Norfolk County Council recognised for making Norfolk and Suffolk a better place to live
Norfolk County Council has won a Bronze award at The Public Sector Transformation Awards 2022 at a ceremony which took place Wednesday, 9 March both virtually and live at Church House in London.
Hosted by the iESE, the winning project, the Norfolk and Suffolk Innovation Network was recognised in the Asset Management and Regeneration Award category to deliver proven benefits to local public services and their communities.
Norfolk County Council was nominated for its work in developing its Internet of Things Innovation Network using its Long-Range Wide Area Network (LoRaWAN) for sending and receiving low power signals from digital devices and objects.
Objects and devices in the LoRaWAN each have built-in sensors that capture small packets of data about their status or information from their surroundings and report the information via the network.
This technology allows roads to flag up when they need gritting, rubbish bins to say when they need to be emptied, rivers to say when the water level is getting close to flooding, and parking spaces to say whether they are empty or occupied.
It also benefits domestic settings, with sensors which can help people to keep living independently in their own homes for longer.
All this extra information can allow cities, towns and rural communities to run smoothly, making them better places to live and work and, crucially, to help the more remote areas of Norfolk and Suffolk become better connected. It also creates an opportunity for businesses in Norfolk to innovate and develop expertise in this emerging sector.
Norfolk County Council's Cabinet Member for Innovation, Transformation and Performance, Cllr Tom FitzPatrick, said:
"I would like to congratulate our IMT team at Norfolk County Council for being recognised in this exciting, innovative field. Having gone from nothing, to having built the largest network in the UK in just two years is an excellent achievement. The network continues to go from strength to strength, which is also a testament to the hard work of our excellent staff. The opportunities for businesses in Norfolk and Suffolk to use this technology are very exciting and I would like to thank the New Anglia LEP for their support. This Innovation Network marks yet a further step in achieving our ambition of making Norfolk one of the best digitally connected rural counties in the country."
Background information
The Norfolk and Suffolk Innovation Network is the largest free-to-use public sector long range wide area network (LoRaWAN) network in the UK.
Funded by the New Anglia Local Enterprise Partnership (opens new window) it delivers dual county connectivity to support IoT sensors. We're creating this network across Norfolk and Suffolk to encourage Internet of Things innovation, giving businesses, individuals schools and educational organisations free access to the network to experiment and build solutions.
Contact us
If you would like to learn more about what we are doing across Norfolk or if you've got an idea about how you can use this technology, get in touch with us email in@norfolk.gov.uk.