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Air Force, ORNL partner in high-performance computing & weather modeling system

Posted at 12:50 pm September 5, 2018
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To extend its weather modeling capabilities, the U.S. Air Force has joined the computing experts at the U.S. Department of Energy’s Oak Ridge National Laboratory in a strategic collaboration that includes procurement and operation of a new high-performance weather modeling computer system. Key members of the Air Force and ORNL teams gathered on July 10, 2018, to kick off the project and tour the facilities supporting the new system. (Photo courtesy ORNL)

For the U.S. military, accurate weather prediction is vital to both the planning and execution of worldwide missions. To extend its weather modeling capabilities, the U.S. Air Force has joined the computing experts at the U.S. Department of Energy’s Oak Ridge National Laboratory in a strategic collaboration that includes procurement and operation of a new high-performance weather modeling computer system. Key members of the Air Force and ORNL teams, including computing and global security team members, gathered on July 10 to kick off this project and tour the facilities supporting the new system, according to a story posted by ORNL.

The Air Force 557th Weather Wing provides the Air Force and Army with global- and regional-level numerical weather model forecasts. With the increasing scale of the requirements for the new system, the Air Force and ORNL identified an opportunity to take advantage of the capabilities of ORNL’s National Center for Computational Sciences—including expertise in high-performance computing facilities and infrastructure, systems administration, computing procurement and acquisition, and system operations, the story said.

“We learned about the Air Force’s needs, and it was immediately clear that ORNL could help them solve their problems,” said Jim Rogers, NCCS director of computing and facilities. “We can integrate the Air Force weather team’s needs into our facilities in a cost-effective way, leveraging our capabilities to deliver exceedingly high availability to support their mission.” [Read more…]

SNS completes full neutron production cycle at record power level

Posted at 3:31 pm August 9, 2018
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As protons (pink) strike the target vessel and pass into the liquid mercury inside, the protons are absorbed, creating neutrons (blue) that are then sent through moderators and beam tubes to research instruments to study the fundamental properties of materials. (Image credit: Jill Hemman/Oak Ridge National Laboratory, U.S. Department of Energy)

The Spallation Neutron Source at the U.S. Department of Energy’s Oak Ridge National Laboratory has reached a new milestone by operating a complete neutron production run cycle at 1.3 megawatts, a press release said.

“Achieving the record power level with a remarkable 94 percent accelerator beam availability establishes a new baseline of operation as well as a path to operate reliably at higher powers,” the press release said. “Increased power offers researchers the ability to conduct faster scientific analyses using neutrons on more types of materials.”

SNS, a DOE Office of Science User Facility, began operations in 2006 and is currently the world’s most powerful pulsed accelerator-based neutron scattering facility, used by scientists to reveal fundamental properties and behaviors of energy and materials at the atomic scale. Neutron contributions at SNS have resulted in advances in electronic devices, improved drug delivery, and stronger building materials for transportation infrastructure, the press release said. [Read more…]

For first time since 2012, US has top supercomputer in world

Posted at 1:37 pm June 25, 2018
By John Huotari Leave a Comment

Oak Ridge National Laboratory’s Summit supercomputer was named number one on the TOP500 List, a semiannual ranking of the world’s fastest computing systems on Monday, June 25, 2018. (Photo credit: Carlos Jones/Oak Ridge National Laboratory, U.S. Department of Energy)

For the first time since 2012, the United States has the most powerful supercomputer in the world, and it’s again located at Oak Ridge National Laboratory.

The new supercomputer, called Summit, is capable of 200 petaflops, or 200,000 trillion calculations per second. Equipment delivery for Summit was completed in March, and officials celebrated the launch of the supercomputer in a ceremony attended by U.S. Energy Secretary Rick Perry on June 8.

The last time the United States had the top supercomputer was in November 2012. That machine, which is still in use, is named Titan, and it’s also at ORNL. It’s now number seven on the semiannual TOP500 list, which was released Monday.

China had held the top spot since June 2013, and the country had held the top two spots since June 2016. That ended with Monday’s TOP500 announcement. Previously at number one and number two, the top two Chinese supercomputers have fallen to number two and number four.

