Published: Oct 29, 2025

Reimagining water utilities for tomorrow’s world

Part 5 – Water intelligence: An NCS whitepaper

The challenges facing water utilities are not static. Climate variability, population growth, and evolving regulatory expectations require organisations to prepare for an uncertain future. Future state modelling provides the foresight needed to adapt.

In this part of our white paper, Brooke Mabry, our Energy, Utilities and Resources Lead at NCS Australia, shares insights to support utilities with preparing for what’s next. 

With a mindset to deliver more value, better quality, and a different kind of partnership built on trust and bold thinking, if you are curious about how to better prepare for tomorrow, we encourage you to reach out.

Our team are skilled at supporting clients with future mapping and planning how technology can be used as an enabler for growth.
 

By integrating climate projections, demand forecasts, and asset performance data, utilities can test the impact of different interventions before committing resources. For example, they can assess how drought scenarios would stress supply systems, or how urban expansion would affect network resilience. These models support long-term planning and risk management, helping utilities align today’s decisions with tomorrow’s challenges.

Another Victorian water utility illustrates this approach with its digital twin pilot. By modernising IT/OT infrastructure and aggregating disparate systems into a unified platform, the utility created a 3D operational environment with real-time data, alerts, and dashboards. Benefits included reduced downtime, improved safety via remote diagnostics, and operational transparency through unified dashboards. Importantly, it also established a foundation for modelling energy use and emissions, enabling sustainability planning alongside operational optimisation.
 

Operational efficiency is not only about performance – it also underpins compliance and reporting. Automating data capture and audit trails simplifies regulatory processes and reduces the administrative burden on staff. PUB in Singapore has shown how a unified digital platform can streamline both service delivery and compliance, ensuring customers receive faster, more reliable service while the utility maintains transparency and accountability.
 
In other energy, utilites and resources companies video analytics and ai have been used to improve safety and compliance real time. This reduces unnecessary inspections and has boosted efficiency.
 

The convergence of operational technology (OT) and information technology (IT) is reshaping the water sector. Utilities that invest in integrated, data-driven platforms are building the foundations for resilience, agility, and sustainability. From reactive maintenance to predictive resilience, digital twins, network optimisation, and lifecycle planning all contribute to operational efficiency that is measurable, sustainable, and future-ready.
 

Water utilities are under pressure to do more with less while navigating unprecedented uncertainty. Customer experience, digital twins, and AI each offer powerful tools to respond – but their true power is realised when deployed together. A customer engagement platform enriched with AI insights, linked to a digital twin of the network, can transform how a utility operates, communicates, and plans.

At NCS, we partner with utilities to deliver these outcomes. Our work demonstrates how cloud platforms, AI models, and digital twins can deliver measurable impact. We bring expertise across IT and OT integration, customer engagement design, and advanced analytics to help utilities build resilience and future readiness.

The journey to future readiness is not about adopting technology for its own sake. It is about rethinking how utilities serve their customers, manage their assets, and plan for tomorrow. By embracing customer experience, digital twins, and AI, water utilities can move beyond reactive responses to become proactive stewards of one of our most precious resources.