Framework for Smart Cities

George Lu & YJ Yangwww.goodXense.com

IoT Use Cases in Smart City Infrastructure

� Smart energy grid

� Smart water grid

� Structural health

� Transportation

� Asset tracking/management

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Structural Health Monitoring (SHM)

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Many Unsafe Bridges

� More than 700K bridges in US

� 1 in 5 is unsafe or structurally obsolete

� Only inspected once in 1-2 years

� Often takes an accident to get attention– I-5 Skagit River Bridge (Washington, 2013)– I-35W Mississippi River Bridge (Minnesota, 2007)

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Why Not Real-Time Monitoring?

� Expensive instrumentation

� Expensive cabling for data telemetry

� Expensive cabling for power supply

� Large amount of data

� >US$200,000 per site

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Technical Aspect of SHM

� Time domain data from many dynamic sensors

� Real-time frequency domain analysis is compute intensive

� Transmission of data needs high bandwidth and storage capacity

� High reliability requirement

� Model update, when needed, is very compute intensive

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Business Aspect of SHM

� High organizational inertia

� Each structure is different– System needs to be flexible– Different sensor combinations– Interested in different events

� Require an efficient framework– Support customized hardware– Customized analysis – Up front deployment + ongoing analysis

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What We Had Done

• Embedded multi-sensor system • Precision synchronization• Rolling backup on device• On-device data processing and compression to

reduce bandwidth requirement

• Flexible Wireless telemetry

• Could operate on harvested solar energy

• Data repository/analysis on cloud

→ Much lower cost of ownership

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How to Value a Safe Bridge?

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Antennae

Main chassis(Inclinometers

Accelerometers)

Water Velocitysensor

Water Levelsensor

Much lower cost

→ Wider deployment

→ Safer public infrastructure

Temperature sensor

Need for Quantitative and Qualitative Monitoring of Water

• Water distribution infrastructure• Quantitative – 30% lost through pipeline• Qualitative – contamination

• Water quality in source water bodies

• Effective water use• Residential, commercial, industrial,

agricultural/landscape

• Pollution detection/regulatory enforcement

• Wastewater management

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Benefits of Water Infrastructure Monitoring

• 2.3 million miles of distribution system pipes in US, most near end of lifespan

• Contamination due to biofilm growth, nitrification, leaching, internal corrosion, scale formation, etc.

• Increasing concern over intentional sabotage

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� Agricultural Waste Water− Pollute source water and underground water with

pesticides and nutrients− Infrequent monitoring/reporting is ineffective in

protecting public

� Industrial Waster Water − Contain various industrial pollutants− Oversight agencies can't afford the labor and

equipment to ensure compliance

� Example (Washington Post 2008-09-22)– Maryland has 132 inspectors to cover 205,000 sites -

“not even close to adequate”

Inability to Enforce Regulations Without Real-Time Monitoring

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� Citywide sensor network for water monitoring– Infrastructure integrity– Quality assurance– Usage accounting– Pollution Detection

� Different sensors on common platform– Efficiency from sharing platform across multiple

applications

Our Model: Smart Water GridEdge Sensors

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� Sensor network management/maintenance

� Data repository

� Data analytics – Event detection– Event response workflow– Cause/effect identification

� Open API– Enable many mobile/desktop/web applications

Our Model: Smart Water Grid Web Services

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Example: Water Quality Credit Trading � Economic incentive for compliance and reuse.� Wider adoption will require common monitoring

framework.

Monitoring Enables Carrots and Sticks

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Webservices

Analytics

Event Management

API

Public/Private Networks

Water Grid

� Electrochemical

� Optical

� Submeters

� Water level

� Water velocity

Civil Structures

� Vibration

� Tilt

Transportation

� Traffic flow

� Parking

� Access control

� Emission control

� Licensing

Energy Grid

� Submeters

Our Model: A Common Smart Sensor Framework

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� Challenges− Difficult to confirm event against fluctuating

background using few parameters� False alarms cause panic, reduce credibility

− Example: Water quality fluctuates due to operational controls, daily and seasonal variations

� Statistical analysis– Reduce false-positives– Recognize known patterns

Event Detection & Analysis

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Incident /Event management• Event verification protocol• Notify first responders, officials, citizens• How is it similar/different from previous• Event tracking from detection through resolution

Knowledge Management• Assess event management effectiveness• Statistics of event type and resolution tactic/strategy• Knowledge improves handling future events

Work Flow

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Citizen Access

• Issue reporting/verification• Smart phones are effective distributed sensors• Turn service consumers into service providers

• Status of known issues

• Solution of past issues

• Process improvement

• Quantity benefit

• Access performance of city management

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Conclusion

• Technology still evolving fast

• Modular design• Loosely-coupled components• Integrated by open protocol• Parts could be changed over time

• Data, data everywhere• Mostly routine non-eventful data• Detecting meaningful events • Work flow to manage events

• Good API design is critical in effective use and continued evolution of this infrastructure

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goodXense Framework

• Built on sails.js – a real-time MVC framework

• RESTful API already familiar to web developers

• Front-end agnostic• Smart sensors using different protocols• Web browsers and mobile apps for human

• Supports many databases

• Extendable interface to various IoT protocols

• Under preparation for open source

• Welcome interested collaboratorsinfo@goodxense.com

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