Could you go for a month without your car?

For the start of August, our communications lead, Sarah Simpkin shares a personal piece about her attempt to go car-free for July, and the insights that gave into the value of some of DG Cities’ projects, particularly when it comes to supporting the shift to electric vehicles in the countryside…

View of London from Blythe Hill Fields on a bike

Earlier this year, environmental charity, We Are Possible set a new challenge, Going Car Free 2022. They invited people to sign up to ditch their car for the month of July. The aim was to change participants’ behaviours by breaking the habit of driving – to give them a reason to try an alternative, even if just temporarily. I signed my family up. Given that we only used our car once in June, how hard could it be? Looking back at the month, there were a few surprises – and some new insights into the value of DG Cities’ work.

The first challenge: a wedding

The month started with a family wedding. The ceremony was in a registry office, a little over five miles from our home in south London, and the afternoon reception was in a local museum. We expected this to be one of the biggest challenges: transporting ourselves and our seven-year-old son on a hot summer’s day in our finery on bikes. But while it took a little more preparation than usual – packing a pannier the night before with snacks, locks, a change of outfit, and planning a safe route to the ceremony, reception and home again – there were benefits. We were able to incorporate a section of the car-free Waterlink Way cycle trail, a new playground, a picnic and take a breath to enjoy the view of London from the top of Blythe Hill Fields.

Our wheels for the month

For the rest of the month, we travelled everywhere by bike, train or bus. We didn’t avoid any events or change our plans. We both cycled to work, we walked our son to school, we took the train around London and we walked to the shops, ordering bulky items for delivery. The truth is, we didn’t really do anything we wouldn’t usually have done – we’re very lucky to live in an area with the services we need nearby and good public transport. We all have bikes, we are able to ride them – and we enjoy it. But then came the heatwave. The record-breaking temperatures a reminder of the urgency of the need to decarbonise and the importance of taking action as individuals.

The second challenge: the heatwave

On the hottest days of July, when London recorded 40°C for the first time, we worked from home. But there was a journey of three miles we had to take with our son. Not going wasn’t an option. Our trains were cancelled, as railways struggled to cope with high temperatures on the tracks and equipment. I read that Network Rail had planned a number of measures in advance of the heat to try to mitigate some of these impacts – maintenance teams had started painting rails white to try to reduce their temperature by 5°C to 10°C, and expansion gaps are routinely incorporated to reduce the chance of tracks buckling. Still, there was severe disruption, which lasted into the following days. We couldn’t cycle in the intense heat, there was no direct bus. And so reluctantly, we gave in – we drove. Our son was furious and demanded we do a fully car-free August to make up for it. We were disappointed too.

How might behaviours change with the climate?

Our decision to drive is just one example of an unvirtuous cycle of emissions. As the impacts of higher temperatures are more acutely felt, people’s behaviours are also likely to change – one of our neighbours talked about buying an air-conditioning unit for the first time. We all used more water than usual. We drove, we plugged in a fan. As energy demand spiked, coal-fired power stations were used to help meet grid capacity demand and avoid blackouts. But more helpfully, we also found new ways to keep cool without electricity, from using sheets to create a buffer between windows and blinds to DIY evaporative cooling techniques. A friend collected the wastewater from his shower and sink to irrigate his vegetable patch, another worked with frozen peas under their armpits.

What if there is no alternative?

Another aspect of the July challenge is talking to others about going car-free, understanding their barriers, and perhaps even persuading them to give it a try for a short time. As I mentioned, it’s easy to choose not to drive when there is a choice to make. I discussed this with friends and family, including my parents, who live in a small village with a population just over 300, almost unchanged since I left more than two decades ago. The village is five miles from the nearest town or any larger village with shops, pharmacy and doctors’ surgery. It is served by an hourly bus during the day, but the stop is on a fast A-road on the periphery of the village, half a mile from their door. A wooden bus shelter is the only sign that a post-bus used to pass through the village itself, although the ‘hopper’ service was discontinued years ago. Due to their mobility needs, active travel is not an option. For them, car-free means isolation.

Of course, the reasons why people drive are more complex than basic needs, and the picture is different across the UK. That’s why the key focus of many decarbonisation efforts in rural areas is, understandably, in supporting the transition to electric vehicles. However, in my parents’ case, their village sometimes struggles with mobile reception, let alone any EV charging infrastructure. That’s why DG Cities work growing electric mobility in rural areas is so vital. One aspect of this is identifying gaps in provision. Working with Field Dynamics, the team developed a data visualisation tool to identify areas which are, for different reasons, not attracting public charge point investment.

The factors influencing uptake are political as well as economic. As our research shows, there is a clear link between a local authority having an EV strategy and rates of EV ownership. Right now, DG Cities and Field Dynamics are looking at places, like my parents’ village, to see how they can support local authorities in developing and implementing their strategy to meet zero-carbon targets. To learn a little more about this, here’s a film we produced to explain our approach.

What next?

Car-free July made us question why we have a car at all - just as when we bought it, its main purpose is to visit family outside London. When it reaches the end of its life, we will look at alternatives, whether that is an electric car or short-term leasing and car club for occasional use. We also considered some new micromobility solutions for the first time, like e-bikes and e-scooters, which like many in DG Cities’ survey, I had always been sceptical of. While the We Are Possible challenge didn’t force us to radically change our habits – and we failed it – it has inspired our son to hold us to account on the journeys we take. And he can be quite persuasive.

Welcome to Leanne, our new Economist!

As has become tradition when we welcome a new member of the team, we invite them to share a few thoughts on our blog. And we have a new Economist! Over to Leanne Kelly to explain her journey here, her unique mix of socio-economic planning and impact evaluation expertise, and the projects she’s getting started with…

Leanne Kelly, Economist

I’m thrilled to have joined the DG Cities team as an Economist, with a behavioural economics slant, and glad to share a few words about my first few weeks.

Firstly, I am so pleased to say what an incredibly warm, open and ideas-driven team it is. It’s clear that collaboration matters, both internally and externally, as testified by the fantastic range of expert, academic, local government and private sector partnerships that DG Cities has developed. Whilst the term ‘dynamic’ is often used, I can genuinely say I am part of a company where no two people have the same career paths or qualifications, but a shared purpose, care and passion for people and improving places sings across the team.

Joining a new organisation gives you a chance to reflect, and to perhaps find a nice overarching narrative that pieces together what has come before and led you to where you are now. My story weaves together my education in economics and local economic development, my early work experience shadowing town centre managers in South West London, and a very enjoyable ten years in infrastructure consultancies, working on a range of multi-disciplinary projects, from needs assessment and business cases for places across the UK to urban economic plans with towns in Kenya. And finally, my part-time return to education to complete a behavioural economics MSc, which was incredibly rewarding.

