Japanese Meteorological Agency Starts Operation Of New Supercomputer

[Paul Ashford]

Posting in here as it seems most relevant, please feel free to move (apologies if it's in the wrong forum)

http://mainichi.jp/e...0na015000c.html

Meteorological Agency starts operation of new supercomputer

The Meteorological Agency on June 5 started operation of a supercomputer that can perform 847 trillion calculations per second, hoping it will contribute to more detailed and accurate weather predictions.

The computer is installed in the agency's system operation office in the Tokyo city of Kiyose. Officials hope that in addition to weather forecasts, it will help improve warnings on tornadoes and localized downpours.

Meteorological Agency officials say the new computer is about 30 times faster than the existing one introduced in 2006, and has the highest processing capacity among computers at meteorological bodies across the world.

Up until now the agency had predicted weather in blocks measuring 5 kilometers by 5 kilometers, but with the new computer, officials will launch a "local model" program, allowing the area to be reduced to 2 kilometer by 2 kilometer blocks.

The local model displays coastlines and mountain areas in detail, so it will be able to more accurately predict localized torrential rain and other weather phenomena, leading to precise warnings for towns, cities and villages.

In addition to providing better wind predictions at airports, it is hoped that the computer will make it easier to grasp the conditions that increase the risk of tornadoes. However technological innovation in the field of meteorology moves quickly, and an agency official said it was likely that a replacement computer would be needed in five or six years.

Edited June 5, 2012 by Paul Ashford

[Snowmadsam]

Great thanks for the info!

[bluearmy]

i wonder if it is relevant to the JMA global model or just a short range model for that part of the hemisphere.

Edited June 6, 2012 by bluearmy

[Coast]

i wonder if it is relevant to the JMA global model or just a short range model for that part of the hemisphere.

On 24 May 2012, the Japan Meteorological Agency (JMA) announced that JMA will start operating the latest generation of the HITACHI supercomputer system from 5 June 2012, aiming to improve its meteorological information for disaster risk reduction and aviation service. The new system, HITACHI SR16000/M1, is about 30 times faster than its predecessor, HITACHI SR11000, and is with the ability to make more than 800 trillion floating-point calculations per second.

The new system will allow JMA to run more sophisticated models of the atmosphere and oceans, leading to better accuracy and precision in from very short-range to long-range forecasting. In two months, JMA will operationally run the Local Forecast Model (LFM) with a horizontal resolution of 2 km, currently in test operation, over East Japan every three hours to make nine-hour forecasts, particularly aiming at timely service of fine-grid forecast to support aeronautical operation especially in the vicinity of Tokyo International (Haneda) airport. By improving its horizontal resolution to 2 km, more detailed terrain can be resolved in the model, thereby improving accuracy of prediction of wind, temperature and precipitation mainly related to local topography. In addition, in one year, the LFM will be modified to cover entire Japan and to run every hour for more sophisticated meteorological forecasts to further support disaster risk reduction and safer flights over the nation.

http://www.jma.go.jp...GRADE_2012.html

[SnowBallz]

The UK Met Office is currently presenting its business case for a £42m upgrade to its supercomputer in 2015.

[bluearmy]

i wonder if it is relevant to the JMA global model or just a short range model for that part of the hemisphere.

reading the link from Coast, it appears the global model will have to wait approx a year to be upgraded to 100 layers. (no detail on horizontal grid resolution)

[lorenzo]

It nailed that rain forecast shown in that article.. impressive

[Interitus]

Peak perfomance is reported as 847 teraflops which puts it 31st in the list of world supercomputers by this measure - to put this into perspective the ECMWF has two supercomputers rated at 754 Tflops while the Met Office has two of 565 and 471 Tflops. Of course in each case the processing power will most likely not be devoted to forecast models alone but also other simulation projects.

The fastest UK system is the 13th most powerful rated at 1468 Tflops but the world's leading machine is a massive 20132 Tflops.

Edited August 2, 2012 by Interitus