(AGENPARL) – ven 14 luglio 2023 A weekly compendium of media reports on science and technology achievements at Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory. Though the Laboratory reviews items for overall accuracy, the reporting organizations are responsible for the content in the links below.
LLNL Report, July 14, 2023
LLNL Director Kim Budil was selected by Fast Company as one of the Most Creative People in Business for 2023.
[She’s in the fast lane](https://www.hpcwire.com/off-the-wire/llnl-director-kim-budil-named-one-of-fast-companys-2023-most-creative-people-in-business/)
Lawrence Livermore Director Kim Budil has been selected by Fast Company as one of the Most Creative People in Business for 2023. The annual list, in its 15th year, recognizes individuals making an impact in society via daring achievements in their chosen fields, from tech to design to healthcare. Budil was selected for leading the team that achieved nuclear fusion ignition.
“At LLNL, more than 8,300 people are dedicated to harnessing leading-edge science and technology to address some of the most significant challenges in national security and global stability facing our nation and the world. This work requires exceptional creativity and real technical innovation – “Big Ideas” – to enable meaningful impact,” Budil said. “It is an honor to be recognized alongside other leaders who strive to make a difference.”
Fast Company selects individuals who used their innovative thinking to make a meaningful impact on the world, highlighting a diverse group of founders, executives, designers, engineers, activists, entertainers and others who are breaking important ground in their industries and represent the future of business.
[Read More](https://www.hpcwire.com/off-the-wire/llnl-director-kim-budil-named-one-of-fast-companys-2023-most-creative-people-in-business/)
El Capitan supercomputer installation is under way at Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory. Photo by Garry McLeod/LLNL
[Reaching the top of the mountain](https://www.nextplatform.com/2023/07/10/lining-up-the-el-capitan-supercomputer-against-the-ai-upstarts/)
The question is no longer whether or not the “El Capitan” supercomputer that has been in the process of being installed at Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory for the past week – with photographic evidence to prove it – will be the most powerful system in the world. The question is how long it will hold onto that title.
It could be for quite a long time, as it turns out. Because when it comes to the big AI supercomputers that AI startups are funding, to use an old adage that described IBM systems in the 1990s: “You can find better, but you can’t pay more.”
It doesn’t look like any of the major HPC centers at the national labs around the globe are going to field a persistent machine – meaning not an ephemeral cloudy instance that is fired up for long enough to run the High Performance Linpack test in double precision floating point that is used to gauge the relative performance of machines and rank them on [the Top500 list](https://www.top500.org/) – that can beat El Capitan, which depending on our mood and our math we think could weigh in at around 2.3 exaflops peak FP64 performance, about 37% more FP64 oomph than the 1.68 exaflops “Frontier” supercomputer at Oak Ridge National Laboratory that has been the most powerful machine on the Top500 list since June 2022.
[Read More](https://www.nextplatform.com/2023/07/10/lining-up-the-el-capitan-supercomputer-against-the-ai-upstarts/)
Researchers have devised a new technique for steel production. Image courtesy ofCleveland-Cliffs Inc.
[Making a greener steel](https://thedaily.case.edu/working-to-make-steel-greener-cleaner/)
Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory scientists and collaborators are developing a new zero-carbon, electrochemical process to produce iron metal from ore.
If successful, the project could be a first step toward eliminating harmful greenhouse gas emissions by eventually replacing century-old, blast-furnace ironmaking with a new electrolytic-iron production process. Reducing iron ore to metal is carbon- and energy-intensive, leading to significant carbon-dioxide emissions that drive global warming.
Ironmaking in a blast furnace involves combining carbon and iron ore at very high temperatures to “reduce” the iron ore to “pig iron,” the key raw material in the steel industry, according to the Department of Energy. But when carbon reacts with oxygen from the ore, the result is carbon dioxide gas.