of sustainability as spatial criteria thematically. The resultant land-use sustainability scores indicate, on the ratio-scale of AHP, whether or not a desirable urban form is likely in the long run, and if so, to what degree. The two alternative modes of synthesis in AHP—ideal and distributive—provide assessments of a land development plan incrementally (short-term) and city-wide pattern comprehensively (long-term), respectively. Thus, the spatial decision support system facilitates proactive and collective public policy determination of land resource for future sustainable urban development.     

不同磷水平下植物体内镉的积累、化学形态及生理特性

在控制条件下,将玉米、小麦植株在含有不同浓度磷（ｃ（Ｐ）０,０．１２,０．６,３．０ｍｍｏｌ／Ｌ）和镉（ｃ（Ｃｄ）０,４．０μｍｏｌ／Ｌ）的营养液中培养２１ｄ,研究植株体内各种镉的形态、生理特性和酶活性的变化,选择三种主要镉的形态,即氯化钠可提取态（镉与蛋白质或多肽结合态）,醋酸可提取态（镉与磷酸盐的结合态）和去离子水可提取态（水溶性、有机酸盐镉的形态）作为优势态镉加以分析和研究。结果表明,提高介     

Comprehensive urban planning and management at multiple scales based on ecological principles: a case study in Beijing,China

SUMMARY

Rapid urbanisation and serious environmental problems have led people worldwide to realise the significance of urban planning and management towards a sustainable environment. Beijing was used as a case study to develop a framework and strategies for sustainable development using ecological principles. At the regional level, Beijing-Tianjin agglomeration and Hebei Province are considered together. At the Beijing administrative level, some important measures are put forward for revision of the Beijing Urban Master Plan. At the Beijing plain level, the future spatial structure of Beijing city and the relationship between settlements, green space and transportation are considered, and three basic development patterns are proposed. At the inner district level, the ecological corridor system is suggested, based on ecosystem services. At the selected area level, a comprehensive strategy and key measures for conservation and renewal of old Beijing city core are provided. Once strategies for Beijing urban development are implemented step-by-step, a vision for future development can be achieved. This paper provides considerations for improvement of urban planning and management in China and other countries.     

Emergy analysis of the urban metabolism of Beijing

Cities can be modeled as if they were superorganisms with a range of metabolic processes. Research on this urban metabolism can contribute to solving urban environmental problems by revealing details of the metabolic throughput of the system. A key issue is how to find a common basis for measuring the environmental and economic values. By providing a single unified unit, emergy theory integrates the natural and socioeconomic systems and thoroughly evaluates a system's metabolism. We analyzed Beijing's urban metabolic system using emergy synthesis to evaluate its environmental resources, economy, and environmental and economic relations with the regions outside the city during 14 years of development. We compared Beijing's emergy indices with those of five other Chinese cities and of China as a whole to assess Beijing's relative development status. These indices are the emergy self-support ratio (metabolic dependence), the environmental load ratio (metabolic loading), empower density (metabolic pressure), emergy used per person (metabolic intensity per capita), and the monetary equivalent of emergy (emdollars; metabolic intensity). Based on our emergy analysis, Beijing's socioeconomic system is not self-sufficient, and depends greatly on external environmental resources. Its GDP is supported by a high percentage of emergy purchased from outside the city. During the study period, Beijing's urban system showed an increasing dependence on external resources for its economic development. Beijing's loading and pressure on the ecological environment is continuously increasing, accompanied by continuously increasing human emergy consumption. In the future, it will become increasingly necessary to improve Beijing's metabolic efficiency.     

某些市售化肥的重金属含量水平及环境风险

对国内使用的部分化肥中Fe、Mn、Cu、Pb、Zn、Cd和Hg的总量及可溶态含量的测定结果表明,氮肥和钾肥中重金属元素含量较低;复合肥和磷肥中重金属元素含量较高。绝大多数化肥中Cu、Pb、Zn、Cd不超过土壤环境质量二级标准,使用是安全的。但某些复合肥料和电子束脱硫生产的氮肥中Hg含量过高,个别复合肥料中Zn含量过高,具有一定的环境风险。     

桥梁-道路建设对西南山地城市扩展影响机制研究——以重庆嘉陵江两桥为例

交通因素对城市空间扩展的影响是一个研究热点,但国内外关于桥梁-道路建设对山地城市扩展影响机制的研究还不多见。基于桥梁-道路对城市待开发区域区位的影响,提出了点状辐射、线状辐射和环状辐射3种影响机制。以重庆嘉陵江大桥和黄花园大桥建设对嘉陵江北岸影响为例,将研究区划分为5个分区,基于Arc GIS软件提取各分区城市建成区与河岸的空间分布关系,并通过5个分区1940~2009年城市扩展差异比较印证3种影响机制。研究结果表明,桥梁和道路建设促进研究区建成区迅速扩张,但对不同分区的建成区扩展速度的影响有差异;第3分区城市扩展反映了桥梁-道路对城市扩展的点状辐射和线状辐射,而第4分区城市扩展反映了桥梁-道路对城市扩展的环状辐射。结论表明研究提出的点状辐射、线状辐射和环状辐射符合桥梁-道路建设对西南山地城市扩展的影响机制。     

江苏省城乡空间融合的形态演化研究

选取1980~2010年5期土地利用/覆被变化(LUCC)作为数据源,获取江苏省近30a的城乡建设用地变化数据,在空间分析和景观分析等方法支持下,分析城乡空间形态的演变特征,揭示城乡空间融合的过程和动力机制,并归纳不同类型的城乡空间融合模式。结果表明:(1)城镇空间扩展方面,数量变化呈先平缓后急剧增长特征,空间形态变化首先以外部扩展为主,然后进入斑块边缘间的填充扩展的循环过程,苏锡常地区城镇空间的扩展最为密集;(2)农村地域变化方面,总量呈小幅增长态势,江苏北部沿淮河地区农村建设用地分布较为密集,沿江地区逐渐形成农村建设用地的次级密集区;(3)城乡空间融合过程方面,城乡空间开始由离散扩展逐步向粘合扩展过渡,城乡连通程度逐步提高,苏南地区城乡粘合扩展最为明显;(4)城乡空间融合的动力机制和地域模式,社会经济发展水平的快速提高、乡镇企业的高速发展、交通基础设施的不断完善、开发区和新城区的快速建设是江苏城乡融合发展的主要驱动力。依据空间形态变化特征和主要动力因素,江苏省具有3种城乡空间融合发展类型:枢纽链接模式、集聚吞并模式、融合扩展模式。