Summary: A new kind of supercomputer system has come online at the Texas Advanced Computing Center. It's called Hikari, which is Japanese for "light." What's new is that Hikari is the first supercomputer in the US to use solar panels and High Voltage Direct Current, or HVDC for its power. Hikari hopes to demonstrate that HVDC works not only for supercomputers, but also for data centers and commercial buildings. The Hikari project is a collaboration headed by NTT Facilities, based out of Japan and with the support of the New Energy and Industrial Technology Development Organization, or NEDO. NTT Facilities partnered with the University of Texas at Austin to begin demonstration tests of the HVDC power feeding system for the Hikari project in late August 2016. What it aims to show is that the high-capacity HVDC power equipment and lithium-ion batteries of Hikari can save 15 percent in energy compared to conventional systems. Podcast host Jorge Salazar discusses the Hikari HVDC project with Toshihiro Hayashi, Assistant Manager in the Engineering Divisions of NTT Facilities, Japan; and Jim Stark, Director of Engineering and Construction for the Electronic Environments Corporation, a Division of NTT Facilities.
