UrbanTwin

UrbanTwin is a Swiss project that uses digital twin technology to model and simulate important urban systems like energy, water, buildings, and transport. Its main goal is to help cities and decision-makers move toward more sustainable and climate-resilient futures. By creating digital models of how a city works, UrbanTwin allows users to test different strategies and policies to reduce greenhouse gas emissions and adapt to the effects of climate change. A special focus of the project is on climate adaptation and how to manage resources better, for example through water recycling, improving energy efficiency, and making infrastructure more resistant to extreme weather.

As part of this project, the EPFL campus water portal was created to support water management on campus. It is an online tool developed by the ENAC 4IT team in collaboration with UrbanTwin. The Water Portal helps users test different sponge city strategies by simulating their impact on stormwater. It includes a rainfall-runoff model, real data from the campus, and a simple interface that makes it easy to try out different scenarios. Users can change key settings like the size of a water tank, how much roof runoff goes into the tank, the type of vegetation, and how often the tank is emptied. They can also choose to use historical or real-time rainfall data. The portal shows the results with clear graphs that highlight important indicators such as how much runoff is reduced and how much water can be reused. It is open to everyone and useful for learning, research, and making better decisions about water use and sustainability.

Contact:Yacine M’Hamdi
Paolo Perona
Keywords: Digital twin, urban systems modeling, climate change adaptation, sustainable urban development, integrated urban planning, decision-support systems, urban infrastructure simulation, resource management, smart city technologies, environmental policy evaluation, urban resilience, data-driven planning.
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