CRI听力:Sweden's largest smart house and society exhibition is underway

An exhibition focused on innovation, smart homes, and society has opened in Sweden. It's the largest event of its kind in the country since 2001 when the first sustainable and ecological city was built in Malmo.

Linkoping Municipality Board Chairwoman Kristina Edlund says the smart city was well planned with innovative technologies and designs.

"Linkoping (linsherping) municipality is Sweden's largest city if we include the whole east Gotland. We also have relatively young population because we have Linkoping University in our city compared with other cities. Therefore we also need a lot of construction in Linkoping."

Edlund says this area not only attracts students who study at Linkoping University, but also attracts people both with high incomes and low incomes. Here, all kinds of people can meet.

One example is the new type of dormitories that were built. The students who designed the dorms say the quarters are a kind of family apartment. Erik is one of the students.

"We thought Swedish students would like to live alone, but we did a survey, it turned out that they like to live with the international students.So they changed the normal dormitory design with big bedrooms and small public spaces and instead designed smaller bedrooms and a larger public space with kitchen and a recreation area."

The other type of house is called "Dream House." They designed very smart apartments where doors, beds and tables can be folded away to make more space. When people want to use sleep or eat, the amenities can be unfolded as needed. More people can manage to live in a relatively smaller apartment, but still enjoy a high quality lifestyle.

Another type of house is called "passive house" in which the house sometimes actually produces surplus electricity that can be returned to the grid.

There are also wooden houses and houses with beehive windows, or houses with their own car washes and electric car charging rooms, and many other features besides.

Moreover, all kinds of waste and waste water in the city are recylcled in a large unified underground recycling center.

According to local officials, this was a low price area, but after their considerable planning, and involving local people and all stakeholders, the land prices soared and all the apartments sold very well.

It has become a good model for building various houses with their own characteristics while at the same time building an harmonious society.