BP provides supercomputer access to fight Covid-19

BP said it will provide access to its supercomputer centre in Houston and allow its scientists and experts, to help work aimed at halting the spread of Covid-19.

BP said it will donate its capability at its Center for High-Performance Computing to a public-private consortium formed of the White House Office of Science and Technology Policy, the US Department of Energy and technology giant IBM. The centre usually serves as BP's global hub for processing and managing geophysical data.

BP said it will also make available the expertise of its Biosciences Center, in San Diego, California.

Italy's Eni said last week that it had made its supercomputing infrastructure and its molecular modelling skills available for coronavirus research, as part of a European project led by biopharmaceutical company Dompe.

BP and Eni have both this year laid out plans to sharply reduce emissions from their operations and the carbon intensity of their energy products in the coming years and decades. They, like their peers, see digitalisation as a vital tool to stay in tune with the world's energy transition to a lower-carbon future while keeping costs down.

BP said its supercomputer can "complete a problem in an hour that would take a laptop nine years".

source: Argus Media