Smart Cities, Volume 6, Issue 1 (February 2023) – 31 articles

Blockchain-related studies that focus on solving AECO (Architecture, Engineering, Construction and Operation) digital management environment issues, such as data protection and data ownership, show the projected benefits of Blockchain-based digital construction environments. However, adopting such technology will require a holistic approach to ensure it does not result in data redundancy, leading to digital system inefficiencies. This article studies the Blockchain construction synergies from the infrastructure point of view to understand its future in construction. The article visualises Blockchain infrastructure elements and fits them within the construction project’s digital environment. A novel framework for Blockchain orchestration and implementation and a blueprint for developing Blockchain applications for construction are presented. The proposed blueprint is then used to develop a Blockchain application using Hyperledger Firefly. The article builds on the previous literature and Blockchain applications on the Ethereum public Blockchain. The expected benefit of such a framework is providing a practical perspective on the implementation side of Blockchain in construction. Full article

The digital transformation of health services is one of the impacts of the COVID-19 pandemic. Various overseas studies have shown a positive response to digital health services, especially in handling the COVID-19 pandemic. This study aims to compare the implementation of digital health services between regions in Indonesia and analyze strategies in the health sector that are appropriate in the era of digital transformation in handling COVID-19 in Indonesia. The focus of this research is on the implementation of digital transformation of health services as one of the derivatives of the Smart City implementation, especially the dimension of Smart Living. The research was conducted using qualitative methods with systematic literature reviews and SWOT analysis techniques. The typology map of the implementation of digital health services in Indonesia shows that digital health services dominate in the Western and Central parts of Indonesia, which varies widely from the Central and Eastern parts of Indonesia, which tend to have limited forms of digital transformation. Various factors certainly influence the difference in implementing digital health services in each region. Therefore, multiple strategies are needed, such as infrastructure improvement, stakeholder collaboration, and increasing the factors that influence the implementation of digital health services. Full article

Learning Analysis (LA) trends show that KPIs used for better understanding and investigation of the learning process are diverse and often depend on the goals of the analyses. One of the most crucial questions for the implementation of LA is the availability of data. Currently, each education organization uses some type of Learning Management System (LMS), thus gathering, storing, and managing different data about the learning process. The initial point of this research is the fact that the time framework of the learning process is predefined, and that learning process analyses must be done according to this limit because each learning activity takes time to be performed. This research conducts an overview of the LMS and proposes KPI clusters for measuring and analyzing learning processes regarding (i) learning engagement, (ii) learning community building and management, and (iii) knowledge no-boundaries. It is structured into three parts. Based on the research methods used (a literature review, desk research, and experiments), (1) a review of LMS is conducted, then (2) the learning analysis is presented, (3) KPI analyses are done, and, finally, a new KPI model for LA is proposed, which includes 22 KPIs grouped into 4 Clusters. In the conclusion, the advantages of the model are explained along with the scientific contribution of the research. The next research steps, regarding the implementation of the model in the real classroom, are presented at the end. Full article

There is an increasing number of older adults being encouraged to come back to the workforce in search of better financial security in their later years. At the same time, the job market nowadays has increasingly depended on technology to recruit new workers, especially in Smart Cities, a concept that has been recently introduced to developing countries. As a result, the use of the Internet for job searches has become increasingly important for older adults living in urban environments, especially those with limited resources. However, there has not been an in-depth paper exploring the various factors that may affect the older population’s ability to use this new development to their advantage. This study offered a closer look at the social and economic factors that influence acceptance of using the Internet to look for a job among older urban poor in Thailand. By understanding the influences that shape their attitudes and behaviors towards online job searches, it is then possible to guide the development of Smart Cities and offer better assistance to older adults who wish to use the Internet for employment opportunities. We applied a logit regression model on data collected from individuals aged pre-retirement and retirement (n = 1505) in two Thai cities with significantly different economic development levels. The results showed that gender, religion, family arrangement, and income had a significant impact on older adults’ online job search activities, especially when it came to women, people of the Islamic faith, people living with partners, and high-income individuals. Urban planners are recommended to take these aforementioned factors into account while formulating the Smart Cities development plan. Full article

