Considering the future of AREVA, the group’s Supervisory Board met and finalized the next steps of the group’s plans (press release). As the world leader in the nuclear power industry, AREVA has witnessed a major increase in demand for CO2-free energy solutions. At the same time, AREVA has exciting goals for the future—both in nuclear energy and renewables—that need investment while keeping a healthy balance sheet.

This is why AREVA will invite new strategic and industrial partners, and current certificate holders, to join as shareholders. Plus, the group will launch a new employee shareholding plan.

Additionally, the Supervisory Board asked AREVA to sell the group’s Transmission & Distribution division. AREVA will initiate a call for bids, and while the financial offer will be one factor; attention will be paid to the potential buyer’s plans for the division. Based on the offers received, AREVA will make the decision whether to sell T&D by the end of the year.

Speaking about today’s decision, Chairman of the Board Jean Cyril Spinetta said, “Solutions for generating CO2-free energy—its core business—have undisputed prospects for growth. The group must be able to pursue an ambitious investment program to take advantage of its growth.”

Construction at Olkiluoto

by Jarret Adams

Hidden among the tall firs of western Finland, the Olkiluoto 3 project remains hidden from view until we arrived at the site. In fact, the first full view was quite arresting—it is an enormous project and in the bright summer Scandinavian sun quite beautiful.

My visit to the Olkiluoto site last week was as the host of Amory Lovins, chairman and chief scientist of the Rocky Mountain Institute. More about that aspect of the visit is below.

The basics of the OL3 project are well-known to the readers of this blog. AREVA and Siemens have partnered to build the first world’s Generation III+ reactor for Teollisuuden Voima Oyj (TVO). It also will be AREVA’s first EPR™ reactor built to produce 1,650 Megawatts, enough CO2-free electricity to power one and a half million Finnish households.

The Finns are a pragmatic people. They choose to build a fifth reactor because in Finland there is not much sun for most of the year, neither is there much wind, geothermal or fossil fuels. They also do not want to rely on Russia for natural gas. Given Finland’s history with Russia, this is understandable. They also want abundant, reliable electricity with a minimal environmental impact. So, they decided to with nuclear energy. And even with all that you may have read about this project, Finland has decided that would like to build another—Ollikuoto 4.

The 4,000 workers at the site have been making excellent progress. They have completed construction of the main control room. In the coming weeks, they will bring in the polar crane that will place items in the massive containment building. By the end of the summer, they plan to lift the dome on the top of the containment, which will mark a major step forward.

Today the civil works at OL3 are approximately 70-75 percent complete and they expect to reach 95 percent by the end of this year. At this point, the work will focus more on installation of components rather than pouring concrete.

Our tour was quite comprehensive—we climbed down into the guts to see the location of the unique core-catcher as well as that of the major components. We then climbed back up to stand inside the containment building to see the liner now complete to the rim of the giant structure. Then we climbed back down under the double wall, each is 1.8 meters at the base, and emerged through the location of the used fuel pool.

We visited the massive reactor vessel, perched in its own shed next to the containment building. Two of the steam generators are complete and waiting at AREVA’s Chalon-St. Marcel plant in France. The other two are being manufactured there as are the reactor’s other major components.

In the turbine building, work is moving along at a clip. The building itself is largely complete and the turbine itself in place. During our visit, workers were welding the cover on the massive Siemens turbine. Our guide from Siemens opined that he believes that producing 1,700 MW here is a good possibility.

Amory and Me at OL3

As readers of this blog have read before, one of AREVA’s guiding principles is to maintain a policy of openness with all of our stakeholders. We are open and forthright about our business and our projects. This is a policy embraced by everyone from our senior management to the rest of our staff. Recently, our CEO Anne Lauvergeon invited Mr. Lovins, a noted critic of the nuclear energy industry, to visit the OL3 project and see it for himself.

So we opened our doors to Mr. Lovins, his wife and mother-in-law (both lovely ladies) and spent a day doing an in-depth tour of the site. The conversations we had were always lively, and we hope that he was impressed with the project. We do not presume this visit will change his 30-year opposition to nuclear energy, but we remain committed to a frank and open exchange of ideas with our stakeholders and to some degree let the work speak for itself.

Mr. Lovins’ visit to OL3 is but one of many visits to our various sites we have done and are doing with folks who are supportive and critical of the nuclear industry. Recently, Ed Lyman of the Union of Concerned Scientists (UCS