City to Smart City: 'Smartness Proportion' with Satellite Intelligence
Part- 2 | Unlocking Smartness: Satellite Edge Computing Advantages
Foundational Layer of smartness
Building upon Part-1: "City to Smart City: 'Smartness Proportion' with Satellite Intelligence", let's explore some activities undertaken by smart city development bodies to demonstrate the utility of satellite edge computing. Before we proceed, let us keep in mind that cities have the autonomy to chart their unique paths towards "smartness", without being rushed or pressured to adopt a specific technology or even the extent of its application.
In his publication (2016), “Smart City Implementation Framework for Developing Countries: The Case of Egypt”, Dr.Karim Hamza suggested the following framework.
Figure 1 illustrates the "Smart City Structure", highlighting the top priorities such as preserving land, water, and forest resources, along with establishing robust infrastructure for sewage systems, water supply and transportation. Maintaining up-to-date digital twins of these features is critical for every city in developing nations, as they aspire to integrate "Smartness" into their urban landscapes, reflecting a holistic approach to urban development.
Without this groundwork, cities may encounter obstacles in subsequent stages of smart city development. This is where satellite edge computing can be a transformative solution, offering an alternate to traditional high-cost approaches.
Unlocking Smartness: Satellite Edge Computing Advantages
Satellite edge computing offers a host of advantages for cities aspiring to embrace smartness. It can seamlessly integrate with existing systems, thereby reducing upfront costs and overhauling legacy infrastructure. Even cities with limited digital infrastructure can benefit during early development stages, accelerating their smart city initiatives. Moreover, by providing actionable insights directly, satellite edge computing reduces the reliance on in-house expertise at the very beginning, enabling swift action and building trust with their citizens for delivering on public goods.
Diverse City Needs: Satellite Edge Computing's Role in City-Led Smartness
Each city has its own unique needs and not every city requires the same level of information. Thanks to the adaptable nature of satellite edge computing, one can customize the solution to meet the distinct needs of each city.
In consonance with our focus on "City-led" approaches (recall the generations of smart cities outlined earlier), technology only serves as an enabler.
Understanding city dynamics – Master Plan Compliance
The increased frequency of data collection, facilitated by satellite edge computing, simplifies the identification of illegal land use, a prevalent issue in many developing nations, through classification models onboarded onto satellites. This capability is crucial for city authorities as it allows them to address illegal land use at its beginning stages, supporting various aspects of urban governance. Additionally, frequent monitoring of land use dynamics enhances the efficiency of disaster management activities. Furthermore, supports proactive urban planning by tracking urban sprawl and ensuring compliance with land-use regulations.
2.Infrastructure Development and Monitoring
In a developing city, construction projects span across roads, buildings and bridges dispersed across the urban landscape. Monitoring these projects from an executive-level often requires extensive field visits, creating a significant dependency on reporting officials.
In a city-led approach, where councils directly oversee project progress, the need for frequent field visits must be kept to a minimum. This means that instead of relying heavily on physical inspections, city officials can leverage technologies like satellite-based construction activity monitoring. With this system integrated into the smart city's monitoring infrastructure, a significant portion of the monitoring work is accomplished without the necessity for on-site visits.
Once a model that is trained to meet the requirements is onboarded, the system delivers regular snapshots of project sites, on a daily or weekly basis. These snapshots are accessible through standard web-mapping frameworks, eliminating the necessity for specialized GIS software and reducing the burden of frequent field visits.
This feature not only ensures effective work implementation but also results in cost-effectiveness. Considering that most infrastructure projects stretch beyond planned timeline and budgets, and involve a multitude of departments across administration tenures, satellite edge computing can be specifically enabled to cater to these extended periods, ensuring continuous monitoring and oversight.
Encroachment detection
Encroachment detection, a critical aspect of urban land management, relies on routine field visit which may not be timely or effective. However, with satellite edge computing, encroachment attempts can be swiftly detected and alerted upon, preventing the unauthorized use of land parcels. This proactive approach ensures the timely conservation of valuable land resources as well as minimize lost revenue to the municipality. Using satellite images in encroachment detection is a high-value activity, widely used by metro cities like Mumbai. Additionally, in forested areas adjacent to urban zones, early warning systems can be established to monitor deforestation activities, safeguarding vital ecosystems.
For further insights into proactive property monitoring and deforestation tracking using satellite imagery and edge computing, explore our case studies on Monitoring property lines and Deforestation early warning.
Natural resources – Management
Satellite-based monitoring is a very powerful tool for natural resource management, tracking water quality and green cover health. Satellite edge computing can be used to provide timely alerts when water quality drops below safe limits, enabling proactive interventions. Additionally, vegetation indices computed continuously can assess green cover health. This integrated approach to natural resource management can enable proactive conservation efforts towards keeping cities sustainable and healthy.
Skyserve conducted a case study illustrating the density of Cyanobacteria, which is known for causing severe social and ecological consequences. These blooms incur significant socioeconomic and environmental costs, affecting various sectors including drinking water, fisheries and habitats. Continuous monitoring of such contamination enables early detection of adverse effects, facilitating timely intervention through appropriate channels.
5. Public health
Landfills hold complex significance in urban areas, preventing waste accumulation and associated health risks. Continuous monitoring of landfills is essential, not only for managing environmental and social impacts but also to preserve the land resources they occupy.
Satellite image-centric solutions offer vital inputs here. Alongside traditional techniques like land use classification and NDVI-based studies, deep learning models are providing better accuracy nowadays. From the medium to very high-resolution, satellite imageries are being trained with those models.
These models not only monitor landfill sites but also detect illegal landfills within cities, where human access and visibility are limited, with minimal effort. Continuous monitoring of official and illegal landfills through satellite edge computing enables the assessment of their growth rates, the development of elimination plans, and the implementation of measures to prevent new pollution.
6. Diverse AI Models to Solve City Problems
High-resolution satellite images can collect property-level information, allowing for automated monitoring of approved properties and detection of modifications. Tax officers can leverage this technology to identify changes and impose relevant taxes, thereby bolstering the financial health of the city corporation. These capabilities extend to many more applications that can be tailored to address city-specific issues. For instance, detection of potholes and road quality monitoring enables timely repair by highway departments, while city-wide traffic monitoring using satellite images informs traffic management strategies.
Empowering Smartness in Developing Nations: Role of AI/ML Models
AI/ML is already playing a crucial role in our quest to increase the smartness quotient of cities, especially in developing countries. These models provide invaluable support by automatedly analysing satellite images and extracting actionable insights, empowering city authorities to make informed decisions with a smaller workforce.
While training these models requires initial effort, the long-term benefits align with the goal of continuously integrating smartness within existing digital infrastructures. Additionally, the adaptability of AI/ML models allows for seamless upgrades to satellite systems, facilitating ongoing smart city development.
The increase in diversity and access to satellite datasets has not only streamlined the process of training AI/ML models, but has also democratized access to remote sensing solutions. This has catalysed innovation in the field, with many researchers, start-ups and enterprises leveraging these datasets to contribute to smart city objectives
Closing the Global Smart City Gap
Satellite edge computing isn't exclusive to developing nations; it can be a priority-driven strategy. Even cities in developed nations, opting to reduce ground-based data collection, may transition towards utilizing satellite edge computing.
We can see that today's cities can adapt very quickly if technologies like satellite edge-computing are adopted, while being prepared to on-ramp infrastructure modifications at their own pace. This prepares cities for future growth, ensuring resilience and adaptability regardless of their current developmental stage. Ultimately, it is the citizens and their trust in their local bodies that will foster a more livable urban environment for the benefit of society.