The long search for the right site to expand the NCAR supercomputing center ended with real estate in Cheyenne’s North Range Business Park. Located on the west side of Cheyenne at I-80 and I-25, the 153,000 square-foot National Center for Atmospheric Research (NCAR) is under construction at a cost of $70 million. It will be functional sometime during the first half of 2012 and will employ about 20 people. Presently, the NCAR supercomputing center is located at the University of Colorado Boulder.
The west Cheyenne commercial real estate offers other businesses an example of cost and energy efficiency. Utilizing a design that is approximately 90 percent more energy efficient than the typical supercomputing center, the architecture incorporates “green” systems and building sustainability. For example, the NCAR supercomputer center will recycle computer heat to heat the buildings. There is also a system to capture and convert wind energy. The design team is hoping to achieve LEED Gold certification for the cutting-edge capabilities of the modernized Cheyenne commercial property.
Proving a link to computers in Wyoming, the United States, and the world, the NCAR supercomputer center will synergize research capabilities throughout Wyoming and Colorado and beyond. It will assist companies to effectively resource the Niobrara oil shale, which extends from Wyoming through Colorado, Nebraska to Kansas. Carbon sequestration is vitally important to the Nairobi project, another major local development. The computing base should provide large-scale correlations about how water and carbon dioxide move through the spaces in rocks.
In the early stages, the Wyoming supercomputers will achieve speeds of hundreds of teraflops per second as it processes data to glean information about weather and environmental phenomena. The NCAR computer could also compute international data that will help scientists glean insight into how climate changes affect agriculture, energy, water, and extreme weather. Supercomputers can assist researchers to foresee rising sea levels or other dangerous situations in tornadoes, hurricanes, solar storms, and earthquake.
Officially known as the NCAR-Wyoming Supercomputing Center (NWSC), the facility is a partnership between the National Science Foundation (NSF), the State of Wyoming, the University of Wyoming, and Cheyenne LEADS as well as the Wyoming Business Council and Cheyenne Light, Fuel and Power. Governor Freudenthal touts NSF, UCAR, and NCAR activities as a boon to Wyoming’s technology portfolio and future research capabilities.
Regional educational institutions will benefit in many ways. Faculty and students will be able to study data about biotechnology, energy, space science, and much more at the University of Wyoming, University of Colorado Boulder, Northern Colorado University, and research universities in Denver and Colorado Springs. The research network will grow to research universities throughout the world.
For information about real estate, ranches, and land in Laramie County, call The Property Exchange at (307) 632-6481.
