DUET White Paper : simplebooklet.com

ABSTRACT"Despite advances in data capture andmanagement just 12% of city data is usedfor policy making"01DUET is an Innovation project designed toleverage the advanced capabilities of cloudand high-performance computing (HPC) tohelp public sector decision-making becomemore democratic and effective, through thedevelopment of Digital Twins for policyexploration and experimentation acrossentire cities and regions. DUET will enhance day-to-day cityoperations by helping managers reactquickly to real-time events, and more easilyharness the collective intelligence of ALLpolicy stakeholders to tackle complex,systemic policy problems which requireinnovative thinking to developtransformative solutions.

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CITIES FACE MANYDATA CHALLENGESCities are struggling to unlock value from their data due to amyriad of factors including, lack of data quality, consistency,accuracy, coverage, freshness, and completeness, plus a lackof data understanding (data literacy) to enable meaningfulinterpretation of data. Aside from the data itself, anoverreliance on traditional analytics techniques, and lack ofan infrastructure with the needed processing power toanalyse the volume and variety of city data fast enough hasalso hampered progress. Despite the economics of sharing hardware and software, inreality the costs for sending data to and retrieving it from thecloud is often more expensive than in-house storage. Datasharing and reuse also amplifies subtle and complex questionsof interpretation, transparency, collaboration and trust thatform a number of data ethics concerns, along with confusionaround balancing the principles of ‘openness’ and ‘privacy’. Use of data must meet wider ethical requirements including;A clear public benefit; Use only to the extent proportionate tothe need; Recognition of the limitations of the data used(including the risks of taking decisions on incomplete orinaccurate data) and; A precautionary approach, withtransparency and accountability in the acquisition,processing, storage and use of data, i.e. ensuring algorithmsdriving HPC analytics are open and fair.Together, these issues put many cities off publishing andsharing data, meaning many notable open data projectsfocused on enhancing city decision-making, never achievetheir true potential for collaboration and innovation. DUET: Digital Urban European Twins02

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Public administrations seem destined to remain stuck in aworld of pilots, with data literacy capacity remaining low,so their results rarely hit the mainstream the same way asprivate sector offerings do. Imagine if cities could overcome these challenges andutilise lessons from the private sector that use freshapproaches to bring together existing and new datasources via an infrastructure which creatively aggregatesthem in a way that makes the data more valuable both in itsquality and usefulness. A new Cloud enabled approach forthe public sector that will aggregate city data adhering tolegal and ethical principles, and intuitively make it easy tounderstand by all. An approach that removes concernsaround ethics and skills and unlocks the real potential inopen data for driving future decisions for cities whilstsimultaneously enhancing today’s city experience for all. To take advantage of the increasing opportunitiespresented by vast amounts of city data for improving policymaking three major barriers must be overcome: 1. Lack of Access to Computing Power: Cities need cost-effective access to high levels of computing power tocreatively unlock tangible benefits from large quantities ofdifferent data, and enable real-time decision making. 2. Lack of Data Literacy: City data needs to be easier tounderstand for all through simple interfaces that enableeveryone to understand the issue being addressed, and tobe able to contribute ideas, thoughts, own data andfeedback towards creating a more sustainable future 3. Lack of Data Ethics: As policymakers move towardsusing data from multiple sources, using new and creativedata models, and advanced analytical techniques and easyto use tools, it is increasingly crucial to ensure that the waythe data is collected and used conforms not only to therequirements of the privacy of personal data but also to thewider ethical principles. DUET: Digital Urban European Twins03

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DUET CHANGES THEGAME BY...1: Providing access to needed computing power: Real-timecity management needs algorithms and computing powerthat can scale to distil oceans of open data, deliver insightsand maintain efficiency. Cloud computing offers the abilityfor cities to access highly scalable hardware and softwareresources for the overwhelming majority of IT use cases. However, for future scenario predictions for policymodelling, cities need to execute heavy algorithms andleverage near real-time deployment and processing requirethe use of high-performance computing (HPC). Cloudcomputing has not been used for high performancecomputing (HPC) to the same degree as other use cases forseveral reasons, namely cost, but DUET will advance this areaby providing a new shared approach for its use in policymaking and city management – using a Digital Twin. A “Digital Twin” is a new concept consisting of a continuouslylearning digital copy of real-world assets, systems andprocesses that can be queried for specific outcomes. DUET(Digital Urban European Twins) will consume Open Data andData models from different sources in the city and integratethem with new technology capabilities including HPC,Artificial Intelligence and Advanced Analytics in order toprovide a replica city environment where policyexperimentation can safely take place. By predicting assetbehaviour and capacity to deliver on specific outcomes withingiven parameters and cost constraints, the Digital Twinprovides a risk-free experimentation environment to informstakeholders what they need to do with the assets in the real-word in order to both achieve the most effective long-termpolicy outcomes, and short-term operational decisions. 2: Making data easier to understand: Easy to understandvisualisations are a critical factor for driving trust in using DUET: Digital Urban European Twins04

