Bacon's Rebellion

Democracy Thrives in Sunlight

Sharing Information to Gain Competitive Regional Advantage

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by

James A. Bacon
in , ,

by James A. Bacon

Very different models of regional competitiveness are emerging as people think seriously how to harness the power of smart cities. In metropolitan regions like Charlotte, Seattle and San Diego, for example, major property owners are collaborating with municipalities and power companies on communal energy-efficiency initiatives.

Tapping the potential of “smart grids” is a great idea. But that’s just a start. Udaya Shankar, a vice president with Xchanging, sees smart buildings as the foundation for smart cities. Writing in IoT World, he recommends that smart buildings pool information for mutual benefit. “When buildings operate in a silo, we gain no insight into the effects one has on the other, and if a smart city is the sum of its parts then there is something to be lost in keeping them separate.” He envisions a future in which smart buildings connect and talk to cities and to one another.

It’s an intriguing premise. Shankar provides few examples of what kind of information sharing property owners can share, but we can think of a few.

Smart grid. Almost all smart buildings draw electricity from the electric grid. They monitor their consumption carefully and have some flexibility as to how much they consume and when. Sharing this information can help the power company optimize its generation and transmission assets, benefiting everyone through lower rates.

Water. All smart buildings consume water. In many municipalities leaking water pipes is a major issue (up to 20 percent of all water is lost through leakage). Sharing of usage data can help water companies identify leaks, reduce water loss and delay the need for expensive capacity expansions.

Parking. Many smart buildings maintain parking assets for their employees: either open parking lots or parking garages. Sharing information about parking capacity and usage can help cities better match parking supply and demand. By optimizing the amount of valuable urban land dedicated to parking, cities can convert excess parking to more productive uses that yield more taxes.

Lighting. Cities operate street lights. So do many smart buildings. Sharing information can allow cities and building owners to reduce the wattage needed to light public spaces, thus conserving electricity and curbing light pollution.

Security. Smart buildings typically are equipped with security cameras to provide added security for occupants. Sharing video feeds with the city can provide law enforcement authorities with more eyes on the street, helping prevent and solve crimes.

Transportation. Smart cities utilize a variety of strategies — mass transit, walkable and bikeable streets, road improvements, car- and van-pooling — to manage traffic demand, many of which require cooperation with employers. Sharing information about employees and their transportation needs can help cities fight congestion.

We’re moving into a world where the sharing of information confers competitive economic advantage. Here in Virginia, we should start by encouraging state agencies and local governments to open up their data — not just to link to it from websites but to make it available so anyone, whether a business enterprise or a civic activist, to add value to it. Then we should start creating mechanisms whereby building owners can share information with local governments to tackle public challenges ranging from energy conservation to traffic congestion.

Communities that move first will gain competitive advantage. Those that are slow to adapt will fall behind.

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10 responses to “Sharing Information to Gain Competitive Regional Advantage”

  1. larryg Avatar
    larryg

    I note that Tysons Engineer has alluded to harvesting rainwater to modulate runoff and to use it to irrigate thus conserving treated water and holding back runoff.

    Then reading about the Silver Line – there is a big complaint – and that is that the Silver Line won’t help congestion because there is no parking for people who want to drive to Metro and use it to get to their destination.

    Down our way – it’s a big freaking deal to get commuter lots for VRE and for slugging… but up in NoVa – no parking for commuters.

    interesting.

  2. TooManyTaxes Avatar
    TooManyTaxes

    Working together can be a good thing. The landowners at Tysons are generally working together to reduce traffic volumes through a consolidated TDM process. Sharing information can also be a good thing. But a lot of information is protected or is deserves protection. Sharing information may not be consistent with privacy requirements. Also, does the system have sufficient protections against hackers?

  3. larryg Avatar
    larryg

    I think citizens are fundamentally entitled to information collected and produced with tax dollars unless that information could be used to harm others.

    I don’t think the hacking idea is any more or less a threat with govt than with private industry. You have just as much chance of having your bank account hacked as your taxes or credit card.

    The School system which is responsible for about 1/2 the spending in most jurisdictions in Va is accountable to the citizens who provide the revenues.

    Playing rope-a-dope games to essentially prevent taxpayers from seeing how money is being spent – is scandalous in my view and it has become the driving force behind the anti-govt, starve-the-beast folks.

  4. TooManyTaxes Avatar
    TooManyTaxes

    Larry, I fully agree about the need to make government information available. But there is considerable private information in the hands of government agencies. That needs to be protected, as provided by law.

    1. larryg Avatar
      larryg

      TMT – we agree mostly but I believe that Govt finds “reasons” to not share data much more than is justified and they try to exempt stuff that should not be exempted and other tactics such as charging outrageous fees.

      None of this has anything to do with the idea of any entity – govt or private – sufficiently protecting the data it holds. Your health, homeowner, auto insurance, your employer, your credit cards, your bank, your cable/phone, etc hold your personal data and all of them are susceptible to being hacked – but …

      don’t you think THAT aspect is a SEPARATE issue from people being able to obtain legitimate information that is not personal?

