Eric Suesz
To say that change is needed in the UK water industry is an understatement. In addition to inflationary pressure and chronic shortages of skills, UK water companies have a big job ahead of them to rebuild faith in the industry amongst the public, particularly with regards to CSO spills.
That change may be just around the corner.
Beginning April 1, 2025, and running for five years, AMP8 will replace the existing £51 billion AMP7 investments in the UK water sector with a new set of challenges and targets.
A record £96B will be allocated for infrastructure and monitoring during AMP8, the largest ever budget for an asset management plan. This five-year funding cycle represents a unique opportunity for water professionals in the UK, who may be able to secure funding for key priorities like:
- Digitalisation: Adopt full digitalisation and data-centric ways of working
- CSOs: Switch from reacting to CSO spills to proactively preventing them before they happen
- BNG: Incorporate Biodiversity Net Gain into regular ways of working
A roundtable discussion for candid conversation
We wanted to gather insights from industry professionals, so Autodesk recently partnered with Utility Week to gather a group of UK water utility professionals and thought leaders together in London to listen to what they had to say about the upcoming AMP8 funding cycle.
This discussion followed the Chatham House Rule, which means everyone involved can share details about what they heard in the meeting, but neither the identity nor affiliation of speakers can be revealed.
We gathered a few of our favourite anonymous quotes from the professionals who attended for the One Water Blog, but you can read more roundtable comments by digging into the full Utility Week article Delivering under pressure: Water companies prepare for AMP8.
