Most of us never think about what happens after water spirals down a drain. But for the people who run wastewater treatment plants, keeping the promise of clean water is a race against time – and data. Treatment plant operators face a major challenge: critical water-quality tests take days to complete, while operators often need to make decisions within hours.
A growing field of artificial intelligence – explainable AI, or XAI – is helping bridge that gap, said Fuad Nasir, a water supply specialist with the Wisconsin Department of Natural Resources.