Sea change: Data and AI are setting a new high-water mark for governments responding to sustainability.

Sea change: Data and AI are setting a new high-water mark for governments responding to sustainability.

Explore how Avanade can help you charter the right course to achieve sustainability.

In 1897, a high-water mark for Venice was established at one of the entrances of the Grand Canal. In the next 20 years, high tides exceeded that mark only six times. In the past 20 years, tides have crossed the high-water threshold more than 150 times.

Venice’s solution to the tides encroaching on the city took 50 years to bring to life, but now there is an option to raise a sea wall—called MOSE—to seal off the Venice Lagoon from rising tides. The wall has been raised nearly 50 times in its two years of operation—far beyond an initial estimate of about five instances per year.

While sustainability was deprioritized by many governments and public agencies due to the pandemic, it’s rushing back in like a high tide in Venice. Governments and public agencies know that they need to be prepared to predict, prevent and react to climate events, while also pursuing their own sustainability objectives through resilience planning.