Ofwat has today called on all water companies to take immediate action across eight areas to release the benefits of open data.
In a new report, Open data in the water industry: making the change, the regulator has found widespread public support for water companies opening their data, but that water companies have made little progress in opening datasets.
Ofwat has set out clear and urgent actions it expects companies to take including:
- identifying priority data sets for release;
- reviewing datasets that have so far only been shared with limited groups and take steps to make them openly available;
- proactive leadership to develop and publish a clear roadmap by October this year for open data delivery for the industry; and
- releasing data sets with an open licence to encourage information to be freely used.
According to the water sector regulator, these steps will enable data to be publicly shared with innovators, citizen scientists and the public, allowing the benefits of open data to be fully explored and for the water sector to keep pace with the wider digital economy.
To ensure that customers and the environment benefit from the potential of open data, Ofwat is also developing a new licence condition that will provide new powers to ensure companies deliver on the challenge.
Ofwat previously found in its 2021 report H2Open, Open data in the water industry: a case for change, that there would be significant benefits to customers, the environment and society from water companies opening their data – including improvements in water company performance.
Two years further on, the new report, which sets out the findings of Ofwat's review of water company progress on delivering open data and next steps says:
"The review has found limited cross-sector progress in making water sector data freely available to everyone to access, use and share."
Open data means making data freely available for everyone to access, use and share. Open data promotes greater transparency and trust and helps innovators to find solutions to environmental and other challenges.
Lisa Commane, Chief Operating Officer, Ofwat said:
"We are challenging companies to show proactive leadership and go further and faster to open up their data. Ofwat, together with the public, expects to see water companies making tangible progress towards the establishment of an open and trustworthy data ecosystem. This needs to happen now and we will look to underpin this with new Ofwat powers where progress falters.
"Learning from other sectors shows that as well as having established data infrastructure, companies must embed a stronger data culture, bring capability and skills into the sector and improve collaboration to speed up delivery. We expect water companies to be able to demonstrate more evidence of tangible progress during 2023 and 2024."
Click here to download Open data in the water industry: making the change
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