CONCLUDING REMARKS
The challenges facing TOs today are significant...
...a rapidly approaching Clean Power 2030 deadline, growing community opposition, environmental sensitivities, and planning processes that can be painstakingly slow. It’s clear we can’t keep working the way we always have, and AI has a growing role to play here.
Lisa Jones, lead account executive, critical infrastructure, EMEA
Technology should empower and support people, not replace them. AI is now a true enabler of smarter and faster decision-making, giving you a list of options – especially in the early stages of power infrastructure development. Whether it's through digital twins, real-time biodiversity modelling, or AI-driven substation design, the common thread is clear: we’re beginning to bridge the gap between vision and delivery. We are working with organisations to integrate agentic AI with Autodesk Forma. These tools don’t just automate tasks; they support better decision-making by helping engineers and planners simulate outcomes, analyse carbon impact in real-time, and optimise designs before any work has even been started. They create a virtual environment for infrastructure planning – and that’s incredibly powerful when you're managing competing priorities like cost, biodiversity, and community impact.
“At Autodesk, we continue to invest in open, interoperable platforms – because unlocking insights across systems is the foundation of meaningful progress.”
It’s not just about speed or automation, however, there is also a critical need for trust, transparency, and collaboration in infrastructure planning. Stakeholders – from local communities to environmental bodies such as the Forestry Commission – want to understand why decisions are made. With AI, that means building systems that don’t just provide answers, but show their working. That’s why explainability and data provenance must be part of the AI journey in this energy sector.
Of course, the potential of AI hinges on the quality and accessibility of the information we feed into it. Structured data like GIS and BIM is vital, but we must also tackle the untapped potential of unstructured or siloed legacy data. That’s why at Autodesk, we continue to invest in open, interoperable platforms – because unlocking insights across systems is the foundation of meaningful progress.
Of course, we’re still in the very early stages of this journey. Standardisation, governance, and skills development all remain key priorities. But if we can work together – operators, suppliers, regulators, environmental groups – we can move from pilot projects to sector-wide transformation.
This isn’t about making AI the star of the show. It’s about using it as one of the many tools at our disposal to build more resilient and sustainable power infrastructure – at the speed the energy transition demands.
