IBM Supercomputer Cooled With Hot Water

1sockchuck writes "IBM has deployed an innovative supercomputer cooled by hot water in a Zurich computer lab. The Aquasar supercomputer employs a chip-level liquid cooling system that can use water at temperatures as high as 60 degrees C (140 degrees F), and as a result consumes up to 40 percent less energy than a comparable system using room-level air-cooling. The system also uses waste heat to provide warmth to buildings, reducing Aquasar's carbon footprint even further."

Comments

This is more idiotic "conservation"

[cdrguru]

The problem is, you can't conserve your way out of the current set of problems. Just plugging the thing in consumes power. Power that, if it wasn't generated in the first place, wouldn't need any help in reducing some carbon footprint.

Come on, folks. There are two possible alternatives here. Plugging in yet another computer pushes things closer and closer to a tipping point where all life on the planet may suddenly die or there is no such thing as "anthropomorphic climate change", in which case it makes no difference. You can't have it both ways, which means any "conservation" effort which doesn't have a net negative consumption of resources is simply misdirection.

So if you want to talk about carbon footprints, it is really quite simple - don't plug it in. Unplug something else. This is a net benefit. Everything else, and I do mean everything else, is just moving things closer and closer to the point where the problems will be obvious.

So far, I have yet to see someone actually unplug something. They will make all kinds of excuses about how they are really "conserving" something or another by making their own lives easier. They are taking advantage of the electric power that through its generation may be destroying the biosphere. They are flying in planes that may be destroying the biosphere. They are driving cars that may be destroying the biosphere. I don't care if they traded in a Hummer for a Prius - it is simply a matter of degree. So they are contributing to the end of all life on the planet a little more slowly than they were before.

Of course, the other alternative is that "climate change" is something that is happening fully apart from the actions of humans and it makes no difference between driving a Hummer or a Prius, or not driving at all - as far as climate change is concerned. But to a lot of people it is deeply offensive to think that there are things that are utterly and completely beyond their (or anyone else's) control. I like to call this the "Not a sparrow shall fall" philosophy.

So if you are deeply committed to anthropomorphic climate change, go out a blow something up today or tomorrow. You will be doing your part to ensure that life does not end on Planet Earth. One (empty) jetliner is probably worth 1000 cars, at least.

But

[rossdee]

wouldn't it work better with cold (or at least room temperature) water? After all there is a lot more water around at ambient temperature.
And if the ambient temperature gets to 60c then global warming has gone too far, and the planet is uninhabitable (by humans anyway.