Australian utility innovation takes the stage at AVEVA World2026

When Territorian Norah Thompson steps onto the stage at AVEVA World 2026 in Milan this May, she’ll be one of only five Australians selected by the global industrial software company to present at the international event.

Norah, an ICT SCADA Specialist at Power and Water Corporation, will also be representing the only Australian utility company included in the three-day conference program. She’ll be there to talk about Australian innovation and how Power and Water’s use of PI System data is evolving.

Power and Water has been using the PI System, a real-time industrial data platform, since 2008. Initially introduced within water services, it has steadily expanded across the organisation, underpinning how complex systems and processes are monitored, understood and managed.

“Data in the PI System is essentially a value plus time,” Norah said. “A number on its own doesn’t mean much. What matters is the context, what it represents, where it comes from, and how it’s changing.”

That context turns simple sensor readings into something far more useful. At assets like Darwin River Dam, PI continuously translates water levels into storage capacity, tracks changes over time, compares them against rainfall and historical trends, and updates everything automatically as new data arrives.

Staff access this information through PI Vision, dashboards built by operational teams using shared, trusted data.

Norah’s presentation will focus on how Power and Water is exploring new ways to connect insights across systems and processes.

“Right now, our data environment is designed to prioritise security and reliability, which is essential for a utility like ours,” Norah said. “The challenge is finding ways to extend the value of that data while maintaining those protections.”

Emerging platforms are opening up opportunities to responsibly combine operational data, Norah said,  helping data ‘talk’ to each other to create richer insights without compromising safety.

One example Norah gave was the Petco Park baseball stadium in San Diego in the United States, where the local power utility and stadium owners shared data.

“The utility could predict demand on game days, and the stadium detected an air-conditioner had been left on between games. Instead of wasting a month of power they caught issues in hours. That’s the power of shared data,” she said.

Norah said making data visible, transparent and easy to interpret helps preserve knowledge, reduce miscommunication, and ensure information is used and not just stored.

“I love data,” she said. “Most people don’t realise what’s possible until they see it working. And when they do, it’s exciting.”