In 2023, we discussed everything from the impact of digital innovation on water quality and how to build long-term trust among communities and customers, to preparing for the silver tsunami and the benefits of open data in the water sector.
But, as we embark on a new year, we’re looking to the future and making predictions for 2024. Sharing their perspectives and joining our host Tom Freyberg are industry experts:
- Dragan Savic, CEO at KWR Research Institute
- Newsha Ajami, Chief Strategy and Development Officer for Research at Berkeley Lab Earth and Environmental Sciences Area (EESA)
- Gigi Karmous-Edwards, Digital Water Technologies Expert and Consultant
The water industry will benefit substantially from AI and generative AI
Tom began by asking Dragan where AI can create breakthroughs in water management in 2024. Dragan explained how in 2023, there was a real paradigm shift in how AI is viewed, hinting at exciting possibilities for 2024.
He expects AI to become much more adept in assisting in water management processes, including water loss, flood, and operations management. He also mentioned how AI, combined with human knowledge and intelligence, will boost decision-making to ensure customers are provided with high-quality water on a 24/7 basis.
In a similar vein, Gigi talked about how large language models like ChatGPT can be used to analyze and cleanse large sets of data to better inform operating decisions. She predicts that although relatively few utilities are currently using or experimenting with these tools, generative AI will improve daily operations in the water industry.
The adoption of distributed and decentralized water infrastructure solutions will grow
Newsha talked about how the impacts of climate change is propelling a growing interest in creating modular solutions as a way of augmenting existing and centralized solutions.
She said that there will be more interest in greywater reuse and demand-side management, a lot of which is enabled by digital solutions to monitor the operation of systems at different scales. On this topic, she explained how this will require changes to current policy, and that individuals and communities will begin to install more on-site reuse systems in a bid to facilitate the easier reuse of water.
Rounding off this prediction, she said that this will impact how we operate the centralized systems and existing pipelines to ensure that they’re managed effectively.
The competition for water will increase
Dragan predicted that there will be increased competition for water and that this will accelerate the use of water for municipal, industrial, and agricultural means. He said this is already happening, referencing a situation in the Netherlands where a water company declined to provide water for a new commercial venture in the area based on resource scarcity.
He said that we will experience more of these types of scenarios as agriculture continues to compete with the domestic water supply, on top of the increasing requirements of the industrial and commercial sectors. He said that digital solutions are poised to help both centralized and decentralized utilities ease the pressure caused by this competition
Enhanced collaboration and data sharing within the water sector
Gigi talked about how collaboration across the water sector, particularly when it comes to data sharing and best practices, will be more commonplace in 2024. She emphasized how data sharing across utilities benefits everyone in the water sector, and said that new tools based on massive amounts of data could be created by generative AI.
She also visualized collecting AMI data across the globe with associated metadata, which could lead to the creation of virtual meters and sensors for utilities with fewer resources
The circular water economy will continue to grow and expand
Newsha said that circularity will come in two waves. The first will be circularity within the sector by way of reusing water multiple times and at different scales. The second will be in creating circularity across different sectors.
She gave Scandinavia as an example of where a circular system has been created, where base heat from the wastewater treatment plants is used as a way of heating homes and communities. She said that the opportunities to treat water at different qualities depending on needs can also reduce our carbon footprints.
Lastly, she emphasized the chance to employ AI and digital solutions, leveraging data for proactive communication with consumers regarding the water cycle. This shift aims to transform the relationship between utilities and customers from transactional to collaborative.
There will be a proliferation of SaaS water management tools
Dragan believes that one of the primary delivery methods for digital water tools for utilities will be through the Software as a Service (SaaS) model, giving them access to large computational power and the benefits of AI. He said that this integration of data through cloud services will also help foster collaboration between utilities, and referenced some examples of existing cross-continental data sharing.
On the same theme, Gigi believes that digital water management tools will significantly decrease in price in 2024, especially given the expansion of generative AI tools.
She also referenced the introduction of OpenAI and Mircosoft’s feature which allows users to use text or speech to create a very specific application, whereby the platform creates a code to accomplish the objective in mind. She explained how generative AI provides access to unstructured data, including the use of PDFs, images, video, and speech that can be used within data analytics.
Finally, she talked about the Microsoft/OpenAI API and how they have reduced the pricing by 2.7 times per token, significantly reducing the price of accessing generative AI tools.
The emergence of innovative financing mechanisms to enable the transition of the water sector
Newsha talked about the paradigm shift in the water sector and how this means that the same tools and financial tools that were used before will not be able to be used to move forward. In terms of financing, she said that utilities need to rethink their business models as we continue to consider distributed solutions as demand management tools, as the circular water economy will create more nuances in how much money and revenue flows into utilities.
She said that as we move forward, revenue streams based on options such as on-site reuse and recycling at different scales will need to be created to remain financially stable.
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