Mail-ID and Postal Service for XXI Century

Smarter cities demand for smarter services. As ailing post offices around the world make headlines with difficulties in covering cost of service and a vastly different ecosystem of communications, we can ponder the post office of the future.

Can you imagine a world without mailing of paper communications? Will we receive virtual mail "pieces" electronically on our personal electronic surfaces or virtual reality mail box?

Can you imagine a world without mailing of packages? This is more difficult to foresee. Will we be able to print complex objects remotely or will we eventually figure out teleportation? This seems very, very far off into the future. Hence, we will continue to require postal service - whether privately run like FedEx, DHL, UPS or government-run like the U.S. Postal Service. Will it cost more to post to or from more remote or sparely populated places? Or will we be able to maintain a more homogeneous and frequent service across the board?

One innovation, using existing technologies, that we could see in the world of postal service is the development of postal mail aliases akin to email addresses or account user names for services like Twitter or YouTube. What would be the advantages? I could have different Mail-ID's (aliases) that I could share with different groups of people, related to the Google+ concept of sharing certain types of information with specific "circles." In other words, I could have a Mail-ID for my company's customers, one for my family and intimate friends, one for companies that might mail me products or information like NetFlix or Amazon. 

One advantage would be the ability to provide someone with a way to mail me without having to necessarily share where I live, as a measure of safety and privacy.  If I happen to move my personal or business address, people do not need to do anything different.  The postal service would have been notified and the very same alias could be re-directed to the new physical address or P.O. box.  Companies that have P.O. boxes would prefer to give their potential customers a Mail-ID, instead. This system could result in significant savings related to change of address and mail forwarding and could provide a valuable service for the post office.

For faster, more accurate service, one could program an RFID tag with the from and to Mail-ID information.  This could be done with a standalone postal service device, an RFID writter plugged in to a computer or a mobile or tablet device. These tags would speed up sorting or mail and packages and could be re-programmed and re-used. We could imagine encrypted tags that we could give or mail to someone so that they could mail us back without even having to know our Mail-ID.

In an age where privacy has eroded significantly, could technology improve privacy in a sector of our lives and could this be a value-add service that the U.S. Postal Service could implement to help improve its precarious situation?

Would you use Mail-ID if it were made available to you? Why?
What ideas do you have to improve services, reduce costs?
What does your future tech crystal ball reveal?

#Democracy & #Energy Policy

You will be hard-pressed to find a fairly objective individual who can assert that our American representative, two-party form of government has been effective in energy policy.

From Texas to Tokyo, however, communities have successfully engaged in the kind of intelligent and democratic dialogue that is sorely lacking in our increasingly polarized world.

Our article on Deliberative Democracy and Utility Modernization produced the greatest response, so we follow up with sharing this series of reports from Stanford University's Center for Deliberative Democracy.

In the wake of the Green Party presidential candidate Jill Stein's arrest for attempting to merely attend the latest debate, and the fact few people know Gov. Gary Johnson will be on all 50 ballots, we can see that more voices can only enrich a debate and that everyday people can make wise, lasting choices given the right conditions.

Water Conservation and Smart Metering

With the world-wide economic belt tightening, municipalities are looking to reduce operating costs more than ever.  An even bigger concern is the scarcity of the very substance that is the ultimate requisite for our lives: water.  Though industries like farming and energy generation need to innovate to utilize less water, municipalities already have the technology required to reduce operating costs and conserve water. 

The same way that Advanced Metering Infrastructure (AMI)  or "smart meters" are a key component of the electrical smart grid, similar technology can be applied to other utilities like gas and water.  In the case of water metering, remote connect/disconnect switching and more accurate, hourly interval reads can provide great savings and an enhanced customer experience.  Applications can include:

• Significant reduction in truck rolls
• Automatic detection of costly and wasteful water leaks
• Conservation-encouraging customer usage and bill estimation web portals with hourly interval data

Besides water metering data itself, the water AMI communications network wireless mesh systems can also monitor other end points:

• Continuous monitoring of sensitive ecological areas (condition-based versus periodic monitoring)
• Selective End-Point Monitoring of Water Quality
• Combined water, gas, and electric metering for an even better financial and social business case
• Substation, distribution, and demand-side automation

Further value can be obtained through the develop a municipality-wide network (which can include wireless, fiber, cellular, powerline carrier and other technologies) for other municipal functions for a more complete Smart City concept. Such applications can include a municipal mobile workforce network to assist building inspectors, police, safety and other employees to exercise their duties on the go with greater ease thanks to mobile connectivity.  Citizens and visitors could benefit from a public layer of wi-fi to increase accessibility to online education, government e-services, and much more.

However, starting with a more limited scope, such as water meter automation, we see can find success cases like Kansas City.  Whenever we hear of states like Florida and Texas struggling with droughts, we see that such measures could save much-needed water as well as reduce public costs, which could help alleviate public budget shortfalls.  When it comes to financing these projects, if the cash-flow is challenging, despite a favorable business case, there are investors looking for the more predictable returns associated with resource conservation upgrades like this one. 

Rethinking Rooftops

Rooftops in cities all across the United States and around the world are getting a green makeover, not limited to solar generation (unsightly solar panels or costly solar shingles or solar thin-film).  Green-roofing is a paradigm for reducing the carbon footprint of a building through a number of roof interventions.  These range from applying modern materials that improve thermal performance to painting a roof white in sun-lit places to reflect more sunlight and reduce air conditioning energy use.

Though much touted about, green roofing construction and maintenance can cost considerable "green," and loading issues require additional engineering review and could make retrofits impractical.  However, the extra layer of insulation and extended life of the roof and building could increase the value of the building.  It could also double as a vegetable garden, which improves the livability and value of the property.

This trend in re-thinking roofs is also going commercial into full fledged rooftop farming.  One startup, Bright Farms, is working with groceries to grow tomatoes, for instance, right on the roof of these establishments.  This ensures very fresh, seasonal, and price-reliable produce with significant financial and environmental savings, given the reduction of transportation.  It is akin to the distributed generation paradigm for the electric industry.  Among cities, New York City has emerged as a leader in rooftop farming.

We can also seen entire abandoned buildings or parts of active structures turn into gardens and farms -- the California Science Center in San Francisco is a prime example of vertical farming.  The reclamation of water through rooftop collection for gray water applications is also becoming more common, as water scarcity hits hard across the world, including U.S. states like Florida and Texas.

Have great examples of this trend in your town or communities you have visited?
You are invited to share in our comments section!