Axios: Oak Ridge National Laboratory To Get New Supercomputer

Axios:

“Chipmaker AMD, long in Intel’s shadow, will be at the heart of one of the world’s most powerful new supercomputers, a new Cray machine being built for the U.S. Department of Energy.

Why it matters: Though such large-scale computers represent a tiny fraction of the market, they still power advanced basic research — and confer bragging rights on those institutions, companies and, increasingly, nations whose devices top the annual rankings.

Details: The contract between the DOE and Cray is valued at $600 million.

The system, known as Frontier, is planned to debut in 2021 and is expected to be the world’s most powerful computer, with a performance of greater than 1.5 exaflops. (An exaflop is a quintillion, or a billion billion, calculations per second.)

Frontier will be housed at Oak Ridge National Laboratory in eastern Tennessee. It will use more than 90 miles of cable and occupy 7,300 square feet. …”

Very interesting.

So, AMD has a $600 million dollar government contract to build the world’s most powerful supercomputer for the U.S. Department of Energy. Wait a minute … isn’t the federal government funding research and development at institutions like Oak Ridge National Laboratory in east Tennessee where we developed the atomic bomb not the essence of socialism?

Oak Ridge National Laboratory is also showing off cutting edge 3D printing technologies like micro-nuclear reactors. Isn’t that socialism though?

“Oak Ridge National Laboratory will show off an assortment of 3D-printed objects, including a submarine, nuclear micro-reactor parts and a turbine blade, Tuesday morning during a tour by U.S. Energy Secretary Rick Perry, according to a news release.

The reactor parts will be the first 3D-printed pieces used in a nuclear reactor, the announcement said.

The laboratory is hosting the Department of Energy’s third InnovationXLab, focusing on advanced manufacturing. Various DOE officials were scheduled to speak during the Advanced Manufacturing Summit.

Summit participants include representatives from the 17 national laboratories, private companies, government officials, investors, universities and others working on energy efficiency, according to a DOE announcement. …”

U.S. Secretary of Energy Rick “Fed Up” Perry ironically drives around a 3D printed vehicle developed at state subsidized Oak Ridge National Laboratory in Tennessee while preaching the “capitalism vs. socialism” canard.

What do you mean “the state” is developing new technologies? Everyone knows only the entrepreneur is capable of doing that!

Why shouldn’t that be left up to the superior free-market to fund the research and develop a Cray supercomputer? Why is the state intervening in the economy and redistributing resources from taxpayers to “take on China”? Isn’t this what we really did back during the Space Race when we set aside the triumphalist free-market platitudes to catch up with the Soviets?

How much of our current research and development goes on in the government financed labs in the 21st century? If the private sector is cooperating and coordinating with the federal government to develop and implement new technologies, then why are we browbeating the Chinese for doing the exact same thing?

Note: In the Southern History Series, I’ve been dying to get around to Oak Ridge National Laboratory in Tennessee and the Research Triangle in North Carolina and how both are successful examples of our secret history of practicing developmental capitalism while preaching the shibboleths of free-market capitalism to foreign countries.