The new HPC6 supercomputer will be one of the most powerful industrial computing systems in the world, marking a major step forward in high-performance computing to support Eni’s transition from today’s energy sources to those of the future.
Eni has started building a new high-performance computing (HPC) system, HPC6, aimed at significantly increasing the computational power of HPC4 and HPC5 from their current 70 PFlop/s to a peak of over 600 PFlop/s, or 600 quadrillion mathematical operations per second. Eni’s new HPC system, characterized by extraordinary computing power, thus marks an order of magnitude increase in computing capacity compared to its predecessor.
The architecture of HPC6 is based on the same technology that powers the leading systems of its kind globally. The HPC6 system and its storage facility will be provided by Hewlett Packard Enterprise (HPE), which won the tender in a competitive international process, and will use HPE Cray EX4000 systems and HPE Cray ClusterStor E1000 technologies for the HPC6 system and storage, respectively. The computing system includes AMD EPYC CPUs and AMD Instinct GPUs, along with HPE Slingshot Interconnect, an open Ethernet-based high performance designed to support exascale-class workloads. Once completed, HPC6 will be one of the world’s most powerful supercomputers dedicated to industrial applications.
Claudio Descalzi, CEO, Eni said, “This project underlines our ongoing commitment to innovation and digitalisation, while also supporting our energy transition process. The new HPC system significantly enhances our computational capabilities and marks a pivotal shift in the way we address challenges related to energy security, competitiveness and sustainability.”
In line with Eni’s commitment to sustainability, HPC6 will be more energy efficient, minimizing carbon emissions. It will be located in a dedicated area within the Green Data Center, where a new liquid cooling system has been built to further enhance its efficiency and sustainability.
This investment reinforces Eni’s leadership in industrial high-performance computing and consolidates its position as a high-tech company supporting the energy transition. In addition to supporting Eni’s digitalisation and innovation process, HPC6 is a key asset in meeting the challenges of achieving net zero, providing a crucial technological lever to gain competitive advantages in the development of new energy sources.
