70 -- Enhancement to High Performance Computing System

The U.S. Department of Commerce/NOAA intends to negotiate on a noncompetitive basis with Raytheon Company of Upper Marlboro, MD to provide an integrated enhancement to the existing high performance computing (HPC) system being leased by the Geophysical Fluid Dynamics Laboratory (GFDL) in Princeton, NJ under Contract Number 50-DDNR-0-90030. The Government intends to modify the existing contract to acquire and integrate additional storage capability and capacity. The existing HPC system was designed by Raytheon Company to provide a balanced supercomputing environment that includes not only large-scale computing but separate resources for analysis, storage, and networking as well. The current system consists of a Large Scale Cluster (192 SGI Origin processors and 2688 SGI Altix processors), an Analysis Cluster (196 SGI Origin processors), an HFS/HSMS Cluster (128 SGI Origin processors), and a tape library (5 STK 9310 Powderhorn silos). Raytheon also provides system administration and other system related support services under the contract. The current system shares a single integrated set of file systems under SGI's clustered file system (CXFS) and data archives under SGI's Data Migration Facility (DMF). The system's resources are managed and scheduled primarily by Raytheon's Grid Engine resource management and scheduling software. The HPC system currently utilized by GFDL directly supports NOAA's strategic goals in Climate and Weather and Water by enabling research into the physical processes governing the Earth's climate and weather. GFDL is responsible for providing routine, on-demand state-of-the-science model-based global projections of future climate resulting in demands greater than what the current HPC system can provide. Recent changes to the execution and post-processing of scientific simulations have created a need for additional resources that must be tightly integrated into the existing HPC system architecture to maintain the balance between computational performance, I/O, and storage while maintaining the contractually required high system availability. While the current total tape storage capacity is sufficient for the expected growth of the data archive, to 7PB by October 2006, recent growth in the size of individual data sets, coupled with intensified analysis of the data, has led to imbalances in the system. Re-establishing system balance requires increasing the capacity of the tightly integrated disk storage subsystem in order to maximize end-to-end processing performance. The estimated budget for these enhancements is approximately $750,000 through September 2006. NOAA anticipates utilizing both acquisitions and leases for the additional hardware, software, and engineering. Vendors who believe they can satisfy the Government's requirements are invited to submit an affirmative response. To be considered an affirmative response, vendors must submit written data and documentation which demonstrates an ability to furnish an integrated system enhancement capable of meeting the previously cited requirements. Seamless integration of the enhancement into the existing HPC system architecture is required, including integration into GFDL's current hierarchical storage management system. Of particular concern to the Government is completion of the system enhancement without any interruption or degradation of performance, both during the actual system upgrade as well as during the remainder of the system's life (through September 2006). Vendors must include in their response an explanation, in explicit detail, of their plan to implement and manage a seamless integration with the existing HPC system. All responsible sources must submit a written narrative statement of capability including detailed technical information and other technical literature sufficient to permit agency analysis in order to determine a bona fide capability to meet the requirements. A determination by the Government not to open the requirement for competition based upon responses to this notice is solely within its discretion. Affirmative responses must be received within 45 days after publication of this synopsis. SEE Note 22.