ORNL, a U.S. Department of Energy laboratory, now has two of the top seven systems on the list. They are Summit at number one and Titan at number seven. The United States now has six of the top 10 machines, according to the TOP500 list. [Read more…]

ORNL again has world’s most powerful supercomputer

Posted at 9:03 pm June 8, 2018
By John Huotari Leave a Comment

Pictured above being interviewed by a CNBC television crew before a ceremony on Friday afternoon, June 8, 2018, for the new Summit supercomputer at Oak Ridge National Laboratory are Ginni Rometty, left, chairman, president, and chief executive officer of IBM; Rick Perry, second from right, U.S. Department of Energy secretary; and Jensen Huang, right, founder, president, and CEO of NVIDIA. (Photo by John Huotari/Oak Ridge Today)

Note: This story was last updated at 6 p.m. June 9.

Oak Ridge National Laboratory again has the world’s most powerful supercomputer. It’s also the world’s smartest supercomputer, a machine that can learn—and run software that will write software.

The supercomputer, called Summit, is capable of 200 petaflops, or 200,000 trillion calculations per second. During a Friday afternoon ceremony, U.S. Energy Secretary Rick Perry said Summit can save 30 years worth of desktop data in one hour. It is millions times faster than a really good high-end desktop, said Ginni Rometty, IBM chair, president, and chief executive officer.

A water-cooled IBM system, Summit is presumed to have bumped China from the top spot, at least among open-science systems or supercomputers that aren’t classified. It has successfully run the world’s first exascale scientific calculation.

“We know we’re in competition, and it matters who gets there first,” Perry told several hundred people at the Friday afternoon ceremony at ORNL, a U.S. Department of Energy laboratory. “We reached a pinnacle today.”

Researchers at ORNL could find the cure for Alzheimer’s disease or cancer, Perry said. Winning the global supercomputing race could have benefits for all of humanity, said Jensen Huang, NVIDIA founder, president, and CEO. [Read more…]

Final drums of old transuranic waste from ORNL prepared for disposal

Posted at 4:30 pm April 24, 2018
By John Huotari Leave a Comment

An aerial view of the Transuranic Waste Processing Center in Oak Ridge, where the final drums of legacy transuranic waste stored at Oak Ridge National Laboratory will be processed before shipment to the Waste Isolation Pilot Plant in New Mexico for permanent disposal. (Photo courtesy U.S. Department of Energy Office of Environmental Management)

An aerial view of the Transuranic Waste Processing Center in west Oak Ridge, where the final drums of legacy transuranic waste stored at Oak Ridge National Laboratory will be processed before shipment to the Waste Isolation Pilot Plant in New Mexico for permanent disposal. (Photo courtesy U.S. Department of Energy Office of Environmental Management)

The final drums of old transuranic waste stored at Oak Ridge National Laboratory have been prepared for disposal.

The U.S. Department of Energy’s Oak Ridge Office of Environmental Management reported Tuesday that it had recently completed installing vents and sample ports in the final drums of the legacy transuranic waste stored at ORNL. The decade-long effort ensures that the drums do not contain any hazardous gases that could cause rapid combustion.

The ventilated unit where the drums were vented is closed and explosion-proof, DOE said. It is capable of withstanding a combustion event while keeping workers and ORNL, the nation’s largest multi-program national laboratory, safe, DOE said.

“Venting and sampling these drums is an essential part of the waste disposal process,” ORNL Portfolio Federal Project Director Bill McMillan said. “Now that we can ensure the safety of each drum, they are ready for transport to the Transuranic Waste Processing Center for processing and subsequent shipment to a permanent disposal facility away from Oak Ridge.” [Read more…]

DOE announces $1.8 billion program for new supercomputers, with one at ORNL

Posted at 11:23 am April 9, 2018
By John Huotari Leave a Comment

Rick Perry

Note: This story was last updated at 12 p.m.

The U.S. Department of Energy announced a new supercomputing program on Monday that could be worth up to $1.8 billion and deploy two systems, with one at Oak Ridge National Laboratory, that would be 50 to 100 times more powerful than today’s computers.

The new systems are called exascale computers. DOE said the new supercomputers will solidify United States leadership in exascale computing.