This article will highlight negative personal privacy and informational security outcomes that may arise from development programs currently pursued in smart cities. It aims to illustrate the ways in which the remedies proposed so far appear insufficient from a legal or practical standpoint, and to set forth a number of tactical approaches that could be used to improve them. Cities require spatial efficiency to address rising complexities, which can only be attained through an adequately efficient exchange of information among its citizens and administrators. Unprecedented volumes of private, public, and business data can now be collected, processed, and transmitted thanks to present technology. According to the authors’ analysis of current trends in technology, data collection, legislation, and the related public acceptance in Italy and Switzerland, governments, corporations, employers, and individuals will increasingly experience hazard and damage given the ease at which tracking technologies can be abused. The study clarifies how significant data privacy and information protection are in the making of a successful smart urban community and provides insights on local Italian and Swiss policy makers’ interest about digital innovation tied to the development of data protection. Full article

Renewable energy communities, first outlined in the European Directives and recently transposed into the Italian regulatory framework, are introduced as innovative entities capable of fostering cooperation between active and passive users involved in the production, sharing, and use of locally produced energy according to innovative management schemes. Renewable energy communities empower the end-customers. Citizens and legal entities are committed to a rational and economical use of energy to achieve the community’s climate neutrality goals and pursue the ecological and energy transition objectives defined in the national recovery and resilience plan. In the future, a significant number of energy communities different actors participating from the residential, industrial, commercial, and tertiary sectors are expected to develop within city districts or in suburban settings. This paper proposes and develops a methodology capable of bridging the complexity that can characterise the prototyping, implementation, and management of an energy community within a positive energy district. The approach presented here can also be extended to other application contexts in urban or rural settings. Requirements and best practices for administrative, technical, and technological management have been identified to achieve this goal. Italy is one of the first states to embed in its regulatory framework the European Directives regarding renewable energy communities. These will have a significant impact on network management models and will provide new ways for creating social inclusion that may help achieve climate sustainability goals. A governance model has been formalised for the empowerment of energy community members, outlining a framework useful for planning the proper implementation of a renewable energy community according to current Italian regulations. Full article

With the growing implementation of smart city projects and the significance of the research problem related to effective design thinking, the opinion of the ordinary citizens have become very relevant and contemporary. The current paper presents a quantitative empirical study focused on the attitudes towards and the readiness to accept smart cities in the specific context of Qatar. The study employs a survey questionnaire as a data collection tool. The survey is distributed online among a sample of 40 respondents from Qatar, including both residents and non-residents of smart cities in the country. Even though the sample is not representative of the Qatari population, the present study provides preliminary findings and fundamental insights into this novel topic in a specific socio-economic context. The major findings of the study uncovered that the respondents show quite positive attitudes toward diverse aspects related to smart economy, smart people, smart governance, smart mobility, smart environment, and smart living, as well as significant readiness to accept this lifestyle. However, the respondents demonstrate concerns related to the privacy and security of the people living in smart cities. The superiority of fundamental aspects of life like housing and healthcare in smart cities compared to conventional ones are also questioned by the respondents. Full article

Environmental and climate protection is one of the areas of development of modern smart cities intensively exposed in the literature. Nevertheless, it often remains only a scientific postulate or a strategic record of city authorities. With these circumstances in mind, this article addresses conceptual assumptions with actual achievements in improving air quality in 16 Polish cities aspiring to be smart. In this way, an answer is sought to the following research problem: To what extent do Polish cities aspiring to be smart and operating in a developing economy realize the climate quality improvement goals exposed today by the smart city concept and the environmental requirements of the European Union? The research was conducted in a long-term perspective covering the period from 2010 (entry into force of EU air quality standards) to 2022. In addition, with reference to contemporary urban environmental studies, special attention was paid to the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on air quality in the surveyed cities. In the course of the study, data on PM10 concentrations were used and statistically analyzed using measures of variability and cluster analysis as an unsupervised classification method. The results allow the formulation of the following key conclusions: (1) PM10 levels were systematically reduced in all 16 cities studied, which allows a positive assessment of the municipal authorities’ efforts to improve urban air quality; (2) the leaders in the effectiveness of PM10 reduction are Warsaw and Wrocław; and (3) after the COVID-19 pandemic, most of the cities studied managed to maintain or improve urban air quality. The originality of the considerations and analysis undertaken is due to the following considerations: (1) to fill the research gap in terms of the long-term assessment of the effectiveness of air quality improvement in cities aspiring to be smart and located in developing or emerging economies; (2) to make a cognitive contribution to the environmental research stream on smart city development (gaining knowledge on the effectiveness of cities’ actions to improve air quality); and (3) to conduct an analysis of the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on air quality in Polish cities located in various provinces. Full article

