Supercomputing and Energy in China: How Investment in HPC Affects Oil Security
Jordan Wilson · RePEc: Research Papers in Economics · 2014
SITC Bulletin Analysis January 2014 Supercomputing and Energy in China: How Investment in HPC Affects Oil Security Jordan WILSON Researcher, Study of Innovation and Technology in China Project UC Institute on Global Conflict and Cooperation China has raced to the forefront of the global high performance computing (HPC) industry over the past decade, moving from placing no computers on the industry’s “Top500” list in June 2001 to 63 today, second only to the United States. 1 China topped the list for the first time in 2010 with its domestic-made Tianhe-1A machine, and now holds the lead again with the Tianhe-2, having rolled it out two years earlier than expected in June 2013. 2 China reportedly has plans to achieve HPC’s next milestone, exascale-speed computing, in 2020, two years before projec- tions for the industry in the United States. 3 While China’s supercomputers continue to impress with their sheer computing power, doubts exist as to whether they are being fully used. Worldwide these multimillion-dollar machines are put to use for a wide range of applica- tions, including nuclear weapons simulations and stockpile management, intelligence analysis, climate prediction, plasma physics, vehicle and aircraft design, computational biology, earthquake simulations, geophysical explora- tion, astrophysics, materials science, and human/organizational systems studies. 4 In China the impact is much less clear, as applications lag behind hardware and many supercomputers reportedly sit idle. 5 Are China’s aggressive efforts in HPC an overreach analogous to its ghost cities and extravagant infrastructure projects, or is there evidence of meaningful development in HPC applications as well? This analysis will focus on the application of HPC to oil exploration in particular to examine China’s progress in su- percomputing and the impact it is making. From the earliest days of supercomputing oil exploration has been a sec- tor that has exhibited a high demand for HPC, with developments in geophysical data processing software closely 1 Louisa Lim, “China’s Supercomputing Goal: From ‘Zero to Hero’,” NPR, August 2, 2011, accessed November 25, 2013, http://www. npr.org/2011/08/02/138901851/chinas-supercomputing-goal-from-zero-to-hero; “List Statistics,” Top500 Computer Sites website, accessed December 2, 2013, http://www.top500.org/statistics/list/. 2 “China’s Tianhe-2 Supercomputer Takes No. 1 Ranking on 41st TOP500 List,” Top500 Computer Sites website, June 17, 2013, ac- cessed November 25, 2013, http://www.top500.org/blog/lists/2013/06/press-release/. 3 U.S. Department of Energy, “Department of Energy Exascale Strategy,” June 2013 report to Congress. 4 Susan L. Graham, Marc Snir, and Cynthia A. Patterson, eds., Getting Up to Speed: The Future of Supercomputing (Washington, DC: National Academies Press, 2004), 71, accessed December 9, 2013, http://www.nap.edu/openbook.php?record_id=11148&page=71. 5 Stephen Chen, “World’s Fastest Computer, Tianhe-2, Might Get Very Little Use,” South China Morning Post, June 20, 2013, accessed December 9, 2013, http://www.scmp.com/news/china/article/1264529/worlds-fastest-computer-tianhe-2-might-get-very-little-use This material is based upon work supported by, or in part by, the U.S. Army Research Laboratory and the U.S. Army Research Office through the Minerva Initiative under grant #W911NF-09-1-0081. Any opinions, findings, and conclusions or recommendations expressed in this publication are those of the authors(s) and do not necessarily reflect the views of the U.S. Army Research Office. Study of Innovation and Technology in China