European ecological initiatives, the energy products price increase of almost 500% in the last few years, and current political processes show the importance of energy self-sufficiency in each country. The increase in renewable energy capacity shows an important contribution to that goal, where hydroelectric energy is currently the largest renewable energy source in Europe (18%) and the greatest energy source in Croatia (44%). Thus, the revitalization of existing and development of new hydroelectric power plants presents a significant contribution to energy independence. In this project, artificial intelligence will be used to improve the design of water turbine hydraulic parts: trash-rack and draft tube. One of the main functions of trash-rack is the prevention of fish entrance into the turbine to reduce their injuries and mortality rate. Fish-friendly trash-racks, which provide better protection, represent an unfavorable solution from the engineering perspective since it increases hydraulic losses. Therefore, artificial intelligence and numerical simulations will be used to provide an optimal solution considering these two opposing goals. Additionally, the draft tube shape will be optimized to maximize turbine efficiency by reducing hydraulic losses and increasing the usage of remaining water energy. To validate the proposed approach, experimental testing will be conducted for obtained optimal shapes. Considering the specific requirements of each water turbine part, individual applications of artificial intelligence methods will be investigated. Particularly, the necessity of satisfying multiple goals which was previously not considered due to limited computational resources. The proposed project has a great potential for establishing collaboration with the industry due to the multidisciplinary approach which tends to synthesize engineering knowledge and ecological demands.