The initiative was announced by U.S. Energy Secretary Rick Perry in Washington, D.C., on Monday. Perry announced a request for proposals, or RFP, for the development of at least two new exascale supercomputers to be deployed at DOE national laboratories sometime around 2021-2023.

“The new supercomputers funded through this RFP will be follow-on systems to the first U.S. exascale system authorized by Secretary Perry this past June, named Aurora, which is currently under development at Argonne National Laboratory and scheduled to come online in 2021,” a press release said. The RFP announced Monday envisions the possibility of upgrades to Aurora or even a follow-on system in 2022-2023, “depending on an assessment of needs and opportunities at that time.” [Read more…]

For first time in 30 years, Savannah River dissolving spent nuclear fuel from ORNL reactor

Posted at 10:40 pm March 20, 2018
By John Huotari Leave a Comment

The reactor pool is pictured above in the reactor bay inside the High Flux Isotope Reactor at Oak Ridge National Laboratory on Thursday, March 15, 2018. Spent nuclear fuel is stored inside the pool. (Photo by John Huotari/Oak Ridge Today)

For the first time in 30 years, spent nuclear fuel from the High Flux Isotope Reactor at Oak Ridge National Laboratory has been dissolved at the Savannah River Site in South Carolina.

The work is important because it is expected to allow the reactor, known as HFIR, to continue its mission, according to the U.S. Department of Energy Office of Environmental Management.

HFIR, which uses highly enriched uranium, is one of the world’s most powerful nuclear research reactor facilities. It’s the highest flux reactor-based source of neutrons for research in the United States. Flux refers to the rate of flow of fluids, particles, or energy. In HFIR’s case, the flux is measured in neutrons per square centimeter per second. HFIR is used for neutron scattering and isotope production, among other missions.

ORNL will reach its maximum capacity for storing HFIR fuel in fiscal year 2020, the DOE Office of Environmental Management, or EM, said in an “EM Update” electronic newsletter on Tuesday. [Read more…]

Fleischmann: Supercomputing race could change with Summit at ORNL

Posted at 3:16 pm March 18, 2018
By John Huotari Leave a Comment

The installation of the Summit supercomputer continues at Oak Ridge National Laboratory on Jan. 23, 2018, with the Oak Ridge Leadership Computing Facility and IBM teams receiving and installing compute nodes. Summit will come online in late 2018 for early science, and will be available to users in January 2019. (Image credit: Jason Richards/ORNL. Used under Creative Commons license)

The supercomputer being built at Oak Ridge National Laboratory could change the race for supercomputing supremacy between the United States and China, U.S. Representative Chuck Fleischmann said during a budget hearing on Thursday.

The congressman said Summit, a 200-petaflop supercomputer at ORNL, will be commissioned this summer, and it will be the fastest supercomputer in the world, with twice the power of the top Chinese system. The Chinese machine is a 93-petaflop system known as Sunway TaihuLight.

During Thursday’s budget hearing, which featured Energy Secretary Rick Perry, Fleischmann said the United States and China are in a race for supercomputing supremacy. The race is critical to advances in science and technology that will drive economic growth, said Fleischmann, a Republican whose district includes Oak Ridge.

Citing a February 9 edition of Science magazine, Fleischmann said the U.S. dominated supercomputer rankings for decades but is now far behind. The combined power of the top two machines in China easily outpaces all 21 supercomputers operated by the U.S. Department of Energy, the country’s top funder of supercomputers, the congressman said.

But that could change with the commissioning of Summit this summer, Fleischmann said. [Read more…]

A great technical achievement, Molten Salt Reactor could be entombed

Posted at 3:03 pm November 26, 2017
By John Huotari Leave a Comment

The Molten Salt Reactor Experiment building at Oak Ridge National Laboratory housed the reactor and offices for operating personnel. The facility was constructed in the 1950s for a nuclear aircraft project and was later expanded significantly and retrofitted to accommodate the MSRE. (Photo courtesy U.S. Department of Energy/Oak Ridge National Laboratory)

Note: This story was updated at 8:30 p.m.