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data for democratic decision making. However, mostvisualisation platforms still need a degree of geo-expertise totruly use them to extract intelligence.DUET is different as itprovides a 3D interface for its Digital Twins alongside a 2Doffering. Users, regardless of their technical or academicbackground, will be able to walk through DUET’s virtual 3D cityneighbourhoods, and directly see dynamic data readings frommultiple sources in a familiar context that makes them easy tounderstand. For example, users may see air quality throughcolours, traffic congestion as lines, incident sites as icons and soon. This simple, relatable way of viewing the city throughmultiple integrated data sources brings to life the tangible,systemic impacts of policy options, fueling ‘what if’experimentation that unleashes creative and innovative qualitiesof all participants. This levelling of the field means that policymakers, administrative workers, emergency services,entrepreneurs, businesses and citizens can all participate in co-creation and consultation exercises as part of the traditionalpolicy making cycle. 3: Establishing Ethical Principles for Data-Driven Decisions:The game-changing, cloud based, Digital Twin infrastructure withits deep-dive visualisation platform for policy experimentation willboost collaboration and policy innovation and bring newdiscoveries and intelligence through novel views of the data.Using visualisation tools, analysis of problems can have greaterdepth as many multi-disciplinary and multi-sectoral layers of datarelating to the physical and social world can be consideredtogether. Using a Digital Twin users can explore policy impactsacross a whole city, rather than just one or two small localities.Instead of providing complicated graphs and multiple versions ofmaps from different industries to illustrate the impacts of, forexample road routing decisions on mobility, air quality andhealth, the Digital Twin provides one version/replica of the city forall to use as a trusted baseline for exploring systemic impact ofdecisions. Visualising multiple data sources through the DigitalTwin make relationships more apparent, dependencies andinteractions more clearly viewed and the trade-off between avariety of possible solutions can be modelled and evaluated. DUET: Digital Urban European Twins05

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THREE MAIN OBJECTIVESDUET: Digital Urban European Twins06Create a cloud and HPCenabled Digital Twin approachfor collaborative policymakingI N N O V A T I O N01Ensure wider impact throughthe scalability andtransferability of outcomes S U S T A I N A B I L I T Y03Test Digital Twin approach formore effective policyexperimentationE X P E R I M E N T A T I O N0203 It is designed to stimulate thecreation of collaborative andinnovative solutions to multi-disciplinary and multi-sectoralsocietal challenges by making iteasier for policy makers and theirstakeholders to access, visualiseand use a wide variety of big geo-data sources to explore and co-create policy in the key Horizon2020 target areas of transportation,environment and health. DUET'S AIMDigital Urban European Twins (DUET) is a H2020 funded project designed to advance policydevelopment in the age of big data and cloud to deliver a trusted, scalable and transferablesolution for accelerating the adoption of data-driven, collaborative decision making andpolicy making.

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THREE PILOT CITIESDUET: Digital Urban European Twins07ATHENSL A R G E M E T R O P O L I T A NPILSENC I T YFLANDERSR E G I O NEmbrace Digital Twin use to understand cityrelationships and overcome engagement barrierswith stakeholders; Create new business valuebased on data-driven insights; Co-create digitalservices with the active engagement andparticipation of citizens; Improve effectiveness ofpolicy design and implementation._______________________________ Develop a set of tools dedicated for policysupport in urban design including traffic andnoise pollution modelling tools, visualisationtools, a sensor data orchestrator and social mediaanalytical tool. The visual insights will provide data-based evidence for policy making._______________________________ Vision to create a Smart Region where everyonecan access services and data, and cross-silocooperation is encouraged. Ctizens andcompanies become active in policy-makingprocesses to improve the quality of decisionmaking and acceptance of the outcomes.

DUET White Paper

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