The headline for me is that I have been so fortunate in my experiences so far, for all I have learnt along the way, and for some brilliant mentors and colleagues. Experiences that I hope help me to consider challenges and solutions for DG Cities’ projects in the broadest sense. Questions like, what makes a place work well for people, and where and why does this differ? What will improve people’s journeys to work, and does this differ for their leisure time? How can we better understand barriers in the uptake of home-based technologies? And, what might be the unintended consequences of accelerating a particular city trend?

“I’m excited to be bringing a quantitative focus to the team. It will help us better understand the challenges of urban innovation, the potential effects of any intervention and, vitally, allow us to openly evaluate impacts – including those that were unexpected. This insight will enable us to explore, in even greater depth, what works, why and where.”

— Leanne Kelly

At DG Cities, I’m excited to bring my experience in socio-economic planning, impact assessment, project appraisal and evaluation to our projects. My work involves drawing together local data and insights to design effective approaches, and to ensure that the impact of interventions can be monitored and refined with a greater openness. I’m keen to draw in the important developments in infrastructure, place and wellbeing evidence and measurement, to help appropriately incorporate behavioural insights, and inform on the socio-economic drivers, uncertainties, inequalities and effects that matter. To bring this knowledge framework to every project, whether we’re talking electric vehicles, digital use cases, high streets or micro-mobility.

In each of my first weeks, I have been fortunate to attend exciting workshops and events where I have met talented and generous folk – and inevitably, made a library of notes! I attended a Wellbeing Valuation workshop led by the What Works Centre, which was framed by both the Green Book – Treasury guidance for officials and analysts who work on business cases and appraisals – and excellent real-world examples. As well as building confidence in robustly considering wellbeing, it brought into focus work from my Masters, where my dissertation looked at travel to work changes through Covid-19 and subjective wellbeing.

I joined DG Cities’ D-Risk deliberative workshop at Imperial College, where members of the public shared their views and ideas for self-driving vehicle safety. It was fascinating to capture participants’ opinion journeys and to hear their stories and hypotheticals. Week three saw me attend the Behavioural Public Policy annual conference hosted by the LSE, with discussions drawing out the future of nudge and inspiring talks on behavioural environmental economics. This emphasised some really useful points for DG Cities’ own projects, including supportive interventions for household energy consumption, and led to fascinating chats with ‘vegan as the default’ snacks in the London sunshine afterwards. And finally, last week, I was at the Smart Mobility Living Lab in Stratford, discussing safety, capacity, sustainability and cost in balancing mobility, where user perceptions and inclusion were central. DG Cities helped to found and has been part of the SMLL community for a number of years, and I was grateful to have had the chance to see what it’s all about.

Joining one of the D-Risk deliberative workshops discussing autonomous vehicle safety

Looking ahead for my role here, I’ve been reflecting on the intersecting challenges ahead. I’m proud to be part of a team with such a strong legacy of understanding where communities and individuals are on emerging issues, and prioritising their needs, views and agency in change-making.

We are working on purposeful projects, which can make a difference to people’s qualify of life and their environments. For example, we are looking at what helps a neighbourhood to thrive and how we can use data from the ground to build interventions with residents. We are looking at the critical energy nexus of consumption-cost-sustainability, both at the hyper-local level to support residents, and with partners to test the feasibility of heat pump deployment. Plus, we are continuing to ask our research community about these pressing issues and future trends, which will certainly be a discussion for a future blog. I am excited about this next chapter and our projects, and look forward to making new connections and sharing more on these topics.

How to make self-driving cars safe: three takeaways from our recent workshops

Over the last couple of weeks, the D-Risk team has been running public workshops across the country to get a better understanding of how people feel about safety when it comes to self-driving cars. Here, Head of Research and Service Design, Ed Houghton and Project Manager, Nitika Raja share some of the initial findings, and explain the value of deliberative methods and local perspectives when it comes to drawing out valuable new insights…

Nitika Raja and Ed Houghton lead a session at Imperial College London

Road safety is an issue that affects us all. Whether you’re a keen cyclist, driver or prefer to get about by foot, we all get around our towns and cities via roads, which are often busy and have to accommodate many different users trying to get from A to B. For many, particularly the elderly or those with young children, simply using the road can be frightening.

Self-driving cars are often cited as a potential solution to increasing road safety. In theory, self-driving cars are more predictable, less prone to human error, and have the added benefit of being constantly connected to one another and their environment. This means that travel in busy city centres could be more coordinated and efficient. But whilst there is a lot of potential, they are very much still in testing - and that means we have limited knowledge of what a safe self-driving future might look like.

Sketches exploring the idea of autonomous vehicles

We decided to open up the discussion to the public to understand a bit more about the potential of self-driving cars to make our roads safer. As part of our work on D-Risk we’ve been running a national survey, and several workshops across the country to explore in detail people’s attitudes to and perceptions of self-driving technology. We wanted to make the experience as interesting, informative and open as possible, so we made use of a deliberative methodology, which is ideal for this type of work, as it aims to build consensus on a particularly sticky topic. The idea of deliberation is all about sharing, listening and learning by making use of data, evidence and expert opinion. We invited self-driving safety topic experts to speak and led a facilitated discussion afterwards, introduced the concept through comparisons to existing automated technology – such as in aeroplanes, lifts and escalators – and gave participants the opportunity to be creative and design their own vehicle. 

We ran these workshops in Southampton, Nottingham and London with members of the public. The discussions illustrated why it’s so vital to get out there to listen and understand local differences. For example, we asked participants to reflect on the modes of transport they typically use and how safe they feel. Something that stood out from this exercise was the extent to which the surrounding environment impacts people’s responses. The workshops were in places with very different infrastructure and transport links. Southampton participants predominantly used cars and bikes, and spoke about the challenges of travelling on the city’s narrow roads. Meanwhile, London participants spoke at length about public transport and many mentioned how they avoid driving in the city whenever they can help it. It was interesting to see how these experiences then shaped participants’ views on self-driving technology. Other factors, such as age and background, also played an important role in people’s perceptions. We were fortunate to speak to a broad demographic who were enthusiastic, engaged and readily shared their views. 

Here’s what they thought:

• Road safety is a big challenge - and one which tech could improve

  Again and again, perceptions of worsening road safety came up in our workshops. Changing road layout, increasing use of e-scooters, and drunk driving were all cited by participants. Many feel confident driving, but are worried about the behaviour of others. However, many of those we spoke to could see the value of technology like automated braking systems, automated lane-keeping systems and some (but not all) wanted to see more done to make tech that can help improve driving safety more widely available.

• Self-driving cars are a long-way off, but the safety case is compelling

  When we introduced self-driving cars as a way to reduce human error, many of our participants were keen to learn more. For those with mobility issues, self-driving cars presented a good option - others were less convinced. We also talked a lot about the kind of features that the public might expect in self-driving cars. Access to video data from cameras, location data, and voice controls were all of interest to participants. 

• Safety and trust go hand-in-hand

  We also introduced the concept of a shared self-driving car, which is operated by a service provider. This was of particular interest to the group, and highlighted the financial and environmental value of no longer owning and running a vehicle. But there were concerns over how personal data and self-driving systems could be managed to make sure individuals feel secure and safe. Many highlighted significant mistrust in “big business”, and also noted that at present trust in the government is low. However, the option of an independent body to oversee the testing and day-to-day operation of self-driving service companies was of real interest to many who participated.

