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IBM Sustainability Accelerator

Providing nonprofit and governmental agencies with IBM technology and AI solutions to support vulnerable communities around the world

Our initiative

The IBM Sustainability Accelerator is a global, pro bono initiative providing IBM technologies and expertise to non-profits and governments addressing climate change impacts on vulnerable populations.

To date, the IBM Sustainability Accelerator has supported 15 global projects across four active cohorts focused on sustainable agriculture, clean energy, water management and resilient cities.

Our differentiators:

  • Global scale, local impact
  • Two-year program duration
  • No cost for participants
  • Focus on populations at risk

UNDP and IBM launch new tools to forecast energy access and model energy equity

Sustainable agriculture

First cohort: Sustainable agriculture Delivering tools and insights to smallholder farmers across the world.

Deltares

Solution: Deltares Aquality App
Project location: The Netherlands

Deltares, a non-profit research organization based in the Netherlands, teamed up with IBM to enhance and expand the reach of its Deltares Aquality app to find a tech solution that helps farmers monitor nitrate levels and give insights into nutrient losses and local water quality.

Learn more Download the app
Heifer International

Solution: OpenHarvest
Project location: Malawi, Africa

IBM and global non-profit Heifer International collaborated to develop OpenHarvest—a mobile application that expands access to visual agricultural data, delivers specialized recommendations (via SMS text message) to farmers in Malawi, Africa, through AI and climate modeling, and enables better farm and field management.

Learn more OpenHarvest on GitHub
Plan21 Foundation

Solution: YvY
Project location: Latin America

Plan21 and IBM, together with developers from the Costa Rica Institute of Technology (TEC), supported the development of a mobile application, YvY, that provides farmers with technical training to make use of insights from weather data, agronomic data and carbon footprint calculations that facilitate production management and allow better adaptation to climate change.

Learn more Go to YvY
The Nature Conservancy Centre India

Solution: CRM Connect
Project location: India

IBM and the Nature Conservancy Centre India developed a public information platform called CRM Connect, a dashboard and web portal, to promote regenerative farming practices in India, with the aim of fostering agricultural sustainability and reducing the impact of climate change on communities.

Learn more Access CRM Connect
Texas A&M AgriLife

Solutions: Liquid Prep, Soil & Water Assessment Tool (“SWAT”) VEXA
Project location: United States

IBM and Texas A&M AgriLife collaborated to advance sustainable farming with solutions including Liquid Prep, which helps farmers optimize water use, and SWAT VEXA, an interactive Gen AI virtual assistant providing soil and water insights. These solutions aim to support farmers, water and land managers, and communities in both agricultural and urban regions in the U.S.

Learn more about Liquid Prep Open SWAT VEXA

Clean energy

Second cohort: Clean energy Helping address electricity access, renewable energy usage and the energy transition.

Environment Without Borders Foundation

Solution: Green Taqa
Project location: Egypt

IBM and Environment Without Borders Foundation (EWBF) created Green Taqa, an innovative platform ecosystem designed to expand access to clean energy resources and providers for communities across Egypt.

Learn more

Download Green Taqa: Google Play Download Green Taqa: Apple App Store
Sustainable Energy for All

Solutions: AI modeling
Project location: Kenya and India

IBM and Sustainable Energy for All (SEforAll) worked together on two projects, Open Building Insights and Modeling Urban Growth, to enable policymakers to identify energy and infrastructure needs for communities in developing regions.

Learn more

Go to Open Building Insights Modeling Urban Growth on GitHub
United Nations Development Programme (UNDP)

Solutions: Electricity Access Forecasting (AI model) and Clean Energy Equity Index (statistical geospatial model)
Project location: Global south—Africa, Asia Pacific, Latin America and the Middle East

To support data-driven decision-making toward a just energy transition, IBM and UNDP launched new interactive models to analyze complex energy issues. 

Learn more 

Access Electricity Access Forecasting Access the Clean Energy Equity Index

Water management

Third cohort: Water management Serving communities facing water scarcity and clean water stress.

Resilient cities

Fourth cohort: Resilient cities Bringing technology-driven solutions to make cities more livable and sustainable.

Our offerings

IBM Consulting
IBM technology
Cloud and weather data credits

Frequently asked questions

IBM believes that science, technology and innovation can help tackle environmental issues while helping communities to address societal needs.

  • According to the World Bank (link resides outside ibm.com), climate-related disasters and natural hazards push 26 million people into poverty each year, putting these populations in need of technical, financial and institutional resources that enable communities to respond to climate change, support climate adaptation and build resiliency.
  • By uniting experts and technology, IBM wanted to find a way to scale and speed up solutions, such as for climate change mitigation, that support underrepresented communities most vulnerable to environmental threats through the lens of environmental justice.

The IBM Sustainability Accelerator has had 15 engagements, each with a different non-profit or government organization, divided into three cohorts: sustainable agriculture, clean energy and water management.

Learn about IBM Sustainability Accelerator projects around the world.

IBM selects about five organizations each year—forming a cohort—to focus on addressing a specific sustainability issue area. The selection process includes a public RFP open to any nonprofit or government organization. Proposals are reviewed and evaluated for feasibility and impact, and vetted through standard IBM compliance processes. The selection process will include input from IBM’s experts across disciplines such as IBM Consulting, Research, Software, Corporate Environmental Affairs and Corporate Social Responsibility. The selection criteria will consider the applicant’s level of support to communities who are especially vulnerable to environmental threats, and its strategic focus and transparency on measurement and reporting, among other factors.

IBM collaborates with organizations to design, develop, and deploy a technical solution directly benefiting communities. Throughout the experience, IBM provides access to  platforms such as watsonx, IBM Cloud, IBM Environmental Intelligence Suite and Red Hat open source technologies as well as technical mentorship to build long-term capacity. Organizations selected to participate will be required to enter into an IBM grant agreement governing access to IBM technology, services and resources.

The IBM Sustainability Accelerator is open to nonprofit and government organizations globally.

IBM plans to introduce a new sustainability topic and select five organizations for this program each year.

Learn more IBM is committed to environmental leadership in all of its business activities—from its operations, to the design of its products, to the use of its technology IBM sustainability blogs Learn more IBM environmental impact Learn more IBM Research climate and sustainability publications Learn more