Former director Alvin Weinberg once called it the greatest technical achievement at Oak Ridge National Laboratory. It was inspired by the campaign to build a nuclear-powered aircraft in the 1950s, and it was the first reactor to ever operate using uranium-233.

Now parts of the Molten Salt Reactor Experiment that are too radioactively “hot” for humans could be entombed in concrete.

For now, the idea is only under study, and there is no guarantee that any part of the Molten Salt Reactor Experiment, a nuclear historic landmark that has been dormant for decades, will be entombed.

But it’s one of the proposals being evaluated by the U.S. Department of Energy’s Oak Ridge Office of Environmental Management. The goal is to finish the evaluation by the end of the year.

Jay Mullis, manager of the Oak Ridge Office of Environmental Management, presented the proposal to the Oak Ridge City Council and Site Specific Advisory Board in two separate meetings earlier this month. The entombment proposal is one of five items being evaluated as part of a 45-day review started by DOE’s Environmental Management, or EM, program in June. [Read more…]

China passes U.S. in number of top supercomputers; ORNL’s Titan drops to 5th

Posted at 9:49 am November 13, 2017
By John Huotari Leave a Comment

The Titan supercomputer at Oak Ridge National Laboratory is pictured above. (Photo by ORNL/U.S. Department of Energy)

China has passed the United States in the total number of top ranked supercomputers, and Titan at Oak Ridge National Laboratory has dropped from fourth to fifth on the TOP500 list of the world’s fastest supercomputers.

The TOP500 list is released twice a year, once in June and once in November. It is based on a benchmark test known as Linpack.

Titan at ORNL dropped from third to fourth in June, bumped from the number three spot by the upgraded Piz Daint, a Cray XC50 system installed at the Swiss National Supercomputing Centre. Titan is capable of 17.59 petaflops. A petaflop is one quadrillion calculations per second. That’s 1,000 trillion calculations per second. Piz Daint is capable of 19.59 petaflops.

That power is useful in scientific research. At ORNL, Titan is used for research in areas such as materials science, nuclear energy, combustion, and climate science. ORNL is a U.S. Department of Energy laboratory.

Titan slipped one more spot in this month’s list, from fourth to fifth. It was displaced by the upgraded Gyoukou supercomputer. That is a ZettaScaler-2.2 system capable of 19.14 petaflops and deployed at Japan’s Agency for Marine-Earth Science and Technology, the home of the Earth Simulator. [Read more…]

ORNL approves 204 for voluntary separations as lab reduces workforce

Posted at 12:45 pm November 3, 2017
By John Huotari Leave a Comment

Photo by ORNL

Lab managers have approved 204 of the 302 applications submitted for a voluntary separation program that could reduce the workforce at Oak Ridge National Laboratory by up to 350 positions.

The Self-Select Voluntary Separation Program was announced by ORNL Director Thomas Zacharia in an August 8 email to employees. ORNL employees were able to apply for the program from Monday, August 14, to Wednesday, September 27. Applicants were notified October 25 whether their application was approved, according to information provided on Friday by Morgan McCorkle, ORNL media relations manager.

Accepted applicants will leave the payroll by December 31.

Applications were approved from staff who charge to indirect accounts, along with some research staff affected by fiscal year 2017 funding who could not be placed elsewhere in the lab. [Read more…]

ORNL reports strong interest in voluntary separations, but still needs to review applications

Posted at 10:56 am September 27, 2017
By John Huotari Leave a Comment

Photo by Oak Ridge National Laboratory

There has been strong interest in a voluntary separation program that could reduce the workforce at Oak Ridge National Laboratory by up to 350 positions, but the lab still has to review applications and finalize who qualifies, a spokesperson said Wednesday, the deadline to apply.

The laboratory is still in the middle of reviewing the applications and determining who qualifies, said Morgan McCorkle, ORNL communications media manager.

The workforce could be reduced by up to 350 positions through both voluntary and involuntary separations.

“We still expect to use both mechanisms,” McCorkle said.

The 350-position reduction would decrease the workforce of 4,800 employees by about 7.3 percent. The workforce reduction, which is expected to be completed by the end of this year, was announced by ORNL Director Thomas Zacharia in an August 8 email to employees. [Read more…]