Defining the digital twin with Alex Luck

The Infrastructure Podcast

In today's podcast we are talking about digital twins and the challenge of digitalising the infrastructure sector in our bid to increase efficiency and boost outcomes from every pound of investment.

There is certainly no shortage of talk nowadays about transforming productivity and the way that the use of digital technology and data can help improve the sector. And to date, the the focus has been largely on improving our design and delivery functions – using tools to draw, design, plan analyse, collaborate and share information more effectively.

But in truth, and ever since we embraced the mandared use of Building Information Modelling on public projects in 2016, we have known deep down, that the bigger prize lies in digitising and boosting performance of the whole infrastructure system while in operation.

Which is where the use of digital twins comes in. Enabling us to connect the physical world with the digital world; generating insights that drive decisions and interventions to help improve performance in the real world.

And creating a National Digital Twin could enable better management and integration across the entire - and varied - built and natural environment ecosystem – reducing cost, carbon and improving those vital outcomes for citizens.

This bold concept was core to the work of the Cambridge University supported Centre for Digital Built Britain in 2017, which morphed into various other programmes when it closed its doors after 5 years in 2022.

One of those initiatives is now known as the National Digital Twin Programmeand run under the Department for Business and Trade.

It is therefore my pleasure to be joined on the podcast today by Alex Luck, Head of the National Digital Twin Programme to update us on progress.

Alex has been riding the digital wave throughout this time and so, I reckon will be well placed to explain where we have been, where we have got to and more importantly where she sees us heading in the future of infrastructure digitalisation.
Resources
The National Digital Twin Programme
Centre for Digital Built Britain legacy site
Data for Public Good
Transforming Infrastructure Performance
Building Information Modelling explained