Bat & smart – rethinking the scope of sustainable development

Abstract

Industrial facilities must comply with the ever stricter resource management and environmental regulations and the Best Available Techniques (BAT) documents are the reference for their performance. Smart Cities represent a voluntary initiative directed to implement sustainable development to human communities. The paper suggests that these two separate actions must conjugate their efforts and achieve sustainability at an integrated level. BAT&SMART would denote geographical, even trans-border areas where industrial development and human communities collaborate for sustainability. Smart Cities should well perform along at least 6 main co-ordinates: smart governance, smart economy, smart living, smart people, smart mobility and smart environment. At EU level, classifications since 2007 include several Romanian cities (Sibiu, Timisoara, Craiova) but their position is at the very end of the list (73, 76, 77 of a 77 city sample). Driving forces for BAT&Smart Projects: poverty, limited resources, environmental stress, social entropy. For industrial platforms adjacent to medium size cities the problem is acute because of few alternatives to existing industry, interest of private persons to replace the industry with profitable residential/commercial projects. Industry has the experts, city administrations are politically motivated - the paper presents authors’ experience in developing BAT&Smart elements and details how these should be put together in a Road Map/Strategy by multidisciplinary teams applying the knowledge based development (BAT industry AND smarter communities). An important side result could be an intricate symbiotic relationship City-Industrial Platform that could prevent further destruction of the few industrial facilities remaining in Romania, encouraging their revival.