CHAMPAIGN, Ill.
University of Illinois trustees voted Wednesday to spend $72.5 million for a building to house a new supercomputer, but most of the money is tied up in a state capital-spending plan stalled in Springfield.
The building on the Champaign-Urbana campus will house the computer known as Blue Waters, which will be the fastest computer in the world when it is finished in 2011. The university, which says it doesn’t have the existing space to house the new computer, plans to fund the construction in part with a $208 million National Science Foundation grant.
The university’s bid to build the computer came with a pledge from Gov. Rod Blagojevich that the state would kick in $60 million.
That money which would make up all but $12.5 million of what the university plans to spend on the building is part of a $13 billion capital plan that has passed in the Senate but is stuck in the House after House Speaker Michael Madigan raised concerns about the major gambling expansion that would pay for the capital program.
University trustees meeting in Springfield approved the measure to build the supercomputer building without comment, spokesman Tom Hardy said Wednesday.
“The hoped-for scenario is that the state, which has committed the $60 million, will go through with that,” he said. “We’re hoping to have state commitment by next spring.”
