Technology and cross-industry collaboration are essential if infrastructure is to move from sustainability ambition to real-world delivery, a FIDIC webinar held in partnership with Autodesk has heard. Speakers explored how trusted data, AI and closer collaboration across the ecosystem can help the sector tackle carbon, resilience and investment challenges at scale.
Industry experts highlighted the growing importance of technology and ecosystem collaboration in scaling sustainable infrastructure at a webinar held by FIDIC in partnership with Autodesk. From Ambition to Action: Scaling Sustainable Infrastructure Through Technology and Ecosystem Collaboration examined the pressures organisations face in delivering on sustainability commitments – including where they are investing and how better planning, design and collaboration can help overcome key barriers.
FIDIC’s head of policy, ESG and sustainability, Basma Eissa, chaired the event, which also explored how construction firms are using technologies such as AI to drive more sustainable outcomes across the infrastructure lifecycle.
Panellists were Marta Bouchard, director of sustainability solutions strategy at Autodesk, Nicolas Miravalls, CEO of ORIS and Andreas Linnett, senior chief consultant and global decarbonisation lead at Ramboll. Together they discussed balancing investment decisions, driving innovation, improving resilience and delivering both business and environmental impact.
Sustainability at the core
Opening the session, Eissa underlined how central sustainability is to FIDIC’s members and to the sector as a whole. FIDIC’s approach, she said, is built on a systems-thinking mindset and “an unwavering commitment to practical impact” – not just responding to climate and net zero pressures, but actively shaping how infrastructure is planned, delivered and maintained across its full lifecycle, globally.
She pointed to initiatives such as the FIDIC Climate Change Charter and the FIDIC Carbon Management Framework (CMF) – a sector-specific tool helping infrastructure stakeholders embed carbon accountability into projects, regardless of geography or market maturity. “Sustainability issues cannot be addressed in isolation from technology,” she said, framing the discussion to follow.
Collaboration as the connecting thread
Collaboration ran through every contribution. Autodesk's Marta Bouchard set the tone early, arguing that as infrastructure enters an “action” phase, sustainability data needs to be as trusted and usable as financial data – a business imperative that depends on robust, accurate information.
Ramboll’s Andreas Linnett agreed, noting that client expectations are shifting fast. “Clients now are asking much more searching questions. They want to know what things mean for asset value and cost and this creates greater demands on their contractors and consultants. Delivery is everything and streamlining is key,” he said.
ORIS’s Nicolas Miravalls echoed this, saying that meeting rising client demands means it’s “a must-have today to build a system to enable us to work at scale”. He described a broader “top-down transformation,” with engineers under growing pressure to report in detail on carbon and leadership and responsibility more critical than ever. He also raised the idea of “tech for good” – a principle he said needs emphasis amid the sheer volume of new technology reshaping the industry.
Returning to the theme of collaboration, Bouchard was clear that no single organisation can solve sustainability alone – “especially in a complex industry like infrastructure”. Delivering large projects, she said, requires the whole ecosystem to work together: “The ability to work with others is a huge advantage in the marketplace and we really need to be working across organisational boundaries.” She pointed to Autodesk’s open platform approach as a way of enabling alignment at scale and accelerating change.
Breaking down silos
All three panellists stressed the risks of fragmented data and disconnected workflows. “Data can get lost when it's kept in different places, so we need to address these disconnected workflows and fragmented data,” said Bouchard. “People sometimes say, ‘we need more data’ – but the key is having the right data, and access to it at the right time.” Empowering people through technology, she added, is central to working smarter: “We are seeing a big demand for connecting sustainability workflows. We are moving in fast times and technology is bringing us closer together.” Miravalls agreed wholeheartedly: “Don't fear technology – embrace it,” he said.
AI as an augmenter, not a shortcut
On AI’s growing role in sustainability decision-making, all three speakers were optimistic – with a caveat. “AI is an exciting time and it gives us the opportunity to enable experts to work more effectively,” said Bouchard. “It's not a quick fix, though – we need to apply it to the right problems,” ensuring AI always augments, rather than replaces, human expertise. Linnett agreed that while AI can speed up repeatable tasks across the project ecosystem, “we need to keep the human spirit intact.”
Resilience and the road ahead
Panellists also addressed the importance of resilience and future-readiness, underpinned by accurate, timely data. “Resilience is an additional ‘brick’ into the engineering project,” said Miravalls. “Decarbonisation and mitigation are linked and are key to adaptation. We as engineers need to feel responsible for today and also the future.”
One shift, one step
Closing the session, Eissa asked each panellist for one mindset shift and one practical step infrastructure leaders could take in the next six months.
“Carbon management is not reporting – it is an important part of design and key to early design integration,” said Linnett.
“The financing gap in infrastructure is crucial and carbon management is key to addressing that,” said Miravalls.
For Bouchard, it came back to collaboration: “Start small and start somewhere. Collaboration is the new competitive advantage – you don’t have to solve everything all at once.”
Summing up, Eissa reflected on the shared responsibility across the sector: “Not one company has all the answers, but by working together we really can make the right decisions, drive innovation, improve resilience and deliver business and environmental impact.”
View the full webinar recording below.