In our survey, we have been noticing some interesting trends, such as the language people use to describe the technology. We asked respondents to share three words that come to mind when they hear the phrase ‘self-driving’ and their language expresses the clear divide in opinion: the words ‘safe’ ‘control’, ‘unnecessary’ and ‘dangerous’ all appear frequently. When we asked the same question in our deliberative workshops, we heard an equally broad range of responses. Issues with the overhead projector reminded us that technology can let us down at the best of times – one participant had this in mind when they wrote ‘unreliable’. Other participants were more trusting in self-driving technology and shared words like ‘optimistic’, ‘enabling’ and ‘convenient’. 

Overall, the workshops were a great success. Participants shared positive feedback and we collected some fascinating insights into how people perceive self-driving technology. Over the coming weeks we’ll be exploring the data in more detail and pulling out key findings for a new report as part of the D-Risk project. Whilst there are many findings still to discover, one thing is clear - the public is keen to play a role in deciding if and how self-driving technology features in their towns and cities.

In the meantime, if you would like to get involved, our survey is still open for you to share your thoughts on self-driving vehicle safety.

DG Cities data insights: what influences electric vehicle uptake?

We gather some interesting data here at DG Cities. For this short blog, we thought it would be useful to share insights from our research into the factors influencing electric vehicle take-up across the UK. Here, our Head of Delivery, Balazs Csuvar explains some of the numbers and the value of a local authority’s EV strategy in supporting the transition…

While the sector is growing rapidly, overall take up of electric vehicles in the UK is still quite low. In this blog, we wanted to explore where EVs have been picked up, the factors influencing uptake and how quickly they will become the dominant vehicle type across the UK.

Of all registered vehicles in the UK today, ~1.9% are electric or plug-in hybrid. These ~750,000 vehicles are not equally distributed across the country, with the majority of local authorities having less than 1% EVs. By comparison, in Norway, 16.9% of all vehicles are electric (23% including plug-in hybrids). 

Early EV adoption has tended to occur in wealthier areas. Disposable household income is an important factor in defining where electric vehicles have been purchased - data shows a clear correlation between GDHI (gross disposable household income) and EV uptake, as seen in the chart below.

Income, however, is not the only factor. Available EV charging infrastructure also plays a huge role in supporting the transition, with a clear correlation between EV uptake and available charging points per person. The availability of infrastructure helps to build confidence. The data and our experience shows that local authorities can get ahead and help people make the switch to EVs by creating a reliable and accessible charging infrastructure for their residents, visitors and businesses.

This chart below illustrates whether or not councils have an EV strategy. It’s not surprising to see that the majority of local authorities with a large number of charging points do have a strategy, either at a county or local level. As the data shows, developing a strategy to support the transition is possibly the best way to kickstart any council activities in this field.

How can we expect this number to change over time?

The number of vehicles registered in the UK annually is approximately 2 million post-pandemic, and close to or over 3 million pre-pandemic. The number of new registered vehicles was 2.2 million in 2021, so for this analysis we will assume that this volume will remain constant over the coming years. The total number of vehicles in the UK was 39.5 million, so we can also assume this will remain relatively constant over the coming decade, as it has been for the last five years, assuming that older vehicles remain as second hand vehicles, and every year the same number of vehicles come off the road as are added.

In 2021, 5% of all newly registered vehicles were plug-in hybrids and 10% were electric. This number is slowly but steadily increasing. In May 2022, for instance, electric vehicles were 12.4% and plug-ins 5.9%. We can project a relatively steady increase of this ratio before reaching 100% by 2030. There will still be non-EVs registered after 2030 as HGVs, for example, will not yet be electric, but in comparison to the total number of vehicles, we can use this as a good enough approximation.

These projections still mean that we need to wait until 2034/35 for over half of all UK vehicles to be electric. But there is cause for cautious optimism - we shouldn’t let the scale of the challenge deter efforts to develop and implement the strategies we need. This timeline suggests that there is sufficient time and need to develop strategies to support EV infrastructure deployment, consider future rollout of technologies within the sector and the changing role a local authority will play over the coming years. 

If you would like to know more about how we help local authorities, developers and other clients define, implement and evaluate their strategies for EV infrastructure, get in touch!

We have moved!

But not too far – just around the corner. We have packed up our boxes, laptops and three (almost) dead plants and relocated to Bureau, a coworking space in North Greenwich’s Design District.

Bureau, Design District by HNNA

DG Cities has been based on the Greenwich Peninsula since 2015, when we were founded by the Royal Borough of Greenwich as an independent consultancy. Our first home was in Mitre Passage, just south of The O2, in one of the early office developments by the river. From there, we have moved around a little as the team has grown and our needs have evolved. We have witnessed the area’s transformation. We watched (and heard!) the Design District being built outside our window, before moving into one of its early buildings, the Institute for Creativity and Technology. Even though some of the final phases are still under construction, the district has already established itself as a unique place, with a great community of creatives, researchers, businesses, students and visitors. It’s testament to this energy that the new workspaces have gone from zero to more than 75% occupancy in a relatively short space of time.

We have also played a part in the Peninsula’s role as a place for experimentation. Just along the river to the west is Morden Wharf, a new neighbourhood of homes, offices, leisure spaces and a waterfront park currently under construction. In 2019, its developers, U + I commissioned us to future-cast the lifestyle and technological changes that were likely to impact on its development, with a particular focus on mobility. Since then, as an outcome of our work on Endeavour, the UK’s first public self-driving car trial, we created the Mobility Assessment Framework. This tool gives local authorities and developers an auditable evidence base to plan ahead for transport and mobility needs, decades from a project’s inception. In 2018, we were also involved in the design and implementation of a future mobility hub for BP close to The O2 – the first of its kind in the UK, it combined EV charging with ‘last mile’ transport options and useful local services.

Bureau

Bureau is designed to support new ways of working and promote collaboration, within and between companies. The distinctive white-rippled building is designed by HNNA with interiors by Roz Barr Architects. The two come together in a very clever workplace, which offers a variety of spaces – and recognises that a meeting room doesn’t have to be a 12-seat windowless box. It can be a padded, soundproof nook for a video call, a terraced lounge, a kitchen bench, a red salon or a studio. Or it can be a 12-person box when you need it, but with a window, integrated technology and a great rug. Right now, this approach suits our flexible, hybrid team. On any given day, you might find some of us on site doing research for a project, speaking at an industry event, working from home or in the test lab of a consortium partner. But for those that do want to come in, there’s a great studio space, which is ideal for collaboration, but also a good place to concentrate on a piece of work.

