LLNL Breaks Ground on Exascale Computing Facility Modernization Project
The upgrades will enable the facility to provide exascale-class service to the NNSA laboratories.
The National Nuclear Security Administration’s (NNSA’s) Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory (LLNL) has broken ground on its Exascale Computing Facility Modernization (ECFM) project. It will substantially upgrade the mechanical and electrical capabilities of the Livermore Computing Center. The upgrades will enable the facility to provide exascale-class service (supercomputers capable of at least one quintillion calculations per second) to the NNSA laboratories: LLNL, Los Alamos and Sandia.
Commissioned in 2004, LLNL’s computing center has housed some of the world’s largest, fastest and most advanced classified systems, but supporting next-generation high performance machines will require NNSA facilities to exceed their current capacities for power and cooling. An official groundbreaking ceremony was canceled due to the COVID-19 pandemic, but construction crews have begun working to expand the facility’s system capacity.
The upgrades will allow LLNL to optimally run future supercomputers capable of regularly performing the high-fidelity 3D modeling and simulation necessary to meet the increasingly challenging certification requirements of NNSA’s Stockpile Stewardship Program and its mission to enhance the capability of the nation’s nuclear deterrent.
The construction is being performed by Nova Probst, consisting of firms Nova Group Inc. and Probst Electric. Both companies are subsidiaries of Quanta Services, a Fortune 500 company and one of the leading utility contractors in the United States.
With additional power resources, LLNL can continue to leverage its national security computing capabilities and respond immediately and aggressively to such challenges as the current COVID-19 threat.
