City of Madrid loT Laboratory
In recent years, cities have been installing a multitude of sensors in the different municipal services: mobility, cleaning, equipment, facilities and buildings, energy, infrastructures, etc. Each one of them, depending on the manufacturer, uses a certain communication protocol. This implies that they "speak different languages", making it difficult or even impossible to connect directly with other devices installed in adjacent locations by other services.
In order to establish a "universal language" for Internet of Things (IoT) protocols used in cities, the City Council has signed a collaboration agreement with the Centre for Integral Domotics (CeDInt) of the Polytechnic University of Madrid. (Convention / Annex).
The IoT City of Madrid Laboratory has thus been created, with the following objectives:
- Set up an IoT expert centre to establish criteria for the city at the disposal of municipal technical managers, bidding companies and suppliers.
- Seek convergence towards a common IoT infrastructure for the city, based on open, neutral and interoperable standards, so that it scales to the dimensions of Madrid and takes into account, from design, the necessary cyber security measures.
- Provide a test environment for municipal areas and service providers to bring their equipment and obtain secure configurations.
- Assess impact in real but controlled environments.
- Facilitate digital empowerment and create a community of innovators.
- Collaborate in Govtech initiatives that incorporate this type of technology in any field: both services to the city and services to citizens.
By using IoT related technologies, services can be improved to enhance people's quality of life. It enables savings in energy consumption and optimisation of resources. It facilitates conservation and maintenance work in a city by knowing the situation, condition and level of use of each device. All this is in real time and depending on certain environmental and environmental variables, which allows a more reliable forecast of future needs and that, progressively, people can interact with the city and have the necessary information to know the operation and functioning of its services.
Another aspect to highlight is the evaluation of the impact on the management and operation of services when the Internet of Things is applied to them for remote and automatic management, calculating savings in consumption, maintenance and emissions reduction, in line with environmental commitments.
The scope and phases of the project can be consulted in "Associated documentation".