Petrer Hosts Conference on AI for Management Efficiency

Petrer hosted the second meeting of the 'An Hour of Change' project this Sunday, in its second edition, an initiative led by Aguas de Alicante and the Advanced Tertiary Association of the Province of Alicante, which this time had the support of the local council of this town in Medio Vinalopó and the collaboration of Líder.

The session took place in the 'Espai Blanc' Room, featuring Irene Navarro, mayor of Petrer, Sergio Sánchez, general director of Aguas de Alicante, and Diego Solorzano, co-founder of the company Square1. Anabel Rosas, director of Líder, acted as the moderator.

The theme of this second session focused on the use of artificial intelligence for management efficiency, under the title 'Artificial Intelligence for Efficient Decision Making'.

The mayor of Petrer, Irene Navarro, noted that as a public entity, this new technology is approached with caution, although it is already being used in some areas. Among the examples she cited was its application in the tourism sector for translating promotional videos of the Moros y Cristianos festivals in Petrer and for the project called 'Crochet Gallery'.

In the general administration field, it is also used innovatively to serve residents or visitors from other countries in multiple languages. In more administrative aspects, artificial intelligence is also being used to improve tenders, grant bases, etc., always within the legal framework. Additionally, the mayor highlighted the complexity of legislating in this unfamiliar area, though it would be important to have a common criterion in the international framework, and the need to improve training for public officials and civil servants.

Diego Solorzano, co-founder of the Irish technology company based in Alicante, Square1, began by explaining what is meant by artificial intelligence, as the ability of computer programs to perform actions in certain areas that would require human intelligence, currently very present in our daily lives, through, for example, our mobile phones (Siri, Alexa, facial recognition, etc.).

Artificial intelligence already has the ability to learn, reason, analyse data, and understand patterns, Solorzano added. The biggest leap currently has been generative artificial intelligence, such as ChatGPT, among other programs, capable not only of analysing data but also of generating all kinds of information, images, videos, etc. Regarding future challenges, he explained the enormous evolution that models are undergoing, increasingly approaching the human brain and training in 'prompt engineering', or learning to ask questions to better use AI tools.

Sergio Sánchez, general director of Aguas de Alicante, pointed out that this technology has been used for some time to control aspects of daily management such as purification, sewage, or data management. Aguas was the first company to have a geolocated data system to optimise the water cycle management and aid decision-making. Artificial intelligence is also used in customer service management with the use of 'chatbots', software that simulates conversation with a real person through a web interface.

Currently, Aguas de Alicante manages more than 9 million data points daily, so the current project they are working on aims to make better use of all this information, always respecting customer privacy. Regarding the current European legislation in this area, Sánchez believes it is important to regulate well to not lose the technological race. Finally, he referred to the 'Perseo' projects, thanks to which the water network of Petrer will be modernised, and 'ChampionIA', focused on training Aguas staff in this area.

During five programmes in the Living Podcast format, the aim is to inspire and give visibility to the commitment to innovation by the public and private sectors of our province. These programmes will serve as a meeting point between the mayors of the municipalities where Aguas de Alicante operates and specialised professionals from across the province in digitalisation.