A microgrid energy management system (EMS) with several generation and storage units is crucial in attaining stable and reliable operation. Optimal scheduling of energy resources in EMS becomes arduous due to uncertainty in the forecasting of intermittent renewable sources, electricity pricing, and load demand. However, with the demand response (DR) approaches the operational benefits in the EMS framework can be maximized. In order to improve the cost-effectiveness of the microgrid, a novel day-ahead energy management strategy is proposed for optimal energy allocation of the distributed generators with environmental consideration. An incentive load control-based demand response program is developed to improve the operational results. The forecasting uncertainties are handled using probability-based Hong’s 2 m approximation method. The suggested approach uses a metaheuristic genetic algorithm (GA) to solve the constrained convex problem in determining optimal load shifting. Incentive pricing is developed to adapt to the demand shifting for the benefit of the customers and utility operators. Two case studies with grid-connected and islanded modes are studied to assess the strategy. Results indicate that the proposed technique reduces the overall cost fitness by 12.28% and 18.91% in the two cases, respectively. The consistency in operational parameters with popular methods confirms the effectiveness and robustness of the method for day-ahead energy management. Full article

With reference to the current focus on urban redevelopment issue, the evaluation of the projects plays a central role for the definition of effective urban development policies. In the present research, a logical-deductive model for the identification of “warning areas” is proposed. Given an urban area to be renovated, the developed methodological approach starts from the detection of the main existing architectural, historical and environmental emergencies in order to investigate the appreciation of the reference market for the higher or lower proximity to each considered urban pole. Thus, an econometric technique is implemented to examine the influence of each locational factor on selling prices, by assuming the property asset price increase as a proxy of the benefits generated by the urban redevelopment intervention for local communities. Furthermore, the proposed methodology is applied to the Esquilino district in the city of Rome (Italy), for which a relevant urge of urban regeneration is found, to orient the selection phases of the areas that need more attention from public entities. Full article

In a pandemic and post-pandemic environment, the consequences for the creative economy have been brutal and nefarious. Thus, this study aims to measure cities’ creativity performance, through a composite index, reported in the year 2021. In this sense, the results show that culture, the creative economy and enabling environment, as subdimensions of creativity, show that cities suffered a significant setback in their creative performance. However, this is currently being reversed so that creativity continues to contribute to the performance and growth of cities, whereby the formation of networks/partnerships as allies of the creative class and industries that characterise this dimension becomes even more important. This means that the creative class was one of the most affected by the pandemic, given that its activities are sustained mainly by the public, which corroborated recent studies. The study’s main contribution lies in the use of the Composite Index, in which it was concluded that creativity generates employment and wealth for a country’s economy. Finally, some limitations and avenues for future research were outlined. Full article

The topic investigated in this article is a comparison, contrast, and integration effort of European strategies for sustainable development with the evolving market initiatives that are beginning to fuel the fourth industrial revolution. Several regulatory initiatives from continental bodies come into effect to radically change access to finances for business development, based on sustainability goals, and an analysis of the legislation and trends becomes essential for an effective pivot tactic in the face of adversity, as well as change management policies to pre-emptively adapt and perform. The general research question is “what the strategic tools are best employed to overcome the hurdles laid forth by the drastic changes legally required for a sustainable future?” The research methods include a quantitative analysis of norms, regulations, and legislation, including strategic initiatives circulated in the European Union governmental bodies, integrated with qualitative research of the literature. The study finds and draws synergies between national strategies that have recently been drafted or are currently evolving with sustainability-centric initiatives such as the hydrogen initiative, the nuclear initiative, the natural gas initiative, the renewables initiative, the synthetics, and biomass initiative, the ESG initiative, the digital initiative. The findings are to contribute to the business administration field by providing an appropriate image of the organizational design model in the sustainability era, and a strategy framework to build the optimum long-term vision founded on continental regulatory initiatives that have come into effect. Full article