      I get confused with your positions sometimes as you seem to conflate the issues.

      your right to data the govt holds – in my mind – is an entirely separate issue from whether or not the govt – or any other entity is adequately protecting your personal data.

      for instance, there is NO personal data when you ask the school system to tell you the current attendance, existing capacity of a school or how much money they spend on Head Start or AP or IB.

  5. TooManyTaxes Avatar
    TooManyTaxes

    Let’s say I am an operator of a commercial or residential building in Tysons and assume much data: parking, energy consumption, other operating expenses, et., are shared with a government entity to ensure a more efficient Tysons. A competitor of mine requests copies of this type of business information to judge its competitive position versus mine. I don’t think turning over such information, absent a statutory reason to the contrary, makes good sense. Now aggregated data can be shared generally without exposing individual competitors’ proprietary info. If you are arguing for the latter, count me on your side.

  6. larryg Avatar
    larryg

    Moving past the right to govt-generated data and the issue of your private data getting hacked via govt or private entity…

    if the govt generates the data then all businesses are probably equallly entitled to it (however the data itself hours or days past collection may not be of any value to some businesses that provide real-time services).

    I would not think the govt would provide any data to private companies that identified specific people although I can see situations where license plate data is captured and processed by a combination of govt and private. And certainly, we already know that the Feds have collected bulk data with personal identifying information.. ostensibly through a search warrant.

    If the govt contracts with a company to provide captured data for govt use – and the private entity claims that data “belongs” to it – the devil is going to be in the details of the contract.

    this is an example of how technology gets ahead of the govt laws and regulation.

    I note the FAA has said that they control drones but in court it was asserted that there is no law and no promulgated regulation – that the FAA is essentially blowing smoke.

    if you thought capturing cell phone location data from cellphone towers, consider a Drone that locks onto a license plate or cell phone signal and follows wherever the vehicle with that plate or that phone goes – and oh by the way – keep in mind that the govt actually has a device called a Stingray.

    ” A stingray is a controversial[1] electronic surveillance device for remotely capturing data from mobile telephones.[2] It mimics a cell tower so all the mobile phones in the area communicate with it and provide information, including location data. This can be done even when the phone is not being used to make a call.[2][3] Critics have called the use of the devices by government agencies warrantless cell phone tracking, as they have frequently been used without informing the court system or obtaining a warrant.[1] The Electronic Frontier Foundation has called the devices “an unconstitutional, all-you-can-eat data buffet.”[4] A stingray can be carried by hand or mounted on a vehicle, such as an unmanned aerial vehicle.[3] ”

    https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stingray_phone_tracker

    so my question is – can private companies use stingrays and if they did, how would you know?

    1. TooManyTaxes Avatar
      TooManyTaxes

      Larry, we are talking past each other. I’m not discussing the risk of hacking – which can happen. But a company turning over proprietary data to see it released under a state or federal FOIA request or simply giving a competitor access to other company’s data through access into the system. In other words, by logging in and looking at aggregate data and my data, I also can access yours.

      1. larryg Avatar
        larryg

        re: ” In other words, by logging in and looking at aggregate data and my data, I also can access yours.”

        how can you do that?

        I’m not convinced you can but it would be AS irresponsible for a govt to not protect your personal data directly as it would to allow indirect access to your personal data but I’m still not understanding how you can get personal data from aggregate data.

  7. larryg Avatar
    larryg

    TMT – any aggregate data that contains personal data has to be scrubbed of personal data if it is going to be released to the public and it’s so easy to do that with modern databases these days that using that as an excuse for not releasing any of it is just bogus.

    for one thing you do not collect nor contract to collect aggregate data without making provisions for removal of personal data – from the get go.

    more often than not in my experience, the govt entity is using a series of different excuses to not release data that can be easily autonomized if they really wanted to.

    there is a war going on between govt agencies and the information they collect and hold – and remember I am NOT one of these anti-govt types but I do call them to account on this issue – in part, because, it’s this kind of behavior that is driving the anti-govt movement. They’ve lost trust in the govt and they see the govt as no longer accountable and the ever expanding list of reasons why data cannot be provided is further undermining people’s confidence in govt. This is leading large segments of our society now days into believing the govt actually not only does not provide the data but cooks it so that when they do release it – the public does not totally trust it.

    The govt has learned to use technology to do the opposite of what we’d expect technology to do – share information – responsibly – autonomously – to be a cost-effective benefit to citizens and companies that can create value from that data –

    simple things like knowing how much money a school system spends on AP, how many enrolled, how many at each school, what the various course enrollments are – and how much it costs… are not only not disclosed in many of their budgets – but roadblocks are purposely put in your way to get to this data and one of those excuses – more and more – is that the data has “personal information” in it – that would be costly to remove … when it’s basically in a database already and the columns with any personal data can be easily deleted.

    I’m not right wing by any stretch of the imagination but I’m extremely concerned that the govt is, in fact, no longer really accountable – and the bogus denial of data is how they are evading accountability and this is becoming rampant in many Virginia School systems where on THEIR OWN website they do NOT report their OWN SOL scores nor provide links to the DOE site with those scores.

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