CO2 emissions produced by the vehicles of drivers who are looking for a parking spot have a significant impact on human health and on the atmospheric burden of urban centers. 30% of traffic congestion is caused by drivers looking for a parking spot while at the same time urban traffic is causing a particularly significant percentage of CO2 and of other polluting elements emissions. By modulating the manner in which drivers look for parking spaces and by drastically reducing the search time, the proposed "smart" parking solution contributes to the improvement of the urban environment.

The solution is based on the installation of parking sensors by the Municipal Authorities, which via a mobile application will inform drivers where they can find free parking spaces and how they can get there. The application is expected to contribute significantly to the reduction of time spent looking for parking (20 minutes on average in urban centers) and, by extension, to the decongestion of traffic and to the reduction of emission of pollutants from vehicles. At the same time, the Municipality can more effectively manage the parking spaces since it will have a clear picture of the parking time of each vehicle and of every parked car that violates the Highway Code.

Street lightning accounts for more than 40% of the energy consumption in Municipalities, therefore cities can benefit from adopting Smart Lightning solutions which will significantly reduce their energy costs. A basic prerequisite is to replace the current lighting fixtures with new ones that will use LED technology. Studies and real-time measurements have shown that simply by replacing the old bulbs we can achieve a 50% reduction in energy consumption. Moreover, by installing a smart lighting system consisting of lighting controllers mounted on fixtures and a central lighting management application, we can achieve further energy saving that reaches 20%.

The Smart Lighting solution allows the cities to have complete and remote control of all connected lighting fixtures. They can program the illumination and extinction circles, they can set the criteria for dimming and utilize many features that will reduce the operating and maintenance costs and which were not available until today.

Air pollution is a major environmental and social problem. It affects the health of the citizens, the environment, the climate and the broader ecosystem. It has important financial implications, since it increases health-care costs and reduces productivity due to loss of man- hours. Therefore the monitoring of environmental parameters allows the authorities to better plan and implement actions in order to reduce air pollution.

The "smart" solution in this case allows the monitoring of various harmful gases of the atmosphere (NO, NO2, CO, O3, SO2), of three types of microparticles (PM-10, PM-2.5, PM-1), as well as of the temperature, humidity and atmospheric pressure. High quality electromechanical sensors are used to monitor the concentration of gases, while the concentration of microparticles in the atmosphere is monitored with electro-optical sensors.

Smart Waste Management is a system that allows the remote measurement of the remaining capacity of waste containers in order to optimize waste collection and transport. It consists of a wireless ultrasonic sensor that measures the available capacity percentage, a web application in order to manage the system and analyze data and a mobile application in order to guide the drivers and manage the project commands.

Optimization of waste collection by reducing the routes of the garbage trucks will provide an immediate cost reduction of up to 50%. Moreover, it will contribute in reducing the CO2 emissions and it will prevent the overfilling of waste containers, thus contributing in creating a cleaner and more sustainable environment.

Municipal water-supply networks face many problems, the most serious of which being that a significant percentage (up to 60%) of the consumed water is not charged. In addition, other problems include leaks, illegal connections and high energy consumption. Smart Water Management installs sensors, gauges and pressure controllers to the main water-supply network that result in the stabilization of water pressure, quality measurement, detection of leakage and illegal connections and reduction of energy consumption.

Reduction of the operating costs of your business is a key priority for its sustainability and therefore control and reduction of energy consumption are key factors for its success. Now, OTE group, in collaboration with Assetcom, a company that develops energy management systems, offers the Energy Management service which is a system that monitors the energy consumption of your business in real time and even offers you the option for remote intervention.

In this case, the key role belongs to the contribution of the innovative Narrow-Band Internet of Things (NB-IoT) Technology, which concerns the manner in which devices such as sensors, vehicles and robots are interconnected directly via the mobile telephony network. The “Smart City” applications that will be based on NB-IoT technology are only the beginning of utilization of new technologies that are here to change the manner in which we have experienced daily life so far. 

With NB-IoT, smart solutions will become even more user-friendly (since the interconnection of the devices does not require special equipment such as the gateways or repeaters that were used until today) and less energy-consuming maintaining, however, the maximum level of safety offered by the mobile telecommunications network in transmission of information. With NB-IoT, Smart City applications will become necessary tools and integral parts of our city life in the near future.

Chalkida is the first Greek Municipality in which pilot Smart Parking, Smart Lighting and Air Quality Monitoring systems will be installed. The aim of this project which is implemented jointly by OTE Group, Cisco, KAFKAS and OTS, is to prove in practice the benefits that a city and its residents can gain by adopting smart technologies. More specifically, the “smart” applications will contribute in finding parking spaces more easily, in decongesting traffic and in reducing the energy consumption in the city.

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