This paper aims to explore public participation for activating underground built heritage (UBH). It describes and analyses practices of stakeholders’ engagement in different UBH assets, based on experiences gathered in the scope of the European COST Action ‘Underground4value’. It brings together five inspiring cases from Italy, Portugal, Spain, Switzerland and the United Kingdom, in which digital and mobile technologies were used as tools to improve community experiences in UBH. Thus, the paper discusses ‘smartness’ from the perspective of people and communities around cultural assets, where ‘smartness’ becomes a new connotation and a pathway to advance (local) knowledge and know-how. Therefore, this paper takes on the challenge to define a smart city as an ecosystem for people’s empowerment and participation, and, in particular, to explore social tools for creating new values in heritage placemaking—where sharing knowledge becomes a fundamental principle. Full article

Based on cited literature, it can be observed that the bike road system is an important part of Smart Mobility. The amount of bicycle roads can be seen as one of the technical-infrastructure indicators used to measure the potential of the Smart Mobility system. Taking this into account the analysis of the development of bike roads in particular provinces of Poland, which is conducted in this paper is a contribution to the knowledge about Smart Cities in the area of Smart Mobility. This publication uses data on the operation of bicycle roads in Poland from 2012 to 2021 for analysis. It uses data collected by the Polish Central Statistical Office. The analysis covered the last 10 years. The latest data that is currently available in terms of complete statistics are from 2021, and it was decided to end the conducted analysis this year. The data for all Polish 16 provinces were analyzed in the paper. The main important finding of the paper is finding the correlation between the GDP (Gross Domestic Product) and the length of bicycle roads in Poland. Also, the very important finding of the paper is connected with the analysis of geographical patterns of bicycle roads in Poland. The analysis of the correlations between the variables allows us to conclude that more is invested in bicycle paths in the provinces located in northwestern Poland than would result from the wealth of the provinces as measured by GDP per capita. In particular, this is the case in Greater Poland, Pomerania, and Kuyavia-Pomerania. By contrast, in central and southwestern Poland, investments in bicycle paths in individual provinces are smaller than their wealth level would suggest. This situation is particularly the case in Opole Province, Lesser Poland, Lower Silesia, Subcarpatia, and Holy Cross. For these provinces in particular, it should be recommended to accelerate the construction of new bicycle roads, which will have a positive impact on the quality of life of residents in smart cities as well as ecology. Analysis of the functioning of bicycle roads as an element of a Smart City on the example of Poland Provinces. Full article

Topics related to sustainable economic development are currently important issues in the modern world. However, the implementation of this concept and related operational strategies raises many controversies. On the one hand, it offers hope for ecological, safe, and independent economic development, while on the other hand, it raises public concerns about the costs of such changes. These problems are widely appreciated in the EU, which is the undoubted leader in implementing the concept of sustainable economic development. With regard to this issue, this paper presents the developed methodology for assessing the sustainable energy and climate development of the EU-27 countries. The basis of this assessment is 17 selected indicators characterizing the most important areas related to this development. Their selection was conditioned by the assumptions of the Europe 2020 Strategy and the goals (7 and 13) of the UN Agenda for Sustainable Development 2030. Five widely used methods for multi-criteria analysis supporting management processes (CODAS, EDAS, TOPSIS, VIKOR, and WASPAS) were used for the study. In order to carry out an unambiguous assessment and determine the final ranking of countries in terms of energy and climate sustainability, a methodology was developed to specify the normalized value of the Final Assessment Score ($A{s}_{final}$). Based on it, the sustainability of individual EU-27 countries in 2010, 2015, and 2020 was assessed, and this assessment formed the basis for dividing these countries into four classes (levels) in terms of sustainability. The results confirmed the high differentiation of the EU-27 countries in terms of sustainability, indicating leaders as well as countries with low levels of sustainability. The countries with the highest and most stable levels of sustainable development of the economy are Sweden and Denmark. The results provide opportunities for their interpretation, both in terms of analyzing changes in individual indicators and in terms of the global assessment of sustainable development in individual countries. These results should be used when developing an energy and climate strategy for the next few years for the EU as a whole and for individual countries. Full article

In this paper, we propose a conceptual-model called the virtualizing/reframing (V/R) twin model to construct a digitally enhanced real world. The V/R twin model simulates the real world, and is an extension of the conventional digital-twin model, which can accurately model the real world and provides a general-purpose method for building digital services that enhance the real world. The major difference between the proposed model and the conventional digital-twin model is its consideration of diverse new information-presentation devices that have been recently developed. The V/R twin model is inspired by agential realism to include the “entanglement of the social and the material”, and the proposed observable-world consists of the social and material that are separate, according to the current context. After explaining the outline of the V/R twin model, where four virtualizing-patterns and reframing-patterns are introduced, the potential opportunities for the V/R twin model are examined, from multiple perspectives. Full article

