New world-class European supercomputer opens in Spain

MareNostrum 5, the latest world-class European supercomputer was inaugurated in Barcelona, Spain. Currently ranked as one of the 10 most powerful supercomputers in the world, it is hosted at the Barcelona Supercomputing Centre and will be accessible to a wide range of European scientific and industry users from March 2024.

MareNostrum 5 has a peak performance of 314 Petaflops, or 314 million billion calculations per second. It is also the greenest supercomputer in Europe. It will be highly energy efficient, fully powered with sustainable energy. The heat it generates will be used to heat the building where it is located.

MareNostrum 5 is one of the most innovative supercomputing systems in the world, specifically designed to solve complex scientific problems. It will help advance Europe’s work in several areas. For example, it will help European medical research by supporting drug and vaccine development and carrying out virus spread simulations. It can also be used for traditional supercomputing applications, in areas such as climate research, engineering, materials science and Earth sciences.

The supercomputer will enhance other European initiatives such as Destination Earth, which aims to develop a highly accurate digital model of the Earth on a global scale, and the European Virtual Human Twin, also launched by the Commission today. The Virtual Human Twin initiative will help scientists better understand the human organism and lead to improved healthcare and personalised medicine.

MareNostrum 5 is also designed to be used by artificial intelligence (AI) developers. It will use the most advanced accelerator chips available today, which will help it meet the needs of emerging AI platforms and boost performance of European large AI language models. As announced by President von der Leyen in her State of the Union address, MareNostrum 5 will be available to European AI start-ups to train their models. This should help accelerate the deployment of European technologies and ethical AI-based algorithms allowing the EU to lead global efforts in responsible, ethical and safe AI.

The new system represents a total investment of over €151 million to cover its acquisition and maintenance, with 50% coming from the EU and 50% from a Spanish-led consortium which also includes Portugal and Türkiye.

More information: European Commission