Bulked-up computers bring new brawn to BP's oil search
In the oil and gas business, time means money, and geologists believe supercomputers will help them save both as they push farther, faster and deeper in their global search for new riches under the ground and beneath the sea.
That's the backdrop to British oil giant BP's decision to build in Houston what the company is billing as the largest supercomputing complex for commercial research in the world.
The move - part of a five-year, $100 million investment in high-performance computing - signals a technology race to the top by Big Oil, as other major energy companies are also enhancing such efforts. Officials from Chevron, Shell Oil, Exxon Mobil and French oil and gas company Total will join BP officials at a workshop on the subject at Rice University in February, BP officials said.
"We talk to a lot of people," said Keith Gray, manager of high-performance computing for BP, as the company announced the new center on Thursday. "We want to learn. But it's a race. I am very competitive. We want to be in front."
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