The digitisation of administrative tasks and processes is a reality nowadays, translating into added value such as agility in process management, or simplified access to stored data. The digitisation of processes of decision-making in collegiate bodies, such as Academic Councils, is not yet a common reality. Voting acts are still carried out in person, or at most in online meetings, without having a real confirmation of the vote of each element. This is particularly complex to achieve in remote meeting scenarios, where connection breaks or interruptions of audio or video streams may exist. A new digital platform was already previously proposed. It considered decision-making, by voting in Academic Councils, to be supported by a system that guarantees the integrity of the decisions taken, even when meeting online. Our previous work mainly considered the overall design. In this work, we bettered the design and specification of our previous proposal and describe the implemented prototype, and validate and discuss the obtained results. Full article

Research efforts on Distributed Ledger Technologies (DLTs) for industrial applications have constantly been increasing over the last years. The use of DLTs in the Industry 4.0 paradigm provides traceability, integrity, and immutability of the generated industrial data. However, Industry 4.0 ecosystems are typically composed of multiple smart factory clusters belonging to several companies, which are immersed in constant interaction with other business partners, clients, or suppliers. In such complex ecosystems, multiple DLTs are necessarily employed to maintain the integrity of the data throughout the whole process, from when the data is generated until it is processed at higher levels. Moreover, industrial data is commonly heterogeneous, which causes compatibility issues, along with security and efficiency issues in the homogenization process. Thus, the data needs to be pre-processed and homogenized in a secure manner before being exploited. Consequently, in this work, we address the issues mentioned above by providing an industrial raw data pre-processing and homogenization process according to a standard data model. We employ decentralized blockchain oracles to guarantee the integrity of the external data during the homogenization process. Hereafter, we design an interoperable plant blockchain for trustworthy storage and processing of the resulting homogenized data across several industrial plants. We also present a prototype implementation of the aforementioned scheme and discuss its effectiveness. Finally, we design a monitoring scheme to overview the usage the performance of the architecture processes and identify possible performance and security issues. Full article

The scarce knowledge and documentation of Underground Built Heritage (UBH) assets frequently limit their full exploitation and valorization. The aim of this work is to reflect on the techniques, functions, and technical features of a specific case study in a very broad context that can, however, be a building block for the understanding, preservation, and reuse of architectural and engineering values that represent a fundamental trace of the history of a society. Therefore, to fill these knowledge gaps, it was constructed a 3D GIS model, multi-scale, and interoperable database, capable of management, promotion, and valorization of UBH. The case study focuses on the old water supply system of the city of Lisbon, as UBH site, with galleries and cisterns that are points of connection with the urban environment above. For the creation of 3D models of the structure under investigation, it was decided to carry out a survey with Mobile Mapping System as a first step, which allowed the construction of a dense point cloud useful to build 3D models of individual objects. Finally, the 3D models were imported into the 3D GIS environment and multi-information could be linked for each previously identified element for greater knowledge sharing. This research has demonstrated how geomatic techniques can be effectively used in conjunction with the information management systems of GIS to explore this “hidden” heritage and has highlighted the limitations and problems of 3D digitization of the UBH. The results obtained offer the possibility of extending and adapting the methodology to different application contexts and the possibility of customizing the data representation. Full article

Sustainable smart cities (SSCs) have developed various services and technologies with multi-stakeholderism under multiple names. The characteristics of SSCs are specified by implementing conceptually related smart cities (CRSCs), which are ICT-based transformative cities. Many scholars point out that in-depth empirical studies of CRSCs are necessary to clarify the nature of the sociotechnical transition of SSCs while avoiding the oversimplified narratives of techno-utopia. Utilizing a periodic matrix taxonomy, this study aims to examine empirical characteristics of CRSCs services’ socio-technical transformation from international perspectives. The target cities were sampled using cluster sampling through three screening steps based on four representative documents reflecting the critical aspects of the operational definition of SSCs. The city-level data were collected using Preferred Reporting Items for Systematic Review and Meta-Analysis Protocol and preprocessed with coding and weighting to create a periodic matrix taxonomy. The outcomes are the commonalities and different services’ sociotechnical transitions of sampled European cities from perspectives of multi-stakeholderism. The outcomes have managerial implications demonstrating empirically the sequences of service transformation of European megacities. Theoretical implications for the existing theories also arise through empirical analysis of historical real-city data and specification of stakeholders’ partnerships in conceptually related smart cities. Full article

