Uploaded September 2022 | Updated September 2026, 1 week ago
A supercomputer doesn’t just magically appear, especially one as large and as fast as Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory’s (LLNL) upcoming exascale-class El Capitan. Projected to be among the world’s most powerful supercomputers when it is deployed at LLNL in 2023, El Capitan at peak will require about as much power as a small city.
Preparing the Livermore Computing Center for El Capitan and the Exascale Era of supercomputers, capable of calculations in the quintillions per second, required an entirely new way of thinking about the facility’s mechanical and electrical capabilities — a utility-scale solution. More than 15 years in planning and development, the $100 million Exascale Computing Facility Modernization (ECFM) project nearly doubles the energy capacity of the Lab’s main computing facility to 85 megawatts – enough electricity to power about 75,000 modest-sized homes. It also expands the facility’s water-cooling system capacity from 10,000 tons to 28,000 tons.
The ECFM project required an extensive permitting process, coordination with local utility companies and the contributions of hundreds of people. After breaking ground in 2020, construction crews installed a 115kV transmission line, air switches, substation transformers, a switchgear, relay control enclosures, 13.8 kilovolt secondary feeders and cooling towers In an area adjacent to Building 453 — the Lab’s main computing facility. Despite the COVID-19 pandemic, the project was finished under budget and months ahead of schedule, completed on June 8, 2022.
The upgrade will enable LLNL and the two other National Nuclear Security Administration (NNSA) laboratories—Los Alamos and Sandia—to use El Capitan and other next-generation supercomputers in the coming years to regularly perform the advanced modeling and simulation necessary to meet the increasingly demanding needs of NNSA’s Stockpile Stewardship Program, which ensures the safety, security and reliability of the nation’s nuclear deterrent.
Learn more: exascale.llnl.gov
LLNL-VIDEO-840463
#LLNL #Exascale #LLNLcomputing
A supercomputer doesn’t just magically appear, especially one as large and as fast as Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory’s (LLNL) upcoming exascale-class El Capitan. Projected to be among the world’s most powerful supercomputers when it is deployed at LLNL in 2023, El Capitan at peak will require about as much power as a small city.
Preparing the Livermore Computing Center for El Capitan and the Exascale Era of supercomputers, capable of calculations in the quintillions per second, required an entirely new way of thinking about the facility’s mechanical and electrical capabilities — a utility-scale solution. More than 15 years in planning and development, the $100 million Exascale Computing Facility Modernization (ECFM) project nearly doubles the energy capacity of the Lab’s main computing facility to 85 megawatts – enough electricity to power about 75,000 modest-sized homes. It also expands the facility’s water-cooling system capacity from 10,000 tons to 28,000 tons.
The ECFM project required an extensive permitting process, coordination with local utility companies and the contributions of hundreds of people. After breaking ground in 2020, construction crews installed a 115kV transmission line, air switches, substation transformers, a switchgear, relay control enclosures, 13.8 kilovolt secondary feeders and cooling towers In an area adjacent to Building 453 — the Lab’s main computing facility. Despite the COVID-19 pandemic, the project was finished under budget and months ahead of schedule, completed on June 8, 2022.
The upgrade will enable LLNL and the two other National Nuclear Security Administration (NNSA) laboratories—Los Alamos and Sandia—to use El Capitan and other next-generation supercomputers in the coming years to regularly perform the advanced modeling and simulation necessary to meet the increasingly demanding needs of NNSA’s Stockpile Stewardship Program, which ensures the safety, security and reliability of the nation’s nuclear deterrent.
Learn more: exascale.llnl.gov
LLNL-VIDEO-840463
#LLNL #Exascale #LLNLcomputing
