A Worldwide Challenge

Every second, the world's cities grow by two people. How can they reduce their environmental impact despite population growth?. In the years to come, urban communities will face explosive growth, not only in population but also in geographical size and economic output. With cities already generating around 80% of the global gross domestic product, it becomes obvious that they will be the backbone for economic growth and prosperity in the future. Our goal is to help cities evolve, and to offer them strategies and tools to ensure that they will become social, cultural and economic hubs.

Siemens City Performance Tool

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City Performance Tool All over the world, cities are shaped by profound forces: their population, their technologies and their infrastructures. Even today, these forces collide and urbanization and climate change will spur dramatic changes in metropolitan areas. Cities need to pave the way for constant evolution: digital technologies are becoming increasingly important and urban infrastructures and buildings require a more efficient and sustainable setup.

These changing environments set free a swarm of urban challenges: Developed cities for instance need to focus on cutting carbon emissions, improving efficiency in infrastructure and buildings, stimulating a market shift towards cleaner vehicles and more efficient and environmentally friendly public transportation. At the same time, infrastructure quality in many advanced economies is deteriorating. Looking forward to 2030, more than $50 trillion will need to be invested in infrastructure globally to keep up with GDP and population growth.

Cities in emerging markets on the other hand face issues such as power outages and inadequate public transport and roads, which brake on growth and development. Infrastructures cannot be built fast enough to keep pace with economic and urban development. In times of constrained budgets city leaders carefully need to identify their infrastructure investments ensuring that their investments address their environmental and economic priorities. Technologies need to be adapted to serve local needs to ensure that the right technologies are applied in the right environments, tailored to the specific characteristics of the individual city.

The Siemens City Performance Tool

To tackle these questions, Siemens has developed an interactive and comprehensive tool – the City Performance Tool (CyPT). It gives guidance to a city on how to achieve their environmental targets while providing an indication on how each infrastructure-related decision will influence job creation and the infrastructure sector growth.

The City Performance Tool

is a leading-edge simulation tool that can be used in many different decision-making scenarios
evaluates buildings, transport and energy technologies in a city through more than 70 technologies deployed at the desired time period and required implementation level
measures the impacts of a city’s strategic plans, and compare traditional methods with state-of-the-art technologies
determines the implementation rate needed for any city to meet its future environmental targets
reports both environmental and economic KPIs across transport, building and energy sectors

The City Performance Tool of Siemens shows a way forward by going beyond a simple carbon footprint. The inclusion of further pollutants (PM10 and NOx) and further sustainability dimensions (cost efficiency and job creation) goes definitely in the right direction.

Prof. Dr. Matthias Finkbeiner, Chair of Sustainable Engineering, TU Berlin

City Performance Tool Reports

Carbon neutral Aarhus

The City of Aarhus has the ambition to become carbon neutral bei 2030 and the Siemens City Performance Tool has shown that this target is realistic. However, the city will need to further electrify its transport and entice the private sector to do the same.

Mexico City's green future

Although Mexico City is already making "green" decisions with regards to infrastructure, it could accerlerate its progress by adopting market-ready buildings, energy, and transport technologies.

Helsinki's 2030 climate technologies

Being on course to meet the goal of reducing its greenhouse gas emissions by 30% by 2020, the city of Helsinki is now preparing to meet its next important target: carbon neutrality by 2050.

Shenzen as a model of sustainability

The award-winning Shenzhen International Low-Carbon City (SILC) in the district of Longgang is highly capable of achieving its carbon emissions target of 5 tonnes per capita, if it focuses on technology deployment and industry upgrading.

Minneapolis can reach 80 by 50

The city of Minneapolis has ambitious sustainability goals. By 2050, it wants to reach 80% of reductions in emissions. To reach the target, 40 building and transportation technologies will have to be implemented and adopted.

Zero carbon growth for Nanjing

By taking decisive actions and implementing effective technical levers, it will be possible for Nanjing to achieve "Zero Carbon Growth" by 2020, resulting in total CO₂ emissions being lower than in 2012, for instance.

Low-carbon vision of Ningbo

Ningbo is capable of taking the lead in peaking CO2 emission in 2018 but still reserves adequate space for industrial and economic development, for example by enhancing the application of technology levers in green infrastructure.

Vienna 2025

Vienna can meet its 2030 targets as early as 2025 if implementing a set of technologies in the energy, building and transports sectors. The Siemens City Performance Tool reports shows which infrastructure solutions the city should be prioritising.

Copenhagen's big incentive

By 2025, the Danish Capital is aspiring to reach carbon neutrality. The CyPT report analyzes what additional actions could be delivered by the city, its businesses and residents to help boost carbon savings and meet the 2025 target.

Cities on the move Siemens went on a global journey and visited cities of all shapes and sizes to show how different the right technologies for each and every city can be. Every event was different – follow our bloggers as they reported from our Cities on the Move tour from a variety of locations around the world – including London, Paris, Shenzhen and Washington.

It’s not all about the budget. The Siemens City Performance Tool (CyPT) offers a diverse range of options for Copenhagen’s climate plan.

Recently, hundreds of government officials, business leaders, city planners, and technology and policy experts convened in Washington, D.C. to share their insights on city sustainability.

At a pivotal moment on the journey to the Smart Cities of the future, urban development experts gather in London to discuss how cities can make the best of powerful digital platforms and intelligent infrastructure.

City Performance Tool Game What would you do if you were the Mayor of your city? Play the City Performance Tool game and find out how technologies can make your city more livable and create more jobs. Are you happy with your results? Share your achievements via social media channels at the end of the game!

Urban focus Read here how the City Performance Tool is put into practice, why digitalization becomes more and more crucial and about China's urban rejuvenation.

Measuring performance, gauging results

Three cities showcase the use of the City Performance Tool (CyPT) instrument for achieving policy and climate targets through changes in areas such as buildings, transport, or energy.

Showcases

Helping cities get smarter

How can cities become smarter and more livable? Siemens expert Martin Powell talks about the main emerging trends for urban technologies and the crucial role of digitalization.