Urban Systems Model: CDM Smith’s R&D program at the Singapore‐based Neysadurai Centre for Integrated Urban Planning.

The fields of urban planning, environmental engineering, architecture, and community management need new approaches to address the challenges of creating truly sustainable Cities of the Future. Public-sector infrastructure planners and utility managers, city managers, and private‐sector developers are asking the same questions: What is sustainability? How can we quantify sustainable performance? What designs, technologies, and/or management options will bring us closer to the goals of sustainability? How can we plan for the future, particularly in light of climate uncertainty? And how can we make decisions for sustainable development given competing objectives, necessary tradeoffs, and limited resources?

There is no shortage of individual “green ideas or actions”. What is lacking is an analytic framework and a set of practical decision‐making and design tools to help implement and operationalize the best mix of green technologies, urban designs, natural and hard infrastructure systems, management policies, and lifestyle incentives for a specific city, given its unique spatial, social, economic, and political context.

In response to this industry need, CDM Smith’s Neysadurai Centre for Integrated Urban Planning has developed the Urban Systems Model to simulate the performance of a city or project’s water, energy, transportation, solid waste, urban form, and natural environment sectors; the relationships among these sectors; and the collective relationship of infrastructure, urban form, and the environment. The model has greenhouse gas emissions and financial analytics, and allows users to test both climate change mitigation and adaptation strategies. The Urban Systems Model provides three important analytical capabilities for decision makers:

Integrated Analysis: By facilitating collaboration among various disciplines, the model helps to identify multi‐benefit, sustainable urban solutions and helps decision‐makers understand how certain choices affect other sectors, the entire urban system, the environment, and economics.

Spatial Analysis: To address inherently spatial aspects of urban and infrastructure planning, a GIS interface has been developed to interface with the simulation modeling environment. This geographic element is necessary to explore the impacts of urban form on resource supply and demands, as well as test centralized vs. decentralized scenarios, an important discussion among water and energy managers in particular.

Temporal Analysis: The model allows for dynamic analysis of resource supplies versus demands at a resolution of up to a 1‐hour time step. Accordingly, past, present, or anticipated future scenarios can be input into the model to support infrastructure planning decisions. This transient flexibility allows assessment of assessing changed future conditions, including climate scenarios, to support adaptation planning.

Macquarie University Energy Supply and Distribution Strategy, North Sydney, Australia

In 2013, CDM Smith and the Institute for Sustainable Futures (University of Technology Sydney) partnered together to deliver the Macquarie University’s energy supply and distribution strategy. We applied the USM to develop and test a range of infrastructure, technology and design scenarios. Leveraging the model’s dynamic, integrative and participatory process, testing scenarios compared and measured the effects of capital expenditure, operating expenditure and greenhouse gas emissions. The model allowed us to test the resilience of the design options to energy demand or price shocks.

Integrated Plan for Wastewater Program, Los Angeles, California USA

The City of Los Angeles developed an Integrated Resources Plan (IRP) to meet future wastewater, runoff, and water

supply needs. CDM Smith utilized urban systems modeling to measure the performance of policy alternatives in relation to a set of objectives and performance measures established by stakeholders. The model represented the relationships between the elements of the wastewater service function, and the relationships between wastewater, drinking water, recycled water and stormwater systems. Over 30 water supply options were evaluated and bundled into portfolios, which were evaluated under differing risk scenarios and hydrologic conditions.

PROJECT SNAPSHOTS

URBAN SYSTEMS MODEL

Part of a video animation of geo-referenced model output visualising the energy demand throughout the day for a particular design at

Macquarie University

Los Angeles Urban Infrastructure

© CDM Smith Inc. (March 2014)cdmsmith.com

Punggol Eco-Town Planning, Singapore

CDM Smith’s Neysadurai Centre is collaborating with Singapore’s Housing Development Board (HDB) to apply the USM tools and processes to evaluate design alternatives for Punggol EcoTown, one of Singapore’s marquee sustainable developments. HDB has identified a set of key performance indicators (KPIs) to achieve sustainable outcomes in Punggol Eco-Town which cover water, energy, and waste reduction and quality of life indicators. CDM Smith’s USM will help quantify the benefits and return on investments and analyze tradeoffs among various urban designs, infrastructure solutions, and green building technologies.

PROJECT SNAPSHOTS

FOR MORE INFORMATION ON CDM SMITH’S NEYSADURAI CENTRE’S URBAN SYSTEMS MODEL,

CONTACT:

Dr. Lynn Reidphone: +61 424 444 548 reidlb@cdmsmith.com

David Spectorphone: +1 828 299 4641

spectorda@cdmsmith.com

© CDM Smith Inc. (April 2014)cdmsmith.com

The model is structured with a user interface for both entering data and viewing results.

CDM Smith’s goal is to achieve resource efficiency targets for our clients, set a clear picture of the infrastructure and technologies

to be utilised, and to predict the estimated “green premium” and return on investment for the project. The Urban Systems Model does not replace urban planning, but instead provides a quantitative tool for guiding decisions.

Structure and define specific sustainability objectives and metrics based upon international standards

and stakeholder input.

Defining Sustainable Performance

Model application provides performance outputs of alternatives

relative to criteria identified in Step 1.

Quantifying Metric‐Specific Performance

Identify and characterize urban form, infrastructure, building technologies, and policy alternatives to test in the

Urban Systems Model

Profile of sustainable solutions

Quantitative outputs and qualitative information on sustainable

performance (Step 1) are ranked and analyzed for balanced, multi-

objective, multi-stakeholder decision making.

Sustainable Decision Analysis

1 2

4 5

Customize Urban Systems Model to effectively measure performance relative to defined performance

metrics (per Step 1). Use model to test urban form, infrastructure, green

building technologies and policy alternatives (per Step 2)

Urban Systems Model 3

Urban Systems Model Process

JTC CleanPark, Singapore

CDM Smith was engaged by Jurong Town Corporation (JTC) to develop a dynamic systems model for Singapore’s first eco-friendly business park – CleanTech Park – devoted to growing the “clean tech” industry. The model simulates the performance of the site and allows quantitative analysis of design and technology to meet the development goals. Through an iterative process, the USM provided design guidance for renewable energy supply mix, demand-side energy reduction strategy, water supply alternatives, demand-side water reduction strategy, GHG reduction assessment, and capital and O&M estimation.

CleanTech ParkSingapore - Punggol Waterway