So far, the team has given the lunches top marks and everyone has appreciated the dog-friendly policy. Thank you to the Bureau team who have made us feel very welcome (and helped us get in and out while we get the hang of the doors). We’re looking forward to getting to know some of our new neighbours soon. In honour of the move, here’s a short film we just made to introduce what we do, how we do it and, when it comes to introducing new technologies, systems or services, why we think our people-first approach is important.

Our new address: Studio 11, Bureau, 13 Soames Walk, London SE10 0AX

A bit late, but hello DG Cities!

When someone joins the team, it’s become traditional for them to write a welcome blog explaining their background and the projects they are looking forward to starting. In October last year, I began working part-time with DG Cities on their communications – seven months on, I have found a moment to post something. It’s been a busy time, learning about electric bin lorries, behaviour change interventions, dark fibre, EV charging in the countryside, how driverless cars make sense of rare events, like fighting squirrels and Scotch mist, IoT, and more practically, finding the best cycle route to the Design District in Greenwich… Sarah Simpkin

Early morning cycle through the Royal Naval College, Greenwich

My background is in art and then architecture. I managed written communications for architects, Foster + Partners for almost eight years and still freelance for other design studios and publishers. My experience has often been in explaining the concept end of large-scale urban visions, the design of the buildings and public spaces, whether it’s a proposal for a new cultural district or estuary airport. What interested me about DG Cities was coming to the same subject from a different perspective – people. While architecture is a response to people’s needs, it seemed radical to prioritise asking people what those needs might be. But that is the essence of what the company does; exploring innovations critically, finding their value, gauging public perceptions and developing a strategy for use.

Everything is framed by the challenges of decarbonisation, social equity and inclusion. It’s been interesting to see the reality of implementing the detail of overarching government policy in the messy complexity of cities, tiny villages, existing housing stock, transport and energy networks, and diverse public opinion. But the team never seems daunted by difficult things. They work very collaboratively and bring a mix of private and public sector experience in different fields, like local government leadership, planning, economics, behavioural science and engineering.

“They find creative solutions to do more with less, to extract the greatest possible value from the smallest investment, squeezing every drop of efficiency from existing systems and making places work better for people.”

— Sarah Simpkin

When I first joined, with no public sector experience, there was an occasional language barrier: I wasn’t fluent in acronyms, purdah, consortium partners or the various panels and boards. I’m still not sure I am. But I appreciate their skill in understanding the nitty gritty of how government agencies and local authorities work – it’s something DG Cities brings to their own projects, but I have also seen how they act as the glue between private and public bodies. And not so unlike good architects, they find creative solutions to do more with less, to extract the greatest possible value from the smallest investment, squeezing every drop of efficiency from existing systems and making places work better for people. It is an embedded approach, a way of thinking, which comes through in every strategy or piece of work.

Another change has been the shift in my focus. While I have always tended to take responsibility for writing, at DG Cities, I have been able to share the load; I took over from a talented writer and inherited an impressive bunch of colleagues, happy to quickly compose an engaging comment on the latest heat pump policy or expectations of COP26. This has given me freedom to explore different ways of communicating what we do, in new formats. Keep an eye out for our next feature film, where Kim faces off the challenge of finding space for EV chargers in a small market town.

I’ve been tempted to recommend DG Cities to some of my architecture clients. “Do you have any real evidence from local engagement to back up that approach?” “Did you know there’s a tool to factor in the transport modes people in that development might need a few decades down the line?” It has helped me develop a more nuanced understanding of the different influences that shape the built environment. And it’s keeping me fit – I enjoy Mondays in Greenwich, the cycle there along the C10, past the Royal Naval College and up to the peninsula and a croissant in SelgasCano’s wonderful yellow canteen.

There is so much collective knowledge and experience within the team, these blogs are a great way to regularly share insights from our projects and life at DG Cities, so if there are any topics you’d like to know more about, or ‘ask our experts’ queries, get in touch!

Heat pumps: serious net-zero solution or hot air? Findings from DG Cities’ latest consumer attitudes survey.

As the Queen’s Speech pledges an Energy Security Bill to deliver the transition to cheaper, cleaner energy, our Head of Research, Ed Houghton reveals the findings from our latest DG Cities Research Community Survey into heat pumps. Is the government grant enough to drive take-up?

Today, the Queen’s Speech outlined an Energy Security Bill, which would pave the way for new, low-carbon technologies and grow the consumer market for electric heat pumps. Home energy has never been more at the forefront of the public's collective consciousness. Rising energy prices have propelled the vital, but often overlooked, agenda of reducing home energy consumption from a ‘nice to do’ to a necessity. In the short term, people across the UK are having to cut their energy consumption, improve their home insulation, and shift from well-established heating habits to more planned and considered behaviour. This is no easy task. But the issue of home heating was on the agenda well before this current crisis.

Home heating accounts for 14% of the UK’s carbon emissions. The government’s Heat and Buildings Strategy committed to greening home heating by setting targets to shift the public from largely gas-boiler based heating systems to heat pumps, an existing but underutilised technology with lower carbon emissions. Its aim is to install 600,000 heat pumps per year by 2028, and by 2035 gas boilers will be removed from the market. This marks a monumental shift in consumer purchasing and home heating behaviour.

At DG Cities, we recognise the importance of creating sustainable and liveable communities, and we believe in the potential of new technologies to do this. Heat pumps present significant potential, and as the above highlights, have received major backing from the government. But we know that if heat pumps are to become a real solution, the public must readily adopt them and be able to use them effectively. That is why we’ve looked into public opinion on heat pumps, and have investigated what needs to be done to improve the chances of a successful home heating transition.

This spring, we surveyed 500 members of the public on attitudes to heat pumps. We investigated their views on the technology, how confident and knowledgeable they feel, and their intentions to use them. The findings highlight that a significant challenge lies ahead for those looking to shift the public to heat pumps.

Awareness is moderate, but knowledge is low

Photo: DG Cities. Air source heat pump on the roof of a new energy-efficient house by 31/44 architects in London.

The public is largely in the dark about how heat pumps work, and their potential value: 82% had heard of heat pumps, but almost half (46%) only ‘knew a little’ about them. Almost 1 in 5 (15%) had heard of them but don’t know what they are.

Knowledge is key to driving purchasing behaviour, and for some, a lack of knowledge of whether a heat pump will be appropriate for their home is a major barrier. This was highlighted in our survey by a respondent who noted the challenge of installing heat pumps in different types of homes. Advice and guidance will need to be tailored to meet the needs of all consumers: “…the advice available (should be) bespoke to the type of home people live in… not generic. Some model homes in each neighbourhood would be good.”

Cost is key: and even with a government grant, it is too high for consumers

Although knowledge and awareness is low, data highlights that the biggest barrier to uptake is the perceived high cost of purchase and installation of new heating systems. At £12,000 to £15,000, the average cost of purchase and installation is considered to be too high by over half (53%) of respondents. And although the government is now offering the new Boiler Upgrade Scheme which provides up to £6000, less than half (46%) of respondents knew about the grant and the majority (60%) would not use it.

