International Collaboration Towards Net Zero Computational Modelling and Simulation (CONTINENTS)

英国的净零战略是让所有经济部门在2050年前实现净零目标。类似的长期目标是在相同的时间尺度上实现净零排放，这一目标在其他国家也存在，包括美国。高性能计算(HPC)也不能免除适应这些战略挑战的需要，如果科学界要在面对气候变化时继续证明大规模HPC资源的使用和成本是合理的，那么推动高性能计算走向可持续性和净零是至关重要的。到目前为止，数据中心和系统的电力消耗是运营HPC碳足迹的最大贡献者，因此将消耗的能源降至最低以及减少/重复利用废物是实现净零的关键。面向净零计算建模和模拟(大陆)项目的国际合作将建立在爱丁堡大学超级计算中心EPCC的专业知识基础上。英国国家大气科学中心和美国国家大气研究中心，通过一项雄心勃勃的研究计划，改变计算建模和模拟在可持续性和功率/能源效率方面的最先进水平，以推动以下方面的创新：数据中心和高性能计算系统操作；硬件的最佳使用；机器学习在数据分析和数值建模中的应用；以及软件设计和开发战略。作为一个具体的使用案例，大陆将把其研究的应用集中在天气和气候建模上。这些都是科学和计算方面的挑战，计算资源密集型的领域，这些领域对于加深我们对气候变化及其影响因素的理解至关重要。大陆是领先的高性能计算研究和服务提供中心、大气科学专家以及数值和机器学习应用程序开发商之间独特的跨学科合作，提供了一种全面的方法，利用计算和气候科学专业知识解决从数据中心到个人应用程序的Net Zero挑战。项目目标包括：在领先的超级计算研究人员与英国和美国的中心之间建立长期合作；推动数据中心可持续运营的界限；探索使用新颖和专业的硬件；开发性能、电力和能效软件开发和部署的新方法；最大限度地减少移动、处理、分析和存储数据所需的资源；以及创造一个鼓励分享专业知识和知识的协作研究环境。

The UK's Net Zero strategy is for all sectors of the economy to meet the Net Zero target by 2050. Similar long-term aims to move towards Net Zero emissions on the same timescales exist in other countries, including the USA. High-performance computing (HPC) is not exempt from needing to adapt to these strategic challenges, and pushing HPC towards sustainability and Net Zero is crucial if the scientific community is to keep justifying the use and cost of large-scale HPC resources in the face of climate change. Electricity consumption of data centres and systems is by far the largest contributor to the carbon footprint of operational HPC and minimising the energy that is consumed, and reducing/reusing waste, is therefore key in achieving Net Zero.The International Collaboration Towards Net Zero Computational Modelling and Simulation (CONTINENTS) project will build on the expertise of EPCC, the supercomputing centre at the University of Edinburgh, the National Centre for Atmospheric Science in the UK and the National Centre for Atmospheric Research in the USA to transform the state-of-the-art in sustainability and power/energy efficiency of computational modelling and simulation through an ambitious programme of research that will drive innovations in: data centre and HPC system operation; optimal use of hardware; machine learning applied to data analysis and numerical modelling; and software design and development strategies.As a specific use case, CONTINENTS will focus the application of its research on weather and climate modelling. These are both scientifically and computationally challenging, and compute resource intensive, domains that are vital to furthering our understanding of climate change and the factors that influence it. CONTINENTS is a unique interdisciplinary collaboration between leading centres of HPC research and service provision, atmospheric science experts, and numerical and machine learning application developers, providing a comprehensive approach to addressing the Net Zero challenge from the data centre all the way through to individual applications using both computational and climate science expertise.The projects objectives include: establishing a long-term collaboration between leading supercomputing researchers and centres in the UK and USA; pushing the boundaries of sustainable operation of data centres; exploring the use of novel and specialised hardware; developing new methods for performance, power and energy efficient software development and deployment; minimising the resources needed for moving, processing, analysing and storing data; and creating a collaborative research environment that encourages sharing of expertise and knowledge.