Lighthouse Cluster Rates

The 2021-22 rates for the Lighthouse Cluster have been approved. These rates represent cost recovery for the Lighthouse Cluster, and do not include any support your unit may choose to provide.

The Lighthouse cluster is meant to support researchers with grants that require the purchase of computing hardware or require hardware configurations not available on Great Lakes. Lighthouse allows researchers to work with ARC to purchase their own hardware and have it within the Lighthouse Slurm environment, with ARC providing the data center, staff, networking, storage and software. More information is available on the Lighthouse webpage. In addition to the hardware purchase cost, there is monthly charge to support the hardware in the Lighthouse environment.

Lighthouse Service Cost	$743.07/node/year ($61.92/node/month)

COLLEGE OF LITERATURE, SCIENCE, & THE ARTS LIGHTHOUSE SUPPORT

To support research using high performance computing, the College of Literature, Science, and the Arts (LSA) will cost-share the monthly operating charge for researchers paying on LSA unit shortcodes. For fiscal years 2022-23, 2023-24, and 2024-25 LSA will provide a 88% subsidy on the monthly service charge of existing LSA Lighthouse nodes. Replacement nodes will also be cost-shared for this period of time given the replacement is a 1:1 replacement with similar or lower physical space, power, and cooling requirements. Any additional Lighthouse nodes will not be cost-shared with the College. The table below provides an estimate of Lighthouse Operating Expenses using published ITS rates for FY2021-22. The rates for LSA researchers will change, and the table updated, if ITS rates change. LSA does not anticipate continuing the LSA subsidy for Lighthouse nodes after FY2025 due to the small number of people who use service across U-M and LSA. Please plan accordingly for the change in cost that would occur at the start of FY2026 if you continue to use Lighthouse.