One respondent highlighted a reason why: the costs of changes that would need to be made to their home are prohibitively high: “It's not just about the cost of the pump & installation. It would require major replumbing and redecoration. Cost for my house would be £30k in all - and lead to less effective heating. I would never recoup the outlay even if I had the money available, even over a 20-year period.”

Will heat pumps hit the mainstream?

Heat pumps are simply not yet the home heating solution of choice for consumers. Whilst home heating purchases are very infrequent, policy-makers must aim to make sure that when consumers look to change their heating, heat pumps are seen as a viable alternative. Unfortunately our data highlights that this may be someway off. And despite the current cost of living crisis, 56% do not see rising gas costs as reasons to switch to a renewable home energy source. And should gas prices continue to rise 46% would still not opt for a heat pump.

We think there are several ways to improve consumer uptake which we hope will feature in this parliament’s Energy Security Bill:

• We think industry and policy makers need to improve the evidence base of public knowledge and attitudes towards heat pumps and other home heating tech so that robust solutions that overcome knowledge and behaviour barriers can be developed.

• Policy-makers should explore how to improve the Boiler Upgrade Scheme, as cost is a major barrier. This should be complemented by other policy interventions that focus on non-financial barriers. 

• It's clear that the current energy crisis isn’t enough to push the public towards net-zero lifestyles. We therefore think policy makers, researchers and industry should build a greater understanding of public willingness and capability to achieve net-zero. 

• And finally, low knowledge is prohibiting engagement with heat pump solutions, partly because consumers don’t have access to good quality information. We must therefore develop and communicate a single, trustworthy and usable source of information to help consumers make informed choices.

We think by doing this we can help to make it more likely that consumers see the potential in heat pumps, and install them in their homes. 

To find out more, check out our new report Heat Pumps: the future of home heating, or all hot air?

Tackling inequalities: digital inclusion in Greenwich

Many of our projects are about breaking down barriers between people and technology; ensuring that the advantages of any innovation are accessible to all, whether that’s a new mobility solution or access to digital services. This was particularly vital during the pandemic, as there was an overlap between groups vulnerable to the risks of COVID-19 and communities with high levels of digital exclusion. For our latest blog, Project Manager, Hiba Alaraj explains how DG Cities helped, from understanding people’s needs, to delivering training, equipment and empowering community champions - starting a ripple effect that has improved people’s lives in Greenwich, and now has lessons for councils across the UK.

Being digitally capable can significantly improve people’s day to day lives. The ability to use the internet and devices such as laptops, computers and phones can bring about endless opportunities; it can let you connect with family and friends, access online banking, shopping, education and employment. On the other hand, those that lack these skills are at a higher disadvantage.  

As technology progresses, services such as health care, banking and council systems are increasingly moving online. Digitally excluded users are not well equipped to benefit from this shift, making them less likely to easily access certain services, including health services and GP surgeries. The importance of digital inclusion was highlighted during the COVID-19 pandemic, whereby many were digitally excluded due to various reasons, and therefore unable to access predominantly online services such as healthcare and vaccine bookings. Digital inclusion during COVID-19 is an integral part of enabling the most vulnerable groups to reduce their risks to the virus by providing them with a virtual means of communicating, working, shopping and accessing healthcare. 

Communities within Woolwich, Charlton, Thamesmead Moorings and Plumstead, and Glyndon within Greenwich were identified by the Royal Borough of Greenwich’s Public Health team as having a higher risk of disproportionate impact from COVID-19. Over a year ago, DG Cities was appointed by the council to identify and address the barriers to digital inclusion in parts of the borough. 

Understanding people’s barriers

To address the negative impacts of digital exclusion, we spoke to over 50 local residents and members of key community groups in Greenwich to understand people’s barriers to accessing and using the internet and different technologies. Through these discussions, it was evident that many people within these vulnerable communities are digitally excluded for various reasons, including: lack of disposable income, limited access to devices, inability to pay for broadband, access to old or inadequate devices, lack of trust, confidence in the internet, and language barriers which prevent people learning how to use devices. 

Addressing these barriers was challenging, yet in working with the council’s public health and digital teams, we were able to develop an extensive digital inclusion programme with the local community. Greenwich Get Digital ‘Loan and Learn’ Scheme was set up to provide Greenwich’s most vulnerable, disadvantaged and at-risk residents with access to free devices and digital training. Over the course of five months, together with the council, we successfully delivered a combination of 92 laptops and tablets to 15 community organisations, which could be loaned directly to disadvantaged and vulnerable members of the community. The need for these specific devices was determined through our discussions with members of the public. To address connectivity issues, the devices were fitted with pre-paid data cards to allow users to access the internet. 

Building skills and confidence

Launch event for the project, lending devices at a community centre in Barnfield

Our research told us that providing access to the internet was not enough. Many people needed training to support them to learn and build their confidence. Therefore, alongside the device distribution, we  partnered with the community-based company, Starting Point to deliver a combination of virtual and face-to-face lessons to 47 Greenwich residents to develop their digital skills. Participants learned the basic skills required to live and work safely online, including how to access council and COVID-19 related health services. Alongside this, a total of 41 Greenwich residents were trained to act as ‘Digital Champions’ to support vulnerable members of their local community to safely access the internet and use digital devices and services.

Over the course of several months, the project was able to reach many different communities, and made a positive impact for the residents: 

“Since we received our 5 sets of Samsung Tabs, we have now been able to [help] many more of our Isolated Elderly Gurkha Veterans and Families in the Borough… We are proud now of being able to use the tablets to teach, explain Covid-19 information/Health Wellbeing/Mental Health Awareness/Vaccination and Self-Testing Videos to the elderly, people with disabilities and those with no IT skills and no internet access. With the continuation of the digital training sessions and with additional devices, we can better provide/care for our Nepalese Community as well as coordinate and integrate better with other communities in the Borough.”

Nepalese Gurkha Community spokesperson

The Greenwich Get Digital pilot was a great opportunity for the council and community to explore how best to support those most affected by the pandemic to get online and connect with others. This urgent work will have an enduring impact. Since our initiative, the Royal Borough of Greenwich has taken the lessons from the programme to refine and improve it. Given that over a fifth (22%) of people in the UK are still digitally excluded, it's important that projects like this are developed and trialled by local authorities and charities across the UK.

A case study for electric vehicle infrastructure in rural areas: Moretonhampstead, Devon

Continuing our series of blogs on the shift to electric vehicles in rural areas, our Head of Smart Mobility, Kim Smith focuses on the picturesque Devon town of Moretonhampstead to explore some of the challenges of providing charging infrastructure along its ancient narrow streets. Here, she explains some of the tools for identifying gaps in provision, and how DG Cities brings it all together, working with experts across disciplines to develop a strategy to help local residents and businesses go electric.

