Raffaella Riva Sanseverino

Smart Cities and Municipal Building Regulation for Energy Efficiency

The “Smart Cities & Communities Initiative†of the Strategic Energy Technology Plan is the strategic European response to lead cities and regions to a carbon free future. In this contest energy efficiency in buildings has a crucial role and must be considered in a holistic approach to the urban planning. In order to implement the minimum requirements stated by the European Directive about the Energy Performance of Buildings, and in order to consider different planning layers with the view to a smart city planning, local regulations are a key factor aiming at sustainable territorial planning. This paper investigates the possibility to draft a basic structure of Municipal Building Regulations in order to guide local administrators and technicians and to limit discretionary power of bureaucracy. The paper is organized as follows. First, a review of the most common practices for building regulations in Europe is proposed, then the basic structure of a municipal building regulation for the city of Palermo (Southern Italy) accounting for sustainability is discussed.

The Integration and Sharing of Resources for a New Quality of Living

In this chapter, the issues of sharing of information and of information technologies use are dealt with from the juridical point of view, through a discussion about some general problems characterizing the relevant juridical debate. Then the urban forms and functions of the smart city are presented. Information technology can interact with the operational problems of the city and the use of environmental resources (energy, soil, water) is the leading parameter with which the urban and building transformations must be carried out. In this chapter, the complex issue of how to share the urban spaces and functions and to what extent such sharing influences the energy consumption is dealt with.

Smart Cities: Case Studies

This chapter shows some examples of smart cities. In the chapter, case studies have been divided into geographical categories (Middle East cities; North-European cities; Mediterranean cities and the Asian ones) which, macroscopically, refer to three different types of city and communities especially in relation to different levels of technological innovation and type of human capital, which are key factors in the achievement of a smart development. The chapter is divided into four main paragraphs. The newly built cities, in the Middle East paragraph, are cities where everything has been planned from scratch on white paper to limit emissions and increase the quality of life of citizens. In the paragraphs about the North-European cities and the Mediterranean cities, the cities with strong historic value are described. In this section, many European cities, which have specific features like limited possibility to apply technology, but still an adequate level of development to understand and correctly implement the ICT driven choices are described with reference to the smart city concept. The last paragraph shows some example of “developing city” that often are cities with low awareness about sustainable settlement issues, but with a great economic and social growth. These are, in most cases, eastern cities; they show a great potential and are gradually, within the world community, trying to create the basis to become leaders of smart cities development.

Municipal Building Regulations for Energy Efficiency in Southern Italy

The building sector is still one of the most energy consuming sectors in Italy, like developed countries in Europe. At European level, the main policy driver related to the energy use in buildings is the Energy Performance of Buildings Directive (EPBD, 2002/91/EC) and its recast. Through the EPBD introduction, requirements for certification, inspections, training or renovation are now imposed in Member States. In order to fulfill the expected changes, local regulations are a key factor aiming at sustainable territorial planning. It is thus required support the issue of local rules at municipal level in order to guide local administrators and technicians and to limit discretional power of bureaucracy. In this paper, a review of the most common practices for building regulations in Europe and in Italy is proposed, then the role and the framework of a municipal building regulation for the Southern European area accounting for sustainability features is discussed.

Sustainable Integration of Renewable Energy Systems in a Mediterranean Island: A Case Study

Starting from a previous technical and economical feasibility study, this paper analyzes the integration of Renewable Energy Sources into an existing territory with specified features of the natural landscape and of the built environment. The work puts into evidence that territories development must use suitable tools and rules based on integrated knowledge, since technical feasibility studies do not assess the sustainability of the proposed infrastructures within the built environment and landscape. The studied system is in the island of Pantelleria situated between Sicily and northern Africa.

The Role of Sharing Practices and Dematerialized Services in Smart Cities

The “intelligent management” of living in cities and of the traditional urban functions, summarizes the model of smart city. Through new integrated approaches generated from the use of Information and Communication Technology (ICT) and of the web, which take the role of enabling technology for change, contemporary cities are strongly changing. The digital age creates, in fact, the conditions for the emergence of new tools and new services for citizens, based on communication and on sharing and participation practices. The chapter contextualizes these changes by focusing on some examples of what can be defined as “dematerialized services” of contemporary cities, seen as new urban services and new practices of communities living in smart cities.

Smart Cities Atlas

New and fascinating examples about innovation in cities come from the real world. Every part of the industrialized world has indeed at least one case to show. But it is not just a matter of appearance, emerging economies may take the lead in the global economy growth forecast, but many studies show that the established top cities will continue to draw the wealthy for some years to come. Cities and network of cities will be the crossing point of the most important economic and financial initiatives. The catalogue of cities analysed in this section gives a synthetic representation of the measures carried out by some benchmark cities in the last ten years all over the world. Being a smart city is quite a complex goal to reach, both for cities to be designed ex novo (such as Masdar in the Arab Emirates or Caofeidian in Asia) as we will see at the end of the chapter, and for cities which have a long history behind them. Ex novo cities are also called top-down smart cities, while most of the examples reported next are bottom-up smart cities, that is, they start from existing settlements with different preconditions.

Experiencing the Smart City Concept: The Challenge of Intelligent Districts

Future cities will become a complex system of variable geometry, where ICT is the main driver of all connections, an intelligent tool that enables the dialogue between different systems, the bonding agent of the smart city. The man still remains the main actor, because he redesigns his habits, corrects his behaviors, shares ideas and solutions based on continuous feedback from the environment. The areas where there are large urban innovations are the field of mobility and energy and ICT of course. Approaches to intelligent cities implementations change, because they are powered by the aspects related to communication. The dimension of the smart districts appears to be the only convincing module, able to test systems, technologies and processes. The most interesting interface to investigate is the relationship between the new city module—infact the smart district—and the citizen, city-user and actor of all urban transformations/changes; the smart city becomes progressively more closer to people, more human.

SHARING PRACTICES AND DEMATERIALIZED SERVICES IN SMART CITIES

The “intelligent management” of the traditional areas of living the cities and of their urban functions, summarizes the model of smart city. Through new integrated approaches generated from the use of Information and Communication Technology (ICT) and of the web, which take the role of enabling tools for change, contemporary cities are strongly changing. The digital age creates, in fact, the conditions for the emergence of new tools and new services for citizens, based on communication and on sharing and participation practices. The article contextualizes these changes by focusing on some examples of what can be defined as “dematerialized services” of contemporary cities, seen as new urban services and new practices of community’s living in smart cities. Keywords: smart city, sharing practices, dematerialized services