Utility Week

UTILITY WEEK | 27TH SEPTEMBER - 3RD OCTOBER 2019 | 15 Policy & Regulation She says the nature of the sprints means the ideas keep coming until the end of the last day, and that success is visible in people's attitudes. "Walking around you'd have a hard job to tell who works for who because everyone is participating 100 per cent to find the shared agenda. I'm really pleased by that," she says. Building on the success of the Innovation Festival, which Northum- brian has hosted in Newcastle for the past three years, the scope of Innovate East was broader because of Anglian's participation. Ideas from further afield The diversity of people involved means ideas come in from further afield, for example in the leakage sprint South- ern Nevada Water Authority from the US shared experiences of fixing leaks in a very water-stressed location and mending leaks 14-feet down without digging up half the Vegas Strip. With a focus on communities, one team developed an idea for a com- munity hub project called Noah's Ark to connect people and ideas to drive community resilience around climate change. The gap in digital skills is a con- cern across the sector as technolo- gies advance and different talents are required. One tent conceived, devel- oped and built an app for children to raise awareness of utilities in every- day life and for older students to learn about careers within those utilities. None of the group had been involved in app-building before. In the main tent on the screen above the bean bags the message "we are not just inviting you to be part of the conversation we need you to be part of the solution" was beamed in between presentations, reminding people of the importance of sharing. The opportunities sharing data offer for improving service, leakage, flood prevention and agriculture were heralded, but the standout data- sharing concept was a labelling system to inform consumers about the carbon and energy footprint of the products they buy. "LifeMark" is aimed at help- ing socially conscious shoppers make informed choices. Four of the ideas will be awarded a share of £20,000 to develop and advance the schemes. Mottram believes better under- standing of the issues involved is also applicable to water consumption. She says a greater knowledge of water scarcity is therefore needed before people will cut consumption. "Water companies do a really, really good job so in people's busy lives they don't have to think too much about water. Which is a big tick in the box, but in light of climate change and water scarcity we have to ask customers to have a greater level of understanding. "Eighteen months ago people didn't think hard about the heinous impact of plastic straws or bottles of water. That didn't make someone a bad person, it just made them a person who hadn't thought about it before. But, now, because of climate change in particular, it has to be more of a conversation." At the hacks, sprints and talks throughout the event, a sense of col- lective consciousness and shared responsibility for the future was appar- ent, as was shared thinking. Mottram says there is evidence the message is getting through and is being seen in conversations with Northumbrian customers. As well as being deeply proud of the places they live, including their local beaches and rivers, she thinks people care about the future of the planet too. "Customers will always want value for money, but they would not want a cheap bill now if it meant damaging water supplies for their children or grandchildren."

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