Power is an often-cited reason for moving to advanced architectures on the path to Exascale computing. This is due to the practical concern of delivering enough power to successfully site and operate these machines, as well as concerns over energy usage while running large simulations. Since accurate power measurements can be difficult to obtain, processor thermal design power (TDP) is a possible surrogate due to its simplicity and availability. However, TDP is not indicative of typical power usage while running simulations. Using commodity and advance technology systems at Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory (LLNL) and Sandia National Laboratory, we performed a series of experiments to measure power and energy usage in running simulation codes. These experiments indicate that large scale LLNL simulation codes are significantly more efficient than a simple processor TDP model might suggest.

翻译：电源是转向快速计算道路上的先进建筑的一个常常被引用的理由,这是因为实际关注要提供足够电力成功定位和操作这些机器,以及在进行大型模拟时对能源使用情况的关切。由于精确的电量测量可能难以获得,处理器热设计电能(TDP)由于其简单和可用性而成为可能的替代物。然而,TDP并不表明模拟过程中的典型电能使用情况。我们利用劳伦斯·利弗莫尔国家实验室(LLNL)和桑迪亚国家实验室的商品和先进技术系统,在运行模拟代码时进行了一系列测量电能和能源使用情况的实验。这些实验表明,大型LLNL模拟代码比简单的处理器TDP模型可能显示的效率要高得多。