A Measured Approach to Going Green...IBM "Green Sigma(TM)"

Corporate Social Responsibility Press Release

provided by

8.18.2008 - 02:21pm ET

News from: IBM

A Measured Approach to Going Green...IBM "Green Sigma(TM)"

Consulting Offering to Help Clients Reduce Energy and Water Usage

(CSRwire) SOMERS, NY -- (MARKET WIRE) - August, 18, 2008 - A new IBM (NYSE: IBM) consulting offering can help clients lower their environmental impact, increase efficiency and reduce costs by applying Lean Six Sigma principles to energy and water usage throughout their operations.

"There's a fundamental truth to understanding and improving any aspect of a company's performance -- if you can't measure it, you can't manage it." said Dave Lubowe, global leader of IBM's operations strategy consulting practice. "This applies as much to a company's energy and water consumption as it does to anything else, and our new offering can help clients apply this principle to make their businesses greener."

IBM's Green Sigma(TM) consulting offering is based on Lean Six Sigma, a business strategy for carefully analyzing operations to improve overall efficiency, lower costs, increase quality, and add, change or eliminate activities and processes to improve overall performance.

This new offering applies these principles wherever energy and water are used throughout a client's operations -- transportation systems, datacenters and IT systems, manufacturing and distribution centers, office facilities, retail space, research and development sites, etc.

The constraints and costs of energy and water usage are rising at an accelerating rate, with a significant impact on business operations and financial performance. In addition, companies are coming under increasing pressure from governments, advocacy groups, investors, prospective employees, and consumers to make their operations, products and services more socially responsible, particularly regarding the environment.

IBM's own conservation efforts have saved 4.6 billion kWh of electricity and $310 million in costs, and avoided over three million metric tons of CO2 emissions since 1990. The company's work-at-home program for employees saves roughly eight million gallons of gasoline annually.

Combining IBM's experience with energy efficiency and carbon reduction, measurement and management dashboards, Lean Six Sigma processes and corporate social responsibility consulting, Green Sigma(TM) allows clients to apply this strategy to their operations and environmental practices to:

• Manage and reduce carbon output and water inefficiencies; Reduce energy and water usage, and associated costs; Use advanced analytical techniques to establish ongoing carbon footprint and water management practices; Increase profit through activities such as carbon trading.

• Establish key performance indicators defined and tailored to the client's operational environment, industry and business. Activities include building key process indicator sets for carbon and water, including regulatory and stakeholder requirements;
  
  
• Identify areas where activities and practices should be measured.
  This can include developing a facilities management plan and determining where to use sensors to collect information for analysis;
  
  
• Use a Carbon and Water Management Dashboard system to monitor key performance indicators and analyze performance data. This can be linked to other systems to help initiate processes such as carbon trading;
  
  
• Apply Green Sigma(TM) statistical tools and techniques to analyze and improve processes to reduce energy usage, carbon emissions and water inefficiencies;
  
  Create ongoing optimization of processes and key performance indicators through the Carbon and Water Management Dashboard, and identifying new areas where improvements can be made.

For more information please contact:

Jay Cadmus , IBM Media Relations
914-766-2326
203-948-2351

www.ibm.com

News Categories: Environment and Clean Technology

More IBM news on CSRwire, click here.