Smarter Sustainable Dubuque

Background Information

Smarter Sustainable  Dubuque (SSD) is a public/private partnership  between the City of Dubuque and IBM Research. SSD is a partnership designed to give people what  they need (access to data around water, electricity,  transportation, discards and  health) to do what they want (save money, conserve resources and improve the economy and environ-ment). 

Goals of the Initiative

The work of SSD partners is specifically designed as a replicable model for action in communities of 200,000 or less across the United States. The in-formation system itself is be-ing developed by IBM for implementation worldwide. Local industry partners are taking products and services designed to respond to the needs of Smarter Sustainable Dubuque, and providing them to new communities across the country, increasing local employment and economic vibrancy. From 2010-2012 (the year with the most recent data available to us) while the Dubuque region represented three percent of the state population, it accounted for 12 percent of the state’s job growth).There were two initial design and implementation strategies for SSD at its launch in 2009, and both were simple and straight-forward. First, give people what they need (real time information specific to their utilization of resources) so that they can do what they want (save money, conserve resources and improve the local environment and economy). Second, give people the power to modify and enhance the program to increase its value to their daily lives. Some examples of “evolution” occurring within SSD: Data and analytics are conveyed in multiple levels of focus and complexity. Beginners can focus on identification of “waste reduction” opportunities. Advanced users can identify opportunities to increase “utilization efficiencies.” Others can create “resource optimization” on an individual or household level.Data and analytics are now “expressible” in terms selected by the individual citizen, including Dollars, Resource Units or Carbon Impact. Data and analytics are now available by means selected by the individual citizen, including internet, social media, SMS text, hard copy or in-person. Data and analytics work cross-silo, allowing data specific to one resource to drive improvement of many resources. For example, water data and analytics can help reduce water usage, but can point to changes that help reduce electrical costs (if the data can see that I normally run my dishwasher at 7 pm, it can calculate for me how much I will save if I run my dishwasher AFTER 8 pm, when lower electricity rates are available.).

Innovation for the Initiative

SSD is a public/private partnership between the city of Dubuque and IBM Research, the division of IBM responsible for its ‘Smarter Planet” campaign. The project was initiated in September 2009 when the city of Dubuque and IBM announced their intentions to make Dubuque one of the first “smarter” sustainable cities in the U.S. This has grown into a collaboration including two dozen industries, three local universities and colleges, one regional college and eight state and federal agencies. SSD uniquely develops “smart” technologies coupled with community outreach and implementation strategies. This model integrates community engagement and documents community improvement and opportunities through smarter resource utilization. Giving citizens the power to use real-time water information to help them reduce their electricity consumption is new. Giving citizens the ability to use their travel and transit data to improve their health and wellness outcomes is new. This ability to view all personal energy interactions within the community is unique. While Dubuque may not be the only community taking a proactive and technologically innovative approach to resource consumption and sustainability, it is the only city to serve as a “Living Lab’.  We combined the testing and analysis of all the individual resources or “silos” of energy into an integrated sustainability system, making this project evolutionary in nature. However, this project is also revolutionary in that Dubuque was the first and only city in the United States selected by IBM to pilot an integrated, cross-silo initiative to manages resources and reduce carbon. It is also revolutionary that a city of our size and with plentiful resources, would undertake an initiative that addresses multiple silos and use a citizen-driven process to guide the project.

Outcomes and Assessments

Overall, 66 percent of all pilot households were either highly or moderately engaged users of the dashboard. The Sustainable Dubuque vision identifies three areas for measurement Environmental Integrity, Economic Prosperity and Social/Cultural Vibrancy.

Measure for Environmental Integrity:

•6.6 percent reduction in water utilization  and an eight-fold increase in the  detection and remediation of water leaks.

•77 percent of Smarter Water households’ aided their understanding of  personal water utilization and 61 percent reported using the data to further reduce utilization.

•Diversion rates rose 5.3 percent during the discards pilot. Diversion= weight of material not sent to landfill (aka recycle and food scraps)/weight of all discards.

•Dubuque was selected for the first SRF Water Quality Restoration grant in Iowa, providing an additional $9,400,000 in state funding to continue and expand its water quality and conversation efforts.

Measures for Economic Prosperity:

•Reduction in electricity utilization of 3 percent - 11percent depending on season. When extrapo-lated to the community and using an average 6 percent reduction, it represents $1,564,000 in annual savings in household utility bills.

•68 percent of participants stated the tools helped reduce energy consumption.

•Smart Water had a State Economic Output Total of $23,927,675.

•Dubuque’s infrastructure changes and Smarter Water programming reduced water treatment costs $65,310.26 while water revenues increased $184,664.88. City water loss reduction between FY 2011 and FY 2012 fell to 9.2 percent.

Measures for Social/Cultural Vibrancy:

•500 transit-dependent citizens used advanced technology to access the Dubuque transit system free of charge, and over 1,000 citizens downloaded new, free technology that allowed for real-time origin and destination information to be incorporated in transit planning. As a result, ridership increased by over 28 percent between FY 2010 –2014, jumping from 373,376 riders to 478,370 riders.

•Smarter Water Grant Leak Program enabled low income households to seek a 50 percent cost-share to repair leaks, over 400 households took advantage of the program.

•Data showed that that residents in low-income neighborhoods who do recycle, do so at the same rate as those in higher-income neighborhoods.This conclusion guides us to target outreach to individuals who are not participating at all in current programs because they are new to neighborhood, unaware of programs.