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The Topic: Future cities Future cities THE Topic 14 | 6th - 12th February 2015 | utILIty WeeK F uture cities are on the agenda around the world. But we need to start nailing down some specifics if we are to be sure they are not simply an excuse for a lot of conferences. Here's what Chiltern Power's John Scott had to say. How fast are future cities emerging? "Typically, in traditional busi- ness sectors like utilities, it takes two to five years to achieve any fundamental change. There are very good reasons for this – you've got to be sure you can keep the system running and there are a number of stake- holders including the govern- ment and the regulator to agree changes with. However, with future cit- ies, there are new players, attracted by the opportunity to manage energy and provide other services, who aren't hide- bound by conventional rules. They will go around the exist- ing systems because start-ups and any organisation with a commercial drive cannot afford to become enmeshed in slow industry processes. What this means is that we may see elements of future cities accelerated through to our day- to-day experience. For instance new players are not waiting for smart meters to roll out as a way to collect home energy data or send different price signals. They will simply put in place their own communications using the internet, for example." Might the development of future cities pose dangers to the UK's energy system? "There needs to be space in the development of future cities for experimentation. It's a natural part of innovation and it may seem like capitalism working well to have lots of fresh parties putting forward attractive ser- vices which our slow moving utilities haven't conceived. My concern is that with the electric- ity system, we are not talking about a simple market where a new, better product is being put on the shelf next to an outdated one. New players are coming in to a highly integrated system and electricity has no regard for commercial or geographic boundaries – it is a highly unu- sual 'product'. Therefore we need to design the additional interactions, opportunities and risks that come with new players into the system. If we don't, we will have frustrated customers as services cease to work or – as we know happens with our computers when the exchange of data does not follow the proper protocols – there will be a system crash. The trick to avoid this is to ensure that the systems engi- neering for electricity is such that it can accommodate, even encourage, entry of new players safely and securely. We need an open system that ensures paral- lel innovations or new services work in a co-operative way. If we don't do this, apart from risking a system crash, it is likely we'll get a classic 'big IT' scenario where projects run very late and over budget or have to be aban- doned completely." How might a system architect mitigate the risk of a system crash? "The Institution of Engineer- ing and Technology has been working on this question for 18 months, looking across sectors for examples of other complex systems to see how they han- dle complexity and what les- sons might be transferable for the electricity system. A review of sectors including telecom- munications, the military, rail, water, and the World Wide Web highlights different forms of a role that is widely termed a 'sys- tem architect'. A system architect is not the owner or operator of the system; it is – if you like – an overseeing role which makes sure that all of the system's elements work together seamlessly and that the overall system retains a holistic approach. The system architect is a concept that could unlock the potential of future cities from an electricity point of view, though it would need to develop to be an energy architect, incor- porating for example heat and potentially transport. A system architect should be independent, have the power to veto developments that threaten system integrity, and be a party that is held accountable for ensuring we have a joined- up system for critical national infrastructure. We will need such a function to ensure a holistic approach if smart systems, tracking and transferring energy across geographic and virtual com- munities, are going to work in practice. Things that we take for granted, while oen highly complex at heart, are character- ised by excellent engineering. Your mobile phone is a case in point: arrive in another country and it works seamlessly on their national network, and without any interaction with you, it cor- rectly allocates charges back to your home account. Probably the most useful example of a systems architect that the Institution of Engineer- ing and Technology looked at was the World Wide Web. It has lots of useful lessons for our electricity system because it is responding to continual change, it has to keep lots of dif- ferent system elements talking to each other and – today – it faces a similar challenge in brownfield development. In other words, improvements have to take account of what is already there. There's no-one in the energy landscape today who fulfils this kind of system architect role. That hasn't been a prob- lem until now, because the sys- tem has been relatively stable with only incremental growth. But that is already starting to change. Watch this space and be ready to shape the future." Reality check Utility Week talks to John Scott, director of Chiltern Power, about the reality of future cities and the challenges they pose for the UK electricity system. "There will be new players, attracted by the opportunity to manage energy and provide other services, who aren't hidebound by conven- tional rules." about John scott: John is di- rector of Chiltern Power, which offers advice and strategic planning services to the power sector and to government. He is a chartered engineer with over 40 years' experience and has expertise in power system design and operation.