Panelists standing together

November 2024

Reflections from Barcelona

The Smart City Expo World Congress took place from 5 to 7 November in Barcelona. How did the DUT Partnership engage and what are key takeaways from the conference? 

Every year, the Smart City Expo World Congress marks a strategic moment for the DUT Partnership. With over 25000 participants from 130 countries, it constitutes a special opportunity for actors to gather, connect, and reflect on how cities can collectively move to a better future: “This is the largest arena in the world for cities to meet and discuss urban development. So, this is a chance for DUT to be present where our core target group meets and where development issues are discussed”, says Marie Ivarsson, Impact Lead at DUT. She adds: “This conference is an opportunity to show our commitment to European ambitions such as the Green Deal, the Cities Mission, as well as the role DUT plays in combination with other initiatives.”

Reflecting on the content of this year’s conference Marie highlights: “Being an event for smart cities and urban innovation you might think the focus is mainly on the role of technology and the business sector. It was encouraging to experience that all aspects of urban development are included, the social and cultural dimension as well. This holistic approach is needed when tackling the challenge of climate change.”

Achieving Net-Zero the Just Way

As 56% of the world’s population live in cities an increased role lies with urban actors in creating impactful climate action. DUT and its partners championed the topic with the session: “Driving Urban Sustainability: Achieving Net-Zero the Just Way”. The thematic roundtable brought together different EU-supported initiatives and discussed the key role of cities for topics such as energy resilience, climate action, and equitable transitions to a net-zero economy.

As part of the panel Orsolya Küttel, CEO at DUT, outlined the work of the partnership: “The core of our activities is that we are financing research and innovation projects addressing urban challenges to help cities in their transition towards sustainability, climate-neutrality, improved functionality and a just transition. We actively encourage multi-stakeholder and multi-national collaboration by inviting a diverse range of urban stakeholders – including urban authorities, but also research institutions, universities, civil society members, and businesses – to work together in transnational consortia.”

Reflecting on the session, Orsolya points out several key takeaways: “Engagement should actively involve citizens and local stakeholders, creating solutions that reflect community needs and build widespread support.” Additionally, “communication is vital to engage all stakeholders – from policymakers to citizens – ensuring they are part of the journey and empowered to act.” Lastly, Orsolya highlights the need for broad collaboration through transnational engagement as well as deep collaboration across different governance levels in order “to support impactful urban transitions.”

Local Actions Global Impact

As part of its conference engagement, DUT further highlighted the role of local actors in the session “Local Actions, Global Impact – Bridging between Grassroots, Local Governance, Research & Innovation for Driving Urban Transitions”. The session was part of a booth organized by the Smart Cities Marketplace team under the umbrella of the European Commission. The session presented DUT’s work in shaping socially inclusive and sustainable societies and discussed how community-led initiatives and research can collaborate with local governments to enable impactful urban transitions: “It is important that the local level is seen and that we can show concrete examples through the DUT projects, Urban Doers, ecosystems, and our community”, outlines Marie.

She explains that as part of the session “we brought forward concrete examples and highlighted what we can do for cities as well as in cooperation with cities. The discussions were incredibly lively. One takeaway for me was that if we want initiatives to be successful and have real impact, we need to put the engagement with citizens at the center.”