Time for Polish cities of the future

During the XXX Economic Forum in Karpacz, Veolia and Orange signed a letter of intent concerning the Smart City project. The focus of the cooperation between the two companies will be the development of a continuous, remote monitoring system of heating and water supply networks in Polish cities.

A pilot version of the project has already been launched this year. The first beneficiaries of the innovative solutions implemented by Veolia and Orange in PWiK Tarnowskie Góry will be the residents of Tarnowskie Góry, Miasteczko Śląskie and the municipality of Woźniki.

Water and energy savings

The signatories of the letter intend to focus on monitoring water supply networks in terms of balancing water consumption in the entire system, allowing for limiting its losses, monitoring its quality and security of supply. The project will also focus on “smart energy” solutions, involving management of heating and power supply infrastructure. This includes not only control of district heating station regulators, remote reading of heat and electricity meters, but also monitoring of the operation of heating networks and management of energy efficiency of buildings. The project also assumes the use of communication technologies to develop an energy efficiency management platform for the industry sector.

As emphasised by Frédéric Faroche, President of the Veolia Group in Poland, this is a very important moment - the two French investors, who have been operating in Poland for a long time are teaming up under a joint project. - Nowadays, infrastructure management must be based on modern means of communication and data transmission, which are fast and efficient. This is exactly why Orange and Veolia have decided to start cooperation. I am convinced that we will make an important contribution to the transformation towards smart cities, which will improve the efficiency of systems and the quality of services, resulting in greater environmental friendliness, as well as energy and water savings - explains Mr Faroche.

Installation of 16,000 “smart” meters

Julien Ducarroz, President of Orange Polska, believes that the project has great potential for our country. - For the moment, Orange is operating in 80 cities in Poland, developing its smart city solutions through the Live Objects platform. I think that this is our future, although there are still some local governments that fail to appreciate the potential of smart city solutions, which guarantee better services for inhabitants - observes president Ducarroz.

The effectiveness of the new solutions is to be proved by the results of the pilot project in Tarnowskie Góry. As explained by Krzysztof Zamasz, Commercial Director, Member of the Board of the Polish Branch of Veolia Group, over 73,000 inhabitants will benefit from the exchange of water meters. - We are entering a new era of digitalisation and the Internet of Things. This is the future. We will want to implement similar projects to the one in Tarnowskie Góry also in other locations - adds Krzysztof Zamasz.

Live Objects is used to manage various municipal services. For example, it enables remote reading of water meters and controlling street lighting. The platform is based on the SaaS model, which allows for the management of various IoT devices, including city bicycle-sharing systems. - We want to give city and municipal authorities a chance to ensure a better quality of life for their inhabitants - explains Tomasz Dreslerski, Sales Director for Key Accounts and Corporate Clients at Orange Polska.

Functions of the platform, including Smart Water, Smart Light or Smart Heating, allow for remote meter reading, heat measurement and automation of the whole process, as well as control of city lighting.

- Information on water consumption is transferred to the platform, which stores the data, allows for its analysis, and sends reports on current water consumption and sewage disposal to local governments. It also allows to detect leakage and illegal water connections - comments Director Dreslerski on the advantages of the solution.

From water meters to smog and noise measurement

Przemysław Brzywcy, Deputy Commercial Director and Marketing Director at the Polish Branch of the Veolia Group, claims that the joint project will not only allow for better management of water supply infrastructure and increasing its efficiency by balancing water consumption and reducing losses, but also for more efficient management of heating and power supply infrastructure, including through control of district heating substation regulators, remote reading of meters, monitoring of network operation or management of energy efficiency of buildings.

- This project also involves the use of other sensors for measuring smog and noise levels - adds Mr Brzywcy.