Moretonhampstead from Hingston Rocks, Martin Bodman

REME (Rural Electric Mobility Enabler) is an Innovate UK-funded project looking at the infrastructure challenges of supporting the transition to electric vehicles (EVs) in rural areas. As part of this work, we developed several case studies identifying areas with barriers to, and opportunities for, charging infrastructure to support both residents and visitors. Overall, the project has three primary innovation strands aimed at understanding and helping address rural EV infrastructure: 

• A ‘cold mapping’ tool developed by consultancy, Field Dynamics. This is a data visualisation tool which identifies areas which are, for different reasons, not attracting public charge point provision, and where a critical number of households don’t have an option for home charging.

• The development of software company, Bonnet’s peer-to-peer platform to facilitate private charge point sharing (similar to an Airbnb model, but for EV chargers).

• A modelling tool from EDF Energy to look at car park spaces and gauge if a conventional charging solution is feasible, or if an off-grid PV/battery charging option is more viable.

The more work we do in rural areas, the more obvious it becomes that ‘levelling up’ isn’t as straightforward as the north/south divide we so often hear about. The exclusion and high levels of deprivation already experienced in some of our rural communities leaves them very much in danger of being left behind, not least when it comes to the dash to meet net-zero transport targets.

Moretonhampstead

Moretonhampstead sits on the edge of Dartmoor at the intersection of two of the very few roads which cross the moor. It’s a small market town and forms the eastern gateway to the National Park for many of its 2.3 million annual visitors. 

The town is home to a resident population of a little under 2,000, a lot of whom earn their living (directly or indirectly) from the influx of both stay and day visitors. Others rely on their cars to commute either directly or to the nearest rail link some 12 miles away. Looking at a picture of the wider area, visitor numbers on Dartmoor have remained fairly stable overall since 2003, rising from 2.3 million to 2.39 million in 2016.

Following conversations with Visit Devon and Devon County Council, a number of reasons emerged that made Moretonhampstead a good case study candidate:

• Most visitors and residents use private vehicles – there is no train service and bus services to the town are limited.

• On-street charging is not possible in many of the town’s narrow, busy streets.

• Visitor numbers are reliably high and tourism makes a major contribution to the local economy. If we look at pre-pandemic figures, revenue generated by tourism on Dartmoor has grown from £87.5 million in 2003 to over £144 million in 2016.

• Off-street parking is limited.

• Internet connections can be ‘a bit sketchy’.

• Devon County Council (a project partner) owns a public car park close to the town centre.

For Moretonhampstead, the first task was to create a ‘cold map’ to see if DG Cities’ initial research flagging the town as a candidate for further investigation was correct. The cold map is a data visualisation tool in which a number of variables can be overlaid, such as existing charge points, all available off-street parking (and therefore the option to charge at home), grid capacity, digital connectivity and footway/highway width. All of this can be plotted and analysed to assess opportunities for on-street provision, as well as investigating publicly or privately owned car parking space. The image below shows several of the data layers from the Moretonhampstead cold map:

Source: Field Dynamics. Contains OS data © Crown copyright and database right 2022

With these particular layers activated, we can see:

• The extent of Moretonhampstead – the hatched blue line. ONS classification data was used to define the rural settlements and the polygon boundaries were created by the project.

• The red dots represent households with no on-street parking, the green dots are households with one space and the orange dots are households with space for two cars.

• The Devon County Council car park is shown centre left of the map (a white dot).

• Directly south of the car park is the green pylon symbol, which denotes a substation close by with good excess capacity.

What does the cold map tell us?

The outputs from the mapping showed that more than a quarter of households in Moretonhampstead had no access to off-street parking. What the town does have, however, within 200 metres of the main square, is a Devon County Council-owned, 65-space public car park - and what’s more, the grid currently has good capacity in the area. 

Not shown in this image are the additional layers of digital connectivity (which is fair) and constraints for on-street provision because of limited street/footway width and seasonal congestion, for many of the ‘red dot’ households. The map gives us a clear, data-driven picture of the issues specific to the area, but the solutions are potentially applicable to other small market towns.

We knew there were barriers to EV charging in Moretonhampstead, but the cold map gave us a more accurate, data-based picture, allowing as to look at the town as a whole and zoom in at a street-by-street level. We found significant physical challenges, from the narrow streets and footways to grid capacity. We discovered that within a five-minute walk of the council’s car park, there are 225 households with no potential for a home charger – could they use chargers there? Are there other areas of the town where car parks or street width and grid capacity would accommodate public charge points? So, the next job for the project is to draw on EDF’s modelling tool to scope out the car park as a potential site for public charge points, and investigate whether they should be on- or off-grid. Although we’re coming to the end of this short project, work here isn’t finished; having the data allows us to help the council with suggestions about the location, type and speed of chargers that would be needed, both now and to facilitate the future uptake of EVs. Follow our blog for more on some of the solutions we proposed…

Sharing Cities, sharing expertise: continued collaboration at the end of our European project

We talk a lot about knowledge-sharing and cross-border collaboration, but few of our projects demonstrate the value of this at an international scale better than the EU-funded Sharing Cities initiative, which brought together project teams across London, Milan, Lisbon, Burgas, Warsaw and Bordeaux. As the programme ends, Head of Strategy and Operations, Heather Yedigaroff reflects on its value and the relationships that it forged - and which continue, as its legacy.

Unsplash/CJ Toscano

Here at DG Cities, we’re all about collaboration. Our strength as an organisation comes from our multi-disciplinary team considering innovation from different perspectives and working together to solve problems. We see collaboration as being so fundamental to our success as a company that we have set it as one of our core company values, the behaviours and skills that we value in our colleagues.

Of course, we love collaborating with other organisations too. Some of the most exciting and far reaching projects we’ve done at DG Cities have been partnership projects where we’ve worked with companies and academia and brought all of our collective brainpower together to do something new and innovative. Some stand-out memories for me were working with Magtec and Veolia on how to develop the UK’s first electric refuse collection vehicle, and the time we worked with TRL, Cisco, Loughborough University and Cubic to develop the Smart Mobility Living Lab in Greenwich, the UK’s most advanced real-world test environment for future mobility. Neither of these projects would have been possible for one partner to deliver alone. It was only through our collaboration and sharing of knowledge and expertise that we were able to deliver those projects successfully.

Sharing Cities delegation

Sharing Cities: 2016-2022

Over the past six years, another initiative we have been quietly involved in is the Sharing Cities project, an EU Horizon 2020-funded programme. This was a Greater London Authority-led collaboration of 30 different partners focused on six European cities: London, Milan, Lisbon, Burgas, Warsaw and Bordeaux. London, Milan and Lisbon acted as ‘lighthouse cities’ and worked together to develop and implement replicable urban digital solutions and collaborative models. The ‘fellow’ cities, Bordeaux, Burgas, and Warsaw, then sought to replicate the solutions in their own areas. Within London, the Royal Borough of Greenwich was the official London demonstrator area and DG Cities has supported the Council to deliver on the project’s ambitious transport and energy related goals.  

The project officially kicked off on 1st January 2016 and over the last six years we’ve had the opportunity to work alongside and learn from our colleagues in the other cities. The project implemented 10 different measures and the beauty of the programme was that whilst the cities were  united by the common goal of finding new ways to improve outcomes for their residents, they each had different starting points and constraints, and tailored the delivery of the measures according to local circumstances.

