IBM (NYSE:IBM) has unveiled an array of software for environmental intelligence that makes use of AI to help businesses prepare for and deal with extreme weather and climate events that could disrupt business operations and help them better evaluate their impact on the earth and lessen the burden of reporting and compliance with regulations.
Businesses are facing damage from climate change on their property, as well as disruptions to supply processes and chains, in addition to growing expectations from consumers and investors to be an environmentally responsible leader. Extreme weather events, climate-related inaction and the human-driven environmental harm were listed among the 3 risks for companies over the next 10 years, according to The World Economic Forum’s “Global Risks Report 2021.” Companies require effective environmental information to tackle these issues, however the current approaches are often inefficient and complicated, requiring a lot of manual work as well as knowledge of climate and data science as well as computing capacity.
Its IBM Environmental Intelligence Suite announced today will help businesses simplify and automate the control of environmental risks, and to operationalize the underlying processes, such as the carbon-based accounting process and reduction in order to achieve their environmental targets. The suite makes use of the existing weather data provided by IBM, the most accurate service provider worldwide advanced geospatial analysis currently used by corporations all over the world and the latest innovations by IBM Research. The suite is the first to combine artificial intelligence as well as climate risk analytics, as well as carbon accounting features in this way which allows organizations to save time and money on preparing this data, and more time analysing it to find insights and taking actions to improve their processes.
IBM Environmental Intelligence Suite is an SaaS solution that is designed to assist businesses:
* Monitor for environmental conditions that could cause disruption like wildfires, severe weather, air quality, and flooding and issue alerts when they are detected;
* Predict the possible impacts of climate change and weather on the company with the help of climate risk analytics
• Gain insight into possible operational interruptions, and prioritize the mitigation and response strategies;
• Measure and review environmental initiatives and make carbon accounting operational, while making it easier for reporting on operations and procurement teams.
The suite provides environmental information through dashboards, APIs, alerts and maps that assist companies with immediate operational issues as well as long-term plans and strategy. The suite can be used to aid retailers in preparing for extreme disruptions to inventory or shipping due to weather and also incorporate environmental risk into future warehouse locations. utilities and energy companies can determine the best places to trim their plants around power lines as well as which most important assets could soon be at risk of fires because of climate changes. It could also be used to assist supermarkets understand better of how their refrigeration systems contribute to their greenhouse gas emissions. It can also help them identify areas for improvement.
“The future of business and the environment are deeply intertwined. Not only are companies coping with the effects of extreme weather disruptions on their operations, they’re also being held increasingly accountable by shareholders and regulators for how their operations impact the planet,” said Kareem Yusuf, Ph.D., General Manager, IBM AI Applications. “IBM is bringing together the power of AI and hybrid cloud to provide businesses with environmental intelligence designed to help them improve environmental performance and reporting, create more efficient business operations to reduce resource consumption, and plan for resiliency in the face of climate disruptions.”
“Today’s announcement further accelerates our commitment to apply scientific methods to find new solutions for the most pressing challenges that we face as a society. Last year, IBM Research launched a global initiative called the “Future of Climate” to develop and demonstrate innovations focused on addressing climate change by leveraging AI expertise across IBM Research,” said Gargi Dasgupta – Director, IBM Research India and CTO IBM India/South Asia. “To support this initiative, IBM Research – India, which has been at the forefront of advancing AI and its applications, has played a critical role in building the new Carbon Performance Engine and Climate aware applications including forecasting, which are now a part of the overall Environmental Intelligence Suite.”
Companies across all over the world are already making use of the weather and AI technologies that IBM has in its Environmental Intelligence Suite. For instance, IBM environmental data and geospatial analytics are utilized by Brazilian bioelectricity, ethanol, and sugar producer BP Bunge Bioenergia to help improve its understanding of its agricultural sugarcane production and to improve the market-intelligence estimates about sugar production worldwide. It is also being used by the leader of the agricultural industry Cajamar to assist Spanish farmers to improve yields and lessen the environmental impact of their operations through its online Plataforma Tierra tool.
It is IBM Environmental Intelligence Suite also makes use of AI-driven advances by IBM Research that make it easier for data and climate researchers to study vast environmental data, as well as the development of a new model of climate risks is used to create data about future flooding and wildfire risk. The suite will also utilize unique technology from IBM Research which apply natural technology and language processing to assist companies in estimating carbon emissions, and discover opportunities to cut them down within their own operations as well as with their suppliers.
It is possible to integrate the Environmental Intelligence Suite can be combined with IBM’s larger software portfolio to help improve efficiency across the business operations for example, IBM Maximo Application Suite to aid companies in protecting and prolonging the lifespan of their most valuable assets, as well as IBM Supply Chain Intelligence Suite for supply chain intelligence to aid in building more resilient and sustainable supply chains.
Companies can also take advantage of the expertise across industries that is available through IBM Global Business Services to assist in the design, implementation and accelerate their eco-friendly business transformation plans. These strategies involve reimagining processes and the supply chain, emission management or ESG and reporting on climate risk using the latest technologies that can assist companies in achieving their environmental targets.
