Scottsdale, AZ – Veolia today opened its first Hubgrade Center in North America, a digital command center that combines human expertise with the power of real-time data and artificial intelligence to deliver top-quality water and wastewater treatment at Veolia-operated facilities across the western United States.

This Hubgrade Center allows communities of any size to benefit from Veolia’s digital capabilities and operational expertise, with AI-enabled data analysis and dedicated experts now able to remotely monitor and continuously improve their operations. Freed from relying solely on in-house tools and teams, municipal water and wastewater providers can rely on this Hubgrade facility to streamline and transform complex operational data into clear, day-to-day guidance.

Veolia has to date implemented Hubgrade capabilities at seven wastewater systems that are remotely and securely managed at the Scottsdale Hubgrade Center, and will expand this service to a total of 27 municipal partners by the end of 2025. Operators at the Center use continuous data monitoring, remote-controlled drones and robots, and 360-degree “digital twin” models of this distributed infrastructure to provide top-quality systemic guidance throughout the West. The Scottsdale location can support all our partner communities, working around the clock, to help optimize chemical use, reduce energy consumption, extend asset life and comply with environmental regulations – helping municipal budgets, residents and communities.

At the formal launch event inside the Hubgrade Center, surrounded by screens displaying real-time operational parameters and optimization tools for Veolia-operated sites from Washington State to southern California, Veolia leaders demonstrated Hubgrade’s capabilities to municipal officials from across the Phoenix Valley. They donned virtual-reality headsets to remotely visit site operations, asked plain-English AI models to evaluate data feeds from plants hundreds of miles away, and discussed how Hubgrade’s digital tools can meet their goals to conserve and reuse water, reduce their carbon footprints and improve environmental quality for their communities.

The Hubgrade Center in Scottsdale also houses Veolia’s Innovation Lab, a dedicated space for developing, testing and training on new technologies and advanced solutions tailored to municipal water needs. Both Hubgrade and the Lab’s innovations and digital solutions are built into Veolia’s robust cybersecurity and data governance framework, ensuring every insight is secure, reliable and aligned with public-sector priorities. Hubgrade’s aggressive embrace of AI and new technology, in concert with Veolia’s unmatched human expertise in water and wastewater operations, aligns with the ambitions set out in Veolia’s strategic GreenUp program to depollute, decarbonize and preserve resources.