Energy-Saving Supercomputer Doubles as Space Heater

Anyone who has actually set their laptop computer on their lap knows how toasty they get after just a few minutes of use. Now, imagine the heat generated from today's supercomputers. Big Blue's 10-teraflop Aquasar, described in Wired News, is not the fastest supercomputer but it runs 500 times faster than a typical desktop machine.

Imagine all the pizzas you could cook in one of those things! But alas, the key is to keep everything cool, which IBM plans to do more efficiently through a water-cooled system that doubles as a space heater for adjacent buildings.

Supercomputer chips generate wasted heat energy 10 times hotter than a typical kitchen hotplate, according to the Wired article, but since they have to stay below 185 degrees Fahrenheit to work properly, as much as 50 percent of the energy used to run a supercomputer usually goes into the air-cooling mechanism.

But IBM's Aquasar system promises to cut power consumption while it diverts extra heat into, for example, a university's main heating system. The challenge is to pump water as close to the chips as possible, allowing heat to transfer to the water, without damaging the sensitive circuits. Then, the heated water moves away from the computer and into a network of tiny capillaries where the heat is channeled into a larger HVAC system. Cooled water is returned to the computer to complete the loop.

The system uses just 2.64 gallons of water. IBM hopes the water-cooled machines will use 85 percent less energy and cut 30 tons of carbon dioxide each year.

Maybe IBM could start calling itself Big Green?