The increasing number of crimes affecting urban areas requires the adoption of countermeasures to tackle this problem from different perspectives, including the technological one. Currently, there are many research initiatives with the goal of applying machine or deep learning techniques leveraging historical data to predict the occurrence of crime incidents. Conversely, there is a lack of tools aiming at crime risk assessment, in particular, by supporting the police in conceiving what could be the crime incidents affecting a given city area. To this purpose, we propose the Crime Prevention System, a modular software application for qualitative crime risk assessment. This consists of an ontology of crime risk, a module to retrieve contextual data from OpenStreetMap, semantics reasoning functionalities, and a GIS interface. We discuss how this system can be used through a case study related to the Italian city of Syracuse. Full article

Achieving urban sustainability through smart cities is necessary to manage urban environmental problems that threaten human survival. Smart city policy emphasizes the environmental aspects of urban areas while embracing the social and economic sectors, allowing for the development of practical plans for urban sustainability. This study suggests smart sustainable city policy directions that can improve the transition to smart cities. It defines concepts such as smart sustainable cities, developing frameworks, and indicators. In this research, a smart sustainable city facilitated sustainable development by incorporating smart technologies into urban activities and services. In this study, indicators for smart sustainable city evaluation and diagnosis were derived. These were applied to selected case areas, such as Incheon Metropolitan City and Goyang-si, Gyeonggi-do in the Republic of Korea. These indicators play an important role in assisting policymakers in making decisions, simplifying a wide range of complex information and providing integrated perspectives on existing situations. The results of this study suggest transition directions for a smart sustainable city and application strategies for related plans and policies. Full article

To adapt to current changes, such as globalization, climate change, and demographic growth, modern cities must embrace the digitalization of city management. In this paper, we examine a concept for digitalizing a city based on Rotterdam’s digital twin showcase. Data-processing frameworks for different sources of data are presented. Security risks and the potential of smart cities for military usage are discussed. Lastly, using an example of available datasets for air quality and public lighting consumption, functions of the Rotterdam digital twin are compared with the Brno city digital platform. It was found that every city has its approach to digitalization, and it is probably impossible to unify every city’s digitalization process. This means that the digitalization of the city is very individual. Both systems in their current form make it possible to visualize the collected data about the city. So far, however, these systems do not use advanced functions such as AI-assisted decision-making and prediction of various events in the city. Even so, they are a source of very interesting data that can be used by third parties. Full article

This concept paper presents our viewpoint regarding the exploitation of cutting-edge technologies for the delivery of smart tourism cultural tours. Specifically, the paper reports preliminary work on the design of a novel smart tourism solution tailored to a multiobjective optimization system based on factors such as the preferences and constraints of the tourist/visitor, the city’s accessibility and traffic, the weather conditions, and others. By optimizing cultural tours and delivering comfortable, easy-to-follow, green, acceptable visiting experiences, the proposed solution, namely, OptiTours, aims to become a leading actor in tourism industry transformation. Moreover, specific actions, applications, and methodologies target increasing touring acceptance while advancing the overall (smart) city impression. OptiTours aims to deliver a novel system to attract visitors and guide them to enjoy a city’s possible points of interest, achieving high visitor acceptance. Advanced technologies in semantic trajectories’ management and optimization in route planning will be exploited towards the discovery of optimal, smart, green, and comfortable routes/tours. A novel multiscale and multifactor optimization system aims to deliver not only optimal personalized routes but also alternative routes, ranked based on visitors’ preferences and constraints. In this concept paper, we contribute a detailed description of the OptiTours approach for ICT-based smart tourism, and a high-level architectural design of the solution that is planned to be implemented in the near future. Full article

