Visualising climate impact for water project

Ofwat, the UK Water Industry regulator had launched a pioneering £200 million programme to unleash a wave of innovation in the water sector and tackle some of the major challenges of our time – delivering transformative benefits for consumers, society and the environment.

Working with Anglian Water, Welsh Water and Skanska, Sweco has developed a ground-breaking model for visualising project carbon and financial costs. Data, visualised in real time, will allow engineers to optimise design solutions. Sweco contributed its expertise in climate calculations to the project.

The project will build upon Anglian Water’s existing carbon database to enable whole life carbon reporting, integrate it with cost data and then connect the two datasets into engineering platforms or data rich BIM models.

A visual project environment will then be created through colour palettes to enable carbon and cost hotspotting, thus aunlocking further carbon and cost savings.

The model will be integrated into Anglian Water’s working procedures and then made available to the entire UK water sector and its value chain. It will enable the UK water industry to visualise carbon and cost impacts over the lifecycle of a project and make truly sustainable solutions for residents, society and the environment.

This project, a UK water industry first, will build upon the current PAS2080 carbon standard and its philosophy that reducing carbon reduces cost. It will also support the industry in delivering its Public Interest Commitment to reach net zero carbon by 2030 and enable the water sector and its value chain to make clear decisions, based on data and visualisations.

This project will enable the UK water industry to move from carbon accounting to whole life carbon cost management and ultimately ensure investment solutions delivered are truly sustainable for customers, society and the environment.