That’s hard to teach. But, one company is doing something about it.  

Nyad is a Birmingham, Alabama-based wastewater AI co-pilot that is designed to capture that judgement, and make it available to operators in real time. The company aims to help treatment plant operators manage complex systems amid a rapidly shrinking workforce, using artificial intelligence tools to analyze and track microbial activity in wastewater facilities. 

Knowledge Loss 

The water workforce shortage is often framed as a hiring problem, but for wastewater utilities, the deeper risk is knowledge transfer. When veteran operators retire, plants lose years of site-specific judgment about how a system behaves under changing flows, seasons, loading conditions and equipment constraints. 

The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency has identified workforce as a key challenge for drinking water, wastewater and stormwater systems, particularly as utilities face recruitment and succession-planning pressures. The Bureau of Labor Statistics projects about 10,700 openings per year for water and wastewater treatment plant and system operators from 2024 to 2034, even as overall employment in the occupation is expected to decline, largely because of replacement needs. 

That challenge is especially important because wastewater operations cannot be learned from a manual alone. Operators must understand biology, equipment behavior, regulatory requirements and the operating history of a specific plant. Certification matters, but much of the job is built through repeated exposure to real conditions. 

“Wastewater treatment doesn't truly run on manuals and textbooks,” said Virginia Szepietowski, co-founder and CEO of Nyad. “They run on the experience and judgement of the operators who’ve been there 20 or 30 years who know what ‘normal’ looks like, and sense when something is off.” 

For newer operators, that gap can create uncertainty. Szepietowski said they are “not always sure what they’re seeing under the microscope or out at the basin,” especially when the veteran who would normally provide guidance has retired or is close to it.

Nyad is designed as a wastewater AI co-pilot for frontline operators, not an automated control system. The platform gives operators a way to upload microscope images, share standard operating procedures and ask questions about what they are seeing in the plant. From there, it provides real-time troubleshooting guidance while also building a searchable record of past issues, actions and outcomes.

“Operators get a sharp microbiologist on their phone or laptop, available whenever they need one,” said Szepietowski. “They can upload microscope images, share SOPs, and chat through what they’re seeing. They get answers in seconds instead of waiting two weeks for a lab report they’re left to interpret on their own.”

That speed matters, because process issues often develop over time. Szepietowski said one problem Nyad is solving is the ability to spot trouble before it becomes a permit violation. “Operators do microscopy regularly, sometimes daily, but nobody’s connecting six weeks of slides together,” she said. “Trends get missed, and the team ends up chasing process upset instead of getting ahead of it.”

The second function is confidence-building. Newer operators may understand the basics but still need help interpreting what they are seeing under the microscope or at the basin. Nyad gives them a sounding board so they can make better-informed decisions without waiting for a senior operator to be available.

The third function is institutional memory. “Every microscopy session, every issue, every fix gets logged,” Szepietowski said. “So when a filament bloom shows up in October that looks a lot like the one from April, the operator can see what they did last time and how it worked out.”

Equally important is what Nyad does not do. “We don’t touch the SCADA, valves or pumps,” Szepietowski said. “Operators keep their hands on the steering wheel. Nyad is a troubleshooting and guidance tool. A second set of eyes, not an autopilot.”

That distinction aligns with broader AI risk-management guidance. The National Institute of Standards and Technology’s AI Risk Management Framework is designed to help organizations manage AI risks and promote trustworthy, responsible AI use: a particularly relevant consideration in critical infrastructure environments where human oversight remains central.
 

Birmingham business and economic development leaders gather at a local small business event. Photo credit: City of Birmingham | click to enlarge.

Training the Next Generation in Real Time

For utilities trying to bring new operators into the field, the challenge is much bigger than recruitment: it’s helping less-experienced workers develop judgment fast enough to operate confidently in real plant conditions.

Nyad’s role in that landscape is to support the on-the-job learning that happens after certification. “Training a wastewater operator is a combination of classroom certification, state exams, and years of on-the-job pattern recognition that no curriculum really shortcuts,” said Szepietowski. “The exams get you licensed. The plant teaches you how to actually run it.”

That second learning curve is where Nyad is designed to help. A newer operator can upload a microscope image, ask why a clarifier is acting up or describe what is happening in the basin, then receive an explanation and a recommended next step while still in the context of the shift.

“Over time, they’re absorbing the reasoning behind decisions, not just the answers,” Szepietowski said. “It’s the difference between being handed a fish and being shown how to read the water.”

For utilities, that distinction matters. The goal is not to replace apprenticeship, certification or veteran mentorship, but to make more of that reasoning available when newer operators need it most.

Operator trust: Built for the Field, Not the Dashboard

AI adoption in wastewater operations will likely depend less on the technology’s novelty than on whether operators believe it respects the work. Frontline crews are used to tools that promise visibility for management, but add little value to the person troubleshooting a problem on shift. In critical infrastructure environments, that distinction matters: a tool that feels like oversight can meet resistance, while a tool that helps operators make better decisions earns trust.