The adoption of the UN 2030 Agenda and the Sustainable Development Goals is a landmark in international sustainability politics. For example, Europe has set ambitious targets to achieve 100 climate-neutral and smart cities by 2030. However, numerous case studies from different countries have found that accelerating the transition to net-zero carbon emissions is easily hampered by the lack of a coherent systems framework, and that implementation gaps remain at the community level. These barriers are often due to a lack of an adequate end-user (i.e., household) input and early planning participation. This work therefore aims to improve on conventional planning methods that do not reflect innovative technologies with uncertainty and may not be applicable due to the lack of community empowerment, which is a dynamic learning and intervention opportunity for end-users at different planning stages (i.e., outreach, survey, planning, implementation, management, and maintenance). Using the lessons learned from participatory action research, whereby the author was involved as a project director throughout the planning and design process, we identified a six-step cycle principle. The steps are (1) collective action commitments, (2) local values and resource identification, (3) carbon footprint inventory, (4) optimized integration of environment, economy, and energy action plans, (5) Flexible strategic energy system plans, and (6) digital performance monitoring. Ultimately, the outcomes provide application support for policymakers and planners and stimulate community engagement to contribute to the achievement of zero net carbon emissions. Full article

The Southeast Asian region has been eagerly exploring the concepts of smart city initiatives in recent years due to the enormous opportunities and potential. The initiatives are in line with their plan to promote energy efficiency, phase down/out fossil fuel-based generation, and reduce greenhouse gas emission intensity and electrification of various sectors in addition to renewable energy targets and policies to achieve net zero emissions by 2050 or 2060. However, the major challenges for these countries are related to leadership, governance, citizen support, investment, human capacity, smart device heterogeneity, and efficient modeling and management of resources, especially the energy systems. An intelligent energy system is one of the most significant components for any functional smart city, where artificial intelligence (AI), the internet of things (IoT), and big data are expected to tackle various existing and evolving challenges. This article starts with a brief discussion of smart city concepts and implementation challenges. Then, it identifies different types of smart city initiatives in Southeast Asian countries focusing on energy systems. In addition, the article investigates the status of smart systems in energy generation and storage, infrastructure, and model development. It identifies the unique challenges of these countries in implementing smart energy systems. It critically reviews many available energy modeling approaches and addresses their limitations and strengths, focusing on the region. Moreover, it also provides a preliminary framework for a successful energy system that exploits AI, IoT, and big data. Finally, the roadmap for a successful energy system requires appropriate policy development, innovative technological solutions, human capacity building, and enhancement of the effectiveness of current energy systems. Full article

The smart home is amongst the most promising areas of development of communication and information technologies. In order to assure safety, comfort, and resource conservation for all users, a smart home should be viewed as a high-tech system that combines the benefits of automation technologies and contemporary construction methods. Installation of the system is possible during the construction of new buildings as well as during the reconstruction of existing buildings. In this study, the smart home system’s overall idea is considered, the necessity of using resource-saving systems and technologies is supported, and the integration of such systems with the reconstruction of low-rise residential buildings is examined. The study generated a representation of the smart home system for a particular reconstruction project as well as an application for controlling the system using a mobile device. Full article

The digitalization of the economy provokes the rethinking of manufacturing processes. Despite numerous publications related to Industry 4.0 as a manufacturing approach, the production of fully digital and crypto-asset products was poorly researched. Besides having a supplementary role, crypto-assets may form an entire smart city product. The authors assess the manufacturing of smart city products, fully or partially formed by crypto-assets. The initial issuance of the crypto assets was usually addressed as an Initial Coin Offer, or through the process of increasing the issuer’s capital. The authors assess the Initial Coin Offer, and address it, like manufacturing to produce products for sale. The authors classify all milestones related to the crypto-assets’ issuance, distribution, and revaluation, and assign incomes and expenses to each milestone. Additionally, the ICO-based production costs and revenues were classified according to crypto-asset types, as defined by European Economic Area legislative acts. Full article

Even though efforts have been made in recent decades to revive urban areas in the European Union (EU), the contemporary challenges that mostly large cities face require continuous support and adjustments in urban policies. Under the EU Cohesion Policy for the 2014–2020 programming period, the integrated territorial development of various specific areas is pursued by the Integrated Territorial Investments (ITI). In Greece, many of these programs concern Integrated Sustainable Urban Development Strategies (ISUDSs). One of these is the ISUDS of Thessaloniki, which is perhaps the most complex in terms of management and implementation in Greece, mainly due to the chosen managerial approach and the size of Thessaloniki, the second largest city in the country. Thessaloniki’s ISUDS is managed by the Urban Authority (UA), which has already evolved into a separate model of metropolitan governance administration. The aim of this paper is to identify the determinants in its design and implementation, as well as the effects of the strategy on urban development through the assessment of its strengths and weaknesses, as well as the opportunities and prospects of strategy through the Delphi approach. Full article