The City of Milpitas has been recognized with a “Smart 50” Award. The annual Smart 50 Awards are given to cities that stand out for having innovative and influential “Smart City” projects, per a partnership between Smart Cities Connect and the Smart Cities Connect Foundation. The term “smart city” refers to cities that are advanced in terms of information and communication technology.
The City will be hosting an event tomorrow, April 23, at 10:00am at the City of Milpitas Community Center parking lot (457 E. Calaveras Blvd.) where attendees can come to learn about recent infrastructure developments.
Milpitas has long nurtured its Smart City infrastructure program, part of which has meant constructing new sustainable microgrids while enacting far-reaching water and energy conservation initiatives.
Said a press release from the City, “Delivered in collaboration with ENGIE North America, 10 water and energy infrastructure improvement measures in the construction phase of the initiative are either complete or nearing completion. Combined, these measures will enhance community services and safety, contribute to the City’s Climate Action Plan and resiliency goals, and reduce its operations, maintenance, and utility costs.”
Working with ENGIE, Milpitas has carried out water upgrades to 25 of its parks and buildings, retrofitted 2,185 street lights with LED bulbs, upgraded another 4,453 street lights with outage detection technology, and installed LED lighting across an array of parks, sports fields, community facilities, and official buildings. On the way are 15,600 advanced metering infrastructure (AMI) water meters with leak detection, along with vehicle charging stations and other state of the art installations.
Meanwhile, both the Milpitas Senior Center and the Milpitas Community Center are seeing microgrid projects near completion.
Citywide, these infrastructure innovations are expected to reduce utility consumption by over 4.2 million kWh of electricity (about 388 households’ worth of consumption) annually, saving $1.5 million in energy and water costs each year.
Said Mayor Rich Tran, “The City is proud to be at the forefront of Smart City infrastructure development. We are now entering the next phase of our journey, with our deployments ready to be operationalized. We look forward to marking this milestone at our unveiling event this Earth Day and welcome all Milpitas residents to attend and learn about the environmental improvements they’ll benefit from in the months and years ahead.”
