Pete Sandford, left, of Communication Arts and Services (IM-1) and Donald Montoya, also of IM-1, install a display in the lobby of the Nicholas C. Metropolis Center for Modeling and Simulation. The 300,000-square-foot facility is formally dedicated at 3 this afternoon. Photo by LeRoy N. Sanchez, Public Affairs
The Laboratory today formally dedicates the Strategic Computing Complex, which houses the Nicholas C. Metropolis Center for Modeling and Simulation.
A number of dignitaries and invited guests will attend the dedication ceremony, which begins about 3 p.m. Laboratory Director John Browne, National Nuclear Security Administration Administrator John Gordon, John McTague, University of California vice president for Laboratory Administration, and Sen. Pete Domenici, R-N.M., are expected to deliver remarks.
Live coverage of the dedication ceremony begins at 2:30 p.m. on Labnet Channel 9.
An open house for Laboratory personnel is set for 11 a.m. to 2 p.m. next Tuesday, May 21. See the May 15 Daily Newsbulletin for more details on the SCC open house.
The two-year SCC construction project ended more than $13 million under budget and several months ahead of schedule. One third of the "Q" supercomputer that the building was designed to house has been installed and successfully tested, with the rest on schedule for delivery, installation and performance testing.
"This building and the Q supercomputer are essential elements in the NNSA's Advanced Simulation and Computing program in support of stockpile stewardship," said Browne. "This project also demonstrates our commitment to renewing the Lab's infrastructure and ensuring we have the facilities and personnel to fulfill our national security mission.
"I'm extremely proud of how well our team performed in bringing the SCC construction project to such a successful completion," Browne said.
The project's leaders, John Bretzke of the Project Management Division (PM) and Nicholas Nagy of Computer, Communication and Networking Division (CCN), said they felt tremendous satisfaction at the project's completion. "We knew there was a lot riding on the success of this construction project," said Nagy, "not only for the success of the ASCI program but also for the Lab to demonstrate that it could handle big construction projects on schedule and within budget."
"This was the first time the Laboratory used the design/build concept on a major project, so certainly there were many unknowns at the beginning," said Bretzke. "I'll admit, we were pretty nervous."
The SCC project team has compiled an impressive list of performance awards including the Performance Excellence Award 2001, granted by the DOE Albuquerque Operations Office; the Associated General Contractors of America 2002 Build America Award in the Design-Build Category, considered the "Oscars" of the construction industry; and the DOE Deputy Secretary Award of Achievement.
"I believe our key to success was the partnership charter we signed back in 1999, even before there was a design for the building," said Bretzke. "The Laboratory, contractors Hensel Phelps and Parsons Brinkerhoff, and the Department of Energy all signed the charter. We decided right then that -- succeed or fail -- we would do it together. This partnering agreement paid all kinds of dividends throughout the project. We had a good plan and we all stuck to it."
Open and honest communication also helped the project succeed, said Bretzke. "We supplied weekly highlight reports to DOE headquarters and worked diligently on making those reports very candid and forthright," he said. "We wanted to make sure that throughout the project there would be no surprises at headquarters, and it turned out that our DOE contacts did a tremendous job and are an important part of this success."
The 300,000-square-foot building features an unobstructed 43,500-square-foot computer room (about three-fourths the size of a football field) that is cooled by 130,000 gallons of circulating chilled water -- a full 3,600 tons of cooling capacity, or enough to cool more that 500 homes.
The electrical system brings 7.1 megawatts of power (expandable to 30 megawatts) into the structure along more than 200 miles of wire. There are more than 1,350 miles of fiber optic cable with approximately 20,000 individual fiber optic terminals. Office spaces include 306 furnished workspaces, several conference rooms, visualization theaters, class rooms, break areas and collaboration laboratories.
All aspects of the design were specifically aimed at providing the Laboratory with the latest in support of high-performance computing.
The structure itself is constructed of 12,000 cubic yards of concrete, 1,400 tons of structural steel, 650 tons of reinforcing steel and more than 8,000 gallons of paint.
The project may be most proud of its safety record. Just a single workday was lost due to injury out of 600,000 labor hours. Only two recordable injuries occurred, both back strains. More than 1,000 workers were involved in the construction project.
"The great thing is that this building doesn't look like your typical government building. It's more like something you might see in Silicon Valley," said Nagy.
"We work at a facility that has a lot of 50-year-old buildings," added Bretzke. "But now we're hearing people, some just starting their careers here, saying, 'hey, these guys are really doing something to improve the infrastructure,' and that makes us feel good about our contribution to the Lab and to the nation."
To view a short slide show of photos from the SCC construction, go to http://www.lanl.gov/orgs/pa/newsbulletin/2002/05/17/scc.shtml online.
The Laboratory has prepared several fact sheets on the Strategic Computing Complex and high performance computing at the Lab. To read the fact sheets, click here. (Adobe Acrobat Reader required)