There are several model_mods and core DART modules that have a fixed size memory requirement on each processor. The memory usage is static_mem* num_procs (does not scale as you add processors), and is a hard limit for the model size in DART.

Goal:

memory usage per core = static_mem / num_procs
total memory usage = static_mem

Rather than the current:

memory usage per core = static_mem 
total memory usage = static_mem * num_procs

Note the code may need to be sensible about what static data is tiny (fine on every core) vs. large.

Static data in DART:

• static data, same across the ensemble:

  • WRF phb (3d variable sized static data). A wrf model_mod version with distributed phb was written 2014/16 but never released.
  • Mesh structures (e.g. MPAS)
  • quad_interp utilities data structures (particularly MOM6 CESM3 workhorse 2/3-degree)
  • POP interpolation data structures
  • get_close data structures

• Per ensemble member static data:
  This gets put into the state at the moment, so is inflated (maybe should not be). An example (I think) is the CLM fields that are 'no-update' see bug: inflation files when using 'no copy back' variables #276

In addition (going as a separate issue), is observation sequence files which are on every core (and particularly for external forward operators which are in the obs sequence).