At Dell Technologies, we are committed to driving human progress. In addition to world-class technology solutions and services that accelerate innovation, we also believe in advancing sustainability, from our supply chain to fight global climate change, including global recycling services.
As we prepare for the SC20 conference, we wanted to take a moment to celebrate and congratulate our customers with the most energy-efficient supercomputers in the world according to the Green500 list. These organizations are pushing the boundaries of what’s possible, and doing it with an eye to using innovative power and cooling methods that dramatically reduce the amount of energy required to fuel the future.
HPC5 at ENI
Dell Technologies is at the heart of the world’s most powerful industrial supercomputer, the HPC5. But it’s not only the fastest, it’s also the greenest. And in a surprising twist, it’s owned by an Italian Oil & Gas company. That’s right, ENI is dedicated to reshaping the future of energy, by using its green data center to fuel a green supercomputer used help the company accelerate seismic workloads, develop new AI-based approaches to energy discovery and processing, and accelerate R&D programs for the transition to non-fossil energy sources.
These organizations are pushing the boundaries of what’s possible, and doing it with an eye to using innovative power and cooling methods that dramatically reduce the amount of energy required to fuel the future.”
Cedar at Simon Fraser University and Compute Canada
Dell is also behind one of the most powerful supercomputers in Canada, the Cedar cluster at Simon Fraser University. In addition to debuting at number 86 on the TOP500 list of the world’s most powerful supercomputers, Cedar is also an extremely energy-efficient system, debuting at number 13 on the GREEN500 list of the worlds’ most energy-efficient supercomputers. The system has a power utilization efficiency (PUE) ratio of 1.07—far lower than typical—meaning that 93% of the power goes toward running the supercomputer and only 7% is used for cooling. This impressive ratio was achieved through innovative cooling techniques, such as evaporative cooling that takes advantage of the naturally cool Canadian climate. The system enables researchers to run a wide variety of scientific workloads, including AI, machine learning, deep learning, personalized medicine and green energy technology.
Beluga at Calcul Quebec and Compute Canada
With over 28,000 compute cores and 688 NVIDIA V100 GPUs, the Béluga system came online in April 2019 and is now the main HPC infrastructure in Quebec. It’s a heterogeneous multi-purpose supercomputer consisting of several different types of components designed to tackle a variety of workloads. Its four principal components are a CPU subsection, a GPU subsection, data storage devices and a high speed interconnect linking together the other three subsystems. Beluga was ranked 21st in the world on the June 2020 Green500list.
Cumulus at Cambridge
The Cumulus supercomputer at Cambridge University provides more than 37,000 cores and 2.27 PFLOPS to advance the UK government’s industrial strategy and enable data-centric AI research for academic and industrial users — all via a cloud interface. It was also ranked 54th in the world on the June 2020 Green500list.
Makman-3 and Makman-2 at Saudi Aramco
Saudi Arabian Oil & Gas company Aramco is home to two Dell Technologies supercomputers on the Green500 list: the Makman-2 and Makman-3. The company is dedicated to advancing greenhouse gas management technologies to reduce greenhouse gas intensity in the global energy mix. The efficiency ratings of the Makman-2 and -3 supercomputers demonstrate the company’s commitment to energy efficiency and reducing environmental impacts through technology.
Frontera and Stampede at TACC
The Texas Advanced Computing Center (TACC) is home to two Dell Technologies-powered supercomputers: Frontera and Stampede 2. In addition to powering groundbreaking climate research, the two supercomputers employ innovative liquid cooling technologies developed by CoolIT, Cooltera, and Green Revolution Cooling (GRC) that help make the data center more efficient and earned both systems places on the Green500.
Orion at Mississippi State University
Orion was completed with the support of USD 22 million in grants from the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA). The University’s HPC capabilities have also led to research partnerships with the United States Department of Agriculture, NASA, the National Science Foundation and the U.S. Department of Energy. It’s fitting that a supercomputer dedicated to such pursuits would take its place on the Green500 list.
Dell Technologies is extremely proud to be changing the world together with these world-class partners.