Szepietowski said that skepticism is both expected and justified. “Operators have rightly earned a healthy skepticism of anything that smells like a manager’s dashboard or a tool designed to second-guess their judgment,” she said. “Nyad isn’t either. It doesn’t touch their control systems. It’s something they open when they’re trying to figure something out on shift.”

That framing is central to Nyad’s adoption strategy. The platform is positioned as decision support, not plant control. Operators remain responsible for the call; Nyad provides another layer of visibility when they are evaluating microscopy, basin conditions or a recurring process issue.

Szepietowski described the relationship this way: “They keep their hands on the steering wheel. We give them better visibility through the windshield.”

The early usage pattern suggests that practicality may be the best trust signal. At one active site, Szepietowski said, “a single operator exchanged 136 messages with Nyad and in his first 48 hours.” Her takeaway: “Operators don’t reach for things they don’t trust.”

The broader lesson for AI in the trades is straightforward. Adoption is not driven by buzzwords. It is driven by whether the tool helps skilled workers do the job without diminishing their role in it.

Birmingham’s Role as an Innovation Ecosystem

Nyad’s development also reflects a broader effort in Birmingham, Alabama to position the region as a home for energy, water and sustainability innovation. The company is based out of Innovation Depot, a Birmingham startup hub that offers workspace, programming and founder support aimed at helping companies gain traction and grow in the city. Nyad also came through the Techstars Alabama EnergyTech Accelerator, which focuses on climate tech, clean tech and energy efficiency startups, including companies working on smart grids, energy distribution and adjacent infrastructure challenges.

Matthew Jaeh, managing director of the Techstars Alabama EnergyTech Accelerator, said Birmingham and Alabama have advantages because of the partnerships surrounding the region’s innovation network. “This starts with Alabama Power Company,” Jaeh said. “They lead the way in supporting not just energytech founders, but founders across the state.”

He also pointed to the AMP Center, which he described as “a unique battery, power, and research facility created through a partnership between Alabama Power, the University of Alabama, and Mercedes-Benz.” For water innovation, Jaeh noted the University of Alabama’s water technology resources, with USGS and NOAA located nearby. That aligns with the Alabama Water Institute’s public description of its work alongside the USGS Hydrologic Instrumentation Facility, and NOAA’s National Water Center.

For startups like Nyad, the value of that ecosystem is access. Jaeh said Techstars connects founders through “a vast network of partners, investors, and thousands of portfolio companies,” helping them reach organizations actively looking for solutions. In infrastructure markets, where utilities tend to be cautious and relationships matter, those connections can help move a technology from promising concept to practical relevance.

For Birmingham, startups like Nyad are part of a larger economic development strategy tied to infrastructure, sustainability and workforce resilience. Coreata Houser, director of the city’s Department of Innovation & Economic Opportunity, said one of the local government’s most useful tools is not always funding, but connection.

“The city supports startups like Nyad by using one of the local government’s strongest tools — our convening power,” Houser said. “We bring the right partners together so founders can access resources, solve problems, and grow in Birmingham.”

That support also includes helping young companies navigate public-sector processes. Houser said Birmingham launched the Office of Business Diversity and Opportunity to give small businesses and startups a central point of coordination inside City Hall. If a company encounters a barrier such as a licensing issue, he said, the team can coordinate across departments and communicate directly with the startup so founders can stay focused on running the business.

Birmingham has also formalized resilience and sustainability as city priorities. The Mayor’s Office of Resilience and Sustainability says it works across departments to build a “stronger, future-ready Birmingham” while responding to environmental, social and economic challenges.

Houser connected those goals directly to workforce development. Birmingham’s talent development incentive reimburses companies for approved employee upskilling, while its talent recruitment incentive helps offset the cost of hiring high-level specialist talent, provided employers meet wage and skill benchmarks.

As Houser noted, workforce participation is shaped by access to childcare, reliable transit, procurement opportunities, apprenticeships, credentialing and work-based learning.

What Success Looks Like

For Nyad, success is not measured by removing operators from the process. It is measured by giving more operators access to the kind of guidance that has traditionally depended on who happened to be on shift.

In the short term, Szepietowski said the goal is “thousands of plants where every operator on shift, regardless of tenure, has access to the same quality of expert level guidance.” That would mean fewer situations where a plant has to “wait until Tuesday when the senior operator is back,” and fewer single points of human failure.

Longer term, she sees the technology as one way to reduce the workforce shortage’s threat to public health and infrastructure. “The answer isn’t finding twice as many people, that’s not realistic,” Szepietowski said. “The answer is making the operators we do have measurably more effective.”

AI’s highest-value role in wastewater may not be replacing field judgment, but helping preserve it, distribute it and train the next generation before too much of it leaves the workforce.