It's a well known fact that developing realistic models to simulate climate change scenarios is a challenge, arduous, and cerebral task that currently is done rather poorly. Many models feature glaring flaws, and most models lag behind true prediction, trying to be able to repeat previous weather patterns as proof of concept that there future predictions will hold true. And most have trouble even doing that.
Half of the equation is coming up with a better understanding of the math and physics driving the problem. The other half of the equation to improve the struggling weather modeling community is allocating more computing resources. Weather models take massive amounts of number crunching to generate semi-accurate results.
The National Center for Atmospheric Research (NCAR) is working to shore up the latter count with the addition of a massive new IBM supercomputer to its Boulder, CO research center. The center is arguably the nation's largest hotbed for climate and weather research. The new supercomputer, a Power 575 Hydro- Cluster, will not only allow it to improve its analysis, but also to conserve energy, thanks to an energy efficient design by IBM.
Part of the use of the cluster will center on climate change. Researchers hope to analyze effects that warming (or cooling) might have on the environment, such as future patterns of precipitation, droughts, changes in growing seasons, and warming's influence on hurricanes.
The system will also analyze severe weather in the present. Researchers hope to use the system's power to develop more accurate weather forecasting models. These models will in turn help to forewarn citizens of impending severe weather. With tornado deaths in the U.S. jumping from 67 to 81 between 2006 and 2007, and with 75 U.S. tornado casualties already this year, these models can literally be life-saving.
The new supercomputer "bluefire" is up to the task. Using the IBM Power 575 architecture, the system sports POWER6 microprocessors, operating at a speedy 4.7 GHz. The system utilizes 4,064 of these blazingly fast processors, 12 terabytes of memory, and 150 terabytes of FAStT DS4800 hard drive storage. The computer is one of IBM's new systems that utilizes water cooling, which allows higher clock speeds and lower energy usage, as the PC enthusiast market has long recognized.
The new system is equipped with cooling copper plates on every processor, which water flows over. The water cooling improves energy efficiency by 33 percent. Factoring in the much higher energy efficiency of the processors, the system is three times as energy efficient per rack as its predecessor.
It can also handle a lot more number crunching. The system replaces three separate supercomputers with a combined capacity of 20 teraflops (20 trillion floating-point operations per second). The "bluefire" system nearly quadruples this, offering 76 teraflops.
Says Tom Bettge, director of operations and services for NCAR's Computational and Information Systems Laboratory, "Bluefire is on the leading edge of high-performance computing technology. Increasingly fast machines are vital to research into such areas as climate change and the formation of hurricanes and other severe storms. Scientists will be able to conduct breakthrough calculations, study vital problems at much higher resolution and complexity, and get results more quickly than before. We're especially pleased that bluefire provides dramatically increased performance with much greater energy efficiency,"
The computer will undergo acceptance testing and come online in August and is expected to remain in use through 2011, serving a variety of purposes. The computer is phase two of the Integrated Computing Environment for Scientific Simulation (ICESS) at NCAR. The ideal fit of IBM supercomputer innovation for the multifunctional nature of the mission is described by strong supporter, Dave Turek, vice president of deep computing at IBM. Turk states, "NCAR has a well-deserved reputation for excellence in deploying supercomputing resources to address really difficult challenges. Bluefire will substantially expand the organization's ability to investigate climate change, severe weather events, and other important subjects."
One of the computer's first main tasks will be a heady and likely controversial one. The system will be tasked with developing climate simulations for use in the next meeting of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), the UN organization monitoring global warming and other climate change phenomena. The organization shared the Nobel Prize in 2007, but has been harshly criticized by global warming critics.
The supercomputer is quite oblivious to the controversy, though, and will likely soon be happily crunching away numbers, and hopefully helping save lives across the country by providing better warning of severe storms.
NCAR is under the administration of the University Corporation for Atmospheric Research (UCAR). The National Science Foundation (NSF) primarily sponsors the center's research. Other funding comes from the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA), National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA), the Department of Defense (DOD), Federal Aviation Administration (FAA), Department of Energy (DOE), Environmental Protection Agency (EPA).