The Minister-Mayor Christian Estrosi and President of Nice Côte d’Azur, along with Stéphane Richard, the CEO of France Télécom Orange, have signed a memorandum of understanding on the “Smart Sustainable City”. Éric Ciotti, Deputy, President of the General Council of Alpes-Maritimes, and Louis Nègre, Senator, Mayor of Cagnes-sur-Mer, and 1st Vice-President of Nice Côte d’Azur were also present.
A “Sustainable City” for better living together
The purpose of this memorandum of understanding is to develop the concept of “Smart Sustainable City” in the Nice Côte d’Azur Urban Community.
This initiative is carried out through “communicating streetlights” that provide a comprehensive view of various environmental issues (air quality, noise level…) and resource management (lighting management…). This “ground” monitoring is a first in France since 2007, with an experimental area located in Cagnes-sur-Mer.
As a continuation of the experimentation conducted over the past two years by the city of Cagnes-sur-Mer and Orange Labs in Sophia-Antipolis, the Research & Development laboratory of the France Télécom Orange Group, the Nice Côte d’Azur Urban Community and France Télécom Orange have decided to extend this experimentation.
For the history:
In October 2008, Jean-Louis Borloo announced the implementation of the National Sustainable City Plan, the launch of the Eco-Neighborhoods project call, and the Eco-City initiative.
Nice Côte d’Azur immediately embraced this “sustainable city” approach by applying for the “EcoCity” project call.
With its specificities in culture, climate, risk management, and water and energy supply, Nice Côte d’Azur indeed aims to become a territory of innovation, a pilot site in the “smart and sustainable” management of its environment.
This memorandum of understanding commits both partners to develop technologies within the community territory that allow supervising environmental parameters in the city of Cagnes-sur-Mer (chosen as the experimental site since 2007) and remotely managing a number of facilities to:
- Monitor in real-time the environmental indicators of the sustainable city
- Remotely manage certain functionalities like public lighting or water consumption
- Provide an environmental dashboard for local decision-makers
Ultimately, it is about making Nice Côte d’Azur an exemplary territory in Europe for the technical assessment of environmental data that constitutes a true sustainable city.
The prospects of the results from this “Smart Sustainable City” approach are to contribute to the reduction of greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions with expected gains ranging from 20 to 40%, and to enable social, technological, and organizational innovations to improve the quality of life.
