Energy, EPA join computing efforts

Environmental Protection Agency

Officials from the Energy Department and the Environmental Protection Agency agreed today to increase the agencies' collaboration on research efforts, including high-performance computing programs.

Under a memorandum of understanding, the EPA will link supercomputers in North Carolina with Energy's Sandia National Laboratory facilities. The research performed by these computers will include environmental simulation, such as the Community Multi-Scale Air Quality model, which helps states meet air quality goals.

The agreement will also further research in computational toxicology, which uses statistical techniques and molecular genetics to allow chemical testing based on molecular structure. In addition, the EPA will also have access to Energy's Joint Genome Institute in the study of genomics, an area of biology derived from DNA-sequencing.

"Linking and leveraging these two great research resources will strengthen the scientific foundation for environmental, energy and public health issues," said EPA Administrator Mike Leavitt.

Energy Secretary Spencer Abraham joined Leavitt in signing the agreement.