andrew neather: tech can help cut pollution but london ... - solar traffic light system

It might look like magic ten years ago.
At the traffic lights
The radar-based system automatically detects how many cyclists are waiting to leave and adjusts the lights as needed to allow them to stay on the green for longer.
But last week, transport to London began experimenting with the system on the bicycle highway on Cable Street.
Technology will play an increasingly important role.
Play a bigger role in greening our city.
The challenge is obvious.
Especially with regard to air quality, people are increasingly panicking.
Although the level of major pollutants in London's air has declined, it is still far above the EU's highest level.
According to the mayor's own data, about 4,200 Londoners die prematurely each year.
At the same time, cities like London emit carbon dioxide.
But these emissions are bigger stories in the long run-
This is the theme of the UN climate change conference in Paris in December.
In fact, some solutions are not high --tech.
For example, we need to plant more trees.
How it works: plants can cut streets
The content of nitrogen oxides is as high as 40.
They are also important in absorbing carbon dioxide.
There may be worse solutions in the future, such as "eating" the smoggy sidewalks and paint.
The problem is that this "pipe end" solution cannot solve the cause of the problem: they do not change the behavior of polluting the environment in the first place.
Greening our transportation system is key: about half of the nitrogen oxides and most of the particulate matter in our air are emitted through road traffic.
Diesel engines are a special problem: many activists have criticized the mayor's schedule for the ultra-low emissions zone and the lack of a full ban on diesel (ULEZ)
It will operate in the congestion charging area from 2020.
While electric cars are still the biggest hope, more bikes and walking will help.
But we're still a long way from a shared, self-contained team.
Driving an electric car glides silently on the street.
Sales in the UK have surged over the past year, but only 1 by March 2015.
2 per cent of new car registration is electric.
Huge challenges remain, although many in the industry want to change this situation completely through nanotechnology.
Graphene and other materials improve the efficiency of the battery.
But London also faces the challenge of providing the necessary infrastructure for electric vehicles.
Charging points (
Currently about 1,400)
Far behind the mayor's goal, there is almost a quarterly target that doesn't work at any given time.
There is more promising progress on the bus: TfL is committed to all its single-
Electric or diesel bus-
Electric hybrid by 2020.
Green technology is not just transportation. Gas-
Coal-fired heating systems contribute about in London's no2.
New systems that allow householders to turn the heating on or off remotely and program the heating room by room can save up to 30 bills, thus reducing pollution and emissions.
New buildings can be designed with more energy. Efficient Way
Although the problem with cities like London is to renovate old buildings.
But real green technology, especially the green technology that changes people's behavior, revolves around the role of "smart city" and "big data.
Digital information generated by the linked device.
Think about oyster/contactless systems: data that Londoners get in and out of their location, where to go and how to be captured 17 million times a day.
Although it has only been kept for eight weeks, this means that the core oyster database holds information on billions of transactions.
Huge data sets can tell us something we never knew about the pulse of the city.
Connecting it with smartphones and GPS systems, we can change traffic management completely.
We can already see the dramatic effects of GPS.
Uber-based applications.
This use of the data also helps to revolutionize the car clubs and other green parts of the "shared economy.
Our use of big data is still in its early stages.
Isabel Delin, deputy mayor in charge of transport, admitted: "The vast amount of data we are collecting now exceeds our policy thinking about how it can and should be used . ".
But in the future, for example, the use of an oyster system may reward those who walk or ride on a heavily congested day.
Future air quality solutions may also get data from pollution sensors across the capital.
For example, TfL is investigating how to switch a new bus to zero
When certain crowded areas outside of the ULEZ are particularly contaminated, the emission pattern changes temporarily: This will require precise real-timetime data.
One answer to data overload is simply to hand it over to app developers to see what they came up.
TfL is the world leader in this regard: a large number of data feedsfrom real-
Time location of pipeline and bus cycle rental docking availability-
Published on its website.
This has led to about 360 applications so far.
"The challenge is to make things in smart cities pay," said Alexander January of the Arup city economic advisory team . ".
But he is optimistic: "If it works anywhere, it's in London: The scale and critical mass that makes these projects successful.
"The broader question is how much change can be brought about by incremental local changes, because of the real major environmental challenges --
The most important thing is climate change.
Policy changes are also needed at the national and international levels.
So while London has to do its part to reduce carbon dioxide emissions through electric vehicles, if the batteries of these cars are charged by burning fossil fuels instead of renewable energy, they just push
Upstream emissions change.
Another option is feasible: investing in solar energy can change the face of London.
However, such energy policy decisions are decided by the City Hall.
We still need political will to make the capital green, not just smart apps.