Milan, for example, has excelled in building retrofit. It set itself ambitious goals and delivered first-of-its-kind building retrofits to 20 multi-property buildings. In a multi property building,  there is no one single building owner to oversee the building design and decision-making process. To overcome this, Milan developed a participatory and co-design approach that will have widespread application across all cities in Europe. 

Unsplash/Helio Dilolwa

When the project began, Lisbon already had impressive shared mobility services, such as a shared bike scheme and car clubs, but through the project, the city has hugely improved and expanded those existing services. One of Lisbon’s challenges is its hills, so to combat that, Lisbon has expanded its bike sharing services to include large numbers of e-bikes. The ebikes proved so popular that Lisbon is now pressing ahead and extending their trial across the city and into the suburbs, with 1,500 e-bikes and a network of new cycling infrastructure. Lisbon also uses a real-time, incentive-based system that generates offers for users to move bikes from overcrowded docking stations to meet demand forecasted in other locations. The e-bike scheme generated over 3 million trips by 16,000 users. It led to a 38% modal shift from the bus and 16% from cars. A massive 26% of users use the scheme daily. Lisbon also now has 160 electric vehicles in its public car-sharing scheme. The service uses a keyless sharing app that allows members of the public to access the vehicles. The vehicles are monitored via GPS and managed through a smart fleet management platform

In Greenwich, we have installed a highly innovative water-source heating system, which will warm 95 homes at the Ernest Dence Estate. This is part of a wider scheme at the Estate, which has included building repairs and redecoration, window repairs, loft insulation, new low-energy LED lighting and smart devices. Renewing the heating and hot water system using a water-source heat pump will provide a more efficient heating system, producing less carbon emissions, improving local air quality and delivering 5,309 tonnes of CO2e savings over 25 years – the equivalent of growing around 87,000 trees. Greenwich also had the Greenwich Energy Hero initiative - a ‘demand-side response’ trial in which participating households were incentivised to reduce their electricity at times of high demand on the electricity grid. Participants that used less electricity during a ‘peak response alert’ earned rewards that could be turned into a donation to a local charity, or a shopping voucher for personal use. The Greenwich Energy Hero app also showed their live electricity usage information, historic usage charts and energy saving tips and advice. This earned Greenwich a Harvard 2020 Innovation Award in Citizen Engagement. 

In Greenwich, we also looked  at electrification and developed an Electric Vehicle Strategy for the borough, which sets out how the Borough will use its position as an accelerator of EV infrastructure deployment to enable every resident and business to use electric vehicles by 2030. We also worked with the borough’s fleet department on a study looking at how to electrify the 550 vehicles in the borough’s vehicle fleet.

As important as these initiatives were the concepts of sharing and replication. Partners continually shared information on their barriers and progress with initiatives. There was also a workstream focused on how to ensure the measures could be replicated in other cities; toolkits and other resources were developed and 100 cities across Europe engaged with the project. 

It was a privilege to have been involved in a project with such a large impact and to have had the opportunity to learn from and work alongside such amazing  partners. It’s fair to say there were a few misty eyes at the recent final project meeting with the EU, but of course the relationships we all developed will continue far beyond the project. We’re already looking for the next opportunity to work together and continue what we’ve started.

Would you let your neighbour charge their car on your driveway?

Peer-to-peer charging is just one of the strategies being explored in our REME project, which aims to grow electric vehicle use in rural areas…

As the UK’s transition from petrol and diesel to electric vehicles gathers pace, recent reports have drawn attention to potential inequity in access to charging infrastructure. Earlier this month, lobbying group, the Society of Motor Manufacturers and Traders warned of a growing regional divide in the provision of public vehicle charging points. Last week, the Resolution Foundation thinktank highlighted the financial advantage afforded to homeowners with private driveways, who can benefit from off-peak tariffs. Our project, REME (Rural Electric Mobility Enabler) is helping to support the growth of electric vehicles in rural areas – we asked Head of Smart Mobility, Kim Smith about some of the strategies they are trialling to make it easier for every vehicle owner to make the switch.

Craig Cameron/Unsplash

REME is an Innovate UK-funded project that aims to promote and support the growth of electric vehicles in rural areas – essentially, to identify ‘where and what’ the needs are and explore strategies to meet them. To make the choice to go electric, people need to feel confident there is reliable charging infrastructure in place. DG Cities has been working with EDF Energy, Bonnet, Devon County Council and Field Dynamics on three key activities. First, establishing a ‘cold mapping’ methodology to identify potential charging sites, map needs and available connectivity - this means capturing data from advanced geospatial modelling and analysis and overlaying it on a map. Second, testing a peer-to-peer charging solution. And finally, trialling an evaluation tool for off-grid charging solutions.

Understanding demand and need

Every local authority has different priorities. In Devon, the priority is trying to work out where infrastructure needs to be put in place to support residents, as well as managing seasonal peaks in demand. As a former transport planning lead in a local authority, I have been in their position. Then, when we were assessing public requests for charging points, the number of requests in a particular location was taken as an indicator of demand. Our cold mapping exercise for REME has allowed us to look at an area in a much more nuanced way and see where the areas of real need are. In that sense, it’s a more equitable, data-driven approach.

For example, in one village, there was considerable demand from residents for charging points. We used the cold map to show that there was more than sufficient capacity from the National Grid, additionally there was a high level of digital connectivity. When we looked at the housing stock, we could also see that the majority of properties had access to private off-street parking, and on-street parking was fairly well distributed. This suggested that there were possibilities of relatively easy solutions - either people could install their own home charge points, or there could be a relatively straightforward provision of on-street units. But if the purpose of the exercise is tackling inequality, what happens if you don’t have your own drive? What happens when there’s no footway or available highway width for on street parking and your front door opens directly onto the road? One answer is developing peer-to-peer charging networks, whereby private charging points are made available to neighbours via an app, which looks after payment, hours of operation and insurance.

Finding alternative solutions

In another case study, we looked at households in Devon without off-street parking in a scenic, narrow-laned town centre. Working with project partner, Field Dynamics our cold map process identified homes where, again, it’s impossible to park on the street. This analysis also showed a council car park within walking distance, so with project partner EDF, who modelled the capacity of the car park to accommodate charge points, we investigated how the council might utilise that in a way that works for residents. Some of the different routes open to the local authority here might be acting as the delivery organisation to get charging points put in; entering into a joint venture with a charge point provider; or simply offering the space to a provider as a commercial proposition, if the area is popular with tourists, for instance. Here, potential operators have a reliable income from local residents using the infrastructure off-season, coupled with a steep rise over the summer months.

This work is vital because in rural areas, people depend more on their cars – there isn’t the same public transport network to support them when petrol and diesel are phased out. The shift to electric has to happen, but it has to be managed carefully and equitably.

REME has been a collaborative effort, both within our team, our consortium and with external agencies. English Heritage has shared useful information on visitor and vehicle numbers, and we have worked closely with Exmouth National Parks and the Forestry Commission. This allowed us to obtain real world data relating to seasonal variations in the numbers of visitors and vehicles. The advantage of working with these organisations at a local level is that we can help to inform their national strategy, while getting an understanding of how things work on the ground from site managers. We have also been looking at vehicle charging provision in holiday accommodation, from cottages and Airbnb rentals to hotels, investigating the case for asking these sites to share charge points with local residents.

Ivy Barn/Unsplash

A case study with applicability across the UK

As well as helping Devon develop their strategy, REME is valuable as a case study for other rural areas. More recently, it has informed our analysis of sites in Wiltshire and Gloucestershire with very different demographic trends, including semi-urban centres which are well serviced by public transport.

Meeting the challenge of the transition to EVs requires a mix of pragmatism and optimism for innovation. For example, a peer-to-peer strategy relies on people being willing to share their private space – to what extent will they? What are the barriers to you letting your neighbour charge their car on your driveway? One of the key issues we identified is the transaction itself, and how that process is dealt with – neighbours don’t want to physically ‘sell’ energy to each other. An important aspect of the software Bonnet is developing is that it takes care of this transaction, the booking slots, even potentially restricting who is able to use a particular charging point. In this way, homeowners retain a sense of control, while supporting their community. To better understand these views, DG Cities and EDF conducted a local survey which gathered more than 1,000 responses. This data helped us understand the exact barriers to implementing a peer-to-peer system, as well as wider challenges to EV uptake.

There’s still a lot of work to do, but if we look at the popularity of an idea like Airbnb, where many people have welcomed the concept of letting guests stay in their spare rooms, there is clearly some appetite and scope to extend this to vehicles. As with any innovation, it comes down to the community – if public engagement is successful, if people understand the potential benefits of the idea and how it works in practice, and if they trust the systems in place, it has the potential to be transformative. The end goal is cleaner, greener and safer transport that is available to all.

Internet of Things (IoT): what are the benefits for local authorities?

The Internet of Things (IoT) is more than a buzzword. While it might not get as much attention as machine learning and big data, it’s a rapidly growing technology that we’re only going to be hearing more about. It has the potential to be transformative. It is predicted that IoT could help reduce UK CO2 emissions by 17.4 million tonnes per year. Another report estimates that IoT will have a global economic impact between $5.5 trillion and $12.6 trillion by 2030. But what exactly is IoT, how can it contribute to urban innovation and how does the technology work?

Robin Glauser/Unsplash

The Internet of Things is all about devices connecting and communicating with one another. It involves linking a physical object, a ‘thing’, to the internet via fixed broadband or a wireless network (e.g. WiFi, Bluetooth, 4G) so that it can send and/or receive data. IoT is all around us, from wearable tech like watches that monitor health, to smart street lights that only switch on when their sensors detect motion.

IoT in practice

The Royal Borough of Greenwich has set out a smart cities strategy, which DG Cities is helping to develop and deliver, to address some of the challenges facing residents. Together, we have identified four scenarios, or ‘use cases’, where IoT can be combined with behavioural nudges, end user engagement and education to address some of the council’s most significant issues.

• Fly-tipping: combining awareness-raising and behavioural change interventions with IoT monitoring technology to reduce fly tipping in Greenwich housing estates. In each use case, we are working closely with the RBG’s Housing Services team, ensuring that stakeholders support our proposed solutions. DG Cities will pilot the solutions in sample estates, evaluate the success of each and then scale across the borough.

• Smarter homes: a smart home strategy for installing environmental and fire safety devices in estates to detect health hazards such as carbon monoxide, damp and mould. As well as making homes safer and healthier, it’s also intended to create a more proactive repair service, as the council receives immediate alerts when there is an issue. They can collect performance data and insights and use these to make data-driven improvements.

• Solar sharing: the equitable distribution of power generated from solar PV to households via solar microgrids. At present, solar power generated on housing estates is only used towards communal demands, for example corridor lighting. Any excess power - often over 90% - is sold back to the National Grid. Installing microgrids directly benefits residents and helps the council decarbonise.

• Saving energy: finding ways to help residents reduce their home energy consumption using a combination of behavioural change interventions and IoT. This aligns with the Government target of reducing the carbon emissions from heating our homes by 95% over the next 30 years.

System in detail: smart meters

The energy saving use case will involve researching and rolling out smart meter systems. If we take a close look at a smart meter system, we can get a deeper understanding of how IoT technology works.

A smart meter system has three devices:

• an electricity meter, which records electricity consumption in almost real-time

• a gas meter, which records gas consumption every half hour

• an in-home display: a digital screen that displays a summary of electricity and gas consumption and the corresponding bills.

These three devices are connected via a home-area network (HAN). The electricity meter and gas meter also send data directly to the energy supplier via a wide-area network (WAN). This connection between the energy meters and the energy supplier is more convenient, as there is no need to manually take readings of energy usage, and households receive accurate figures for bills rather than estimates. Another major benefit of smart meter systems - and IoT in general - is that they help us make informed decisions. Smart meter systems give us valuable insight into our home energy use and are a useful tool to reduce our carbon emissions and energy bills. We can see which appliances use the most energy. The government’s cost benefit analysis predicts that if smart meter systems were rolled out across the UK, they could save a total of £5.6bn in energy bills and reduce carbon emissions by 45 million tonnes.

Risks and benefits

There are concerns about IoT, particularly around cyber security. When devices are connected to each other and to the internet, this allows multiple entry points for unauthorised users. One way to increase the security of a system is to encrypt data. For smart meter systems, the data transmitted across a WAN is encrypted to prevent hackers from interfering with energy suppliers. However, even if the systems are secure, getting consensus from residents is a challenge in itself. Studies show that 84% of social housing residents are sceptical about IoT due to data privacy concerns. For each use case, we intend to address residents’ concerns early on, providing openness and transparency on how data would be stored and used, and by whom. While clearly communicating the benefits of IoT, we will help residents make an informed decision on whether they want to participate in use case trials.

We will also take care to capture only necessary data; for the fly tipping use case, we have ensured the smart cameras fully comply with legal requirements, such as only sending alerts when unusual activity is detected, and not using facial recognition technology. Finally, installing IoT can be complicated, lengthy and expensive, with difficulties often arising when trying to integrate IoT with legacy systems. To overcome this, we are closely collaborating with Royal Borough of Greenwich stakeholders to understand the existing infrastructure and policies in place and to determine how IoT will fit in. We are also looking at longer term strategies and have identified where IoT would deliver value.

“The potential applications of IoT technology are hugely exciting. As well as the cost and environmental benefits of monitoring energy use, might sensors allow vulnerable elderly people live for longer in their own homes? DG Cities is analysing the opportunities, as well as seeing how new technology might address recurring problems. Further research and engagement will be necessary, but these early use cases aim to achieve tangible benefits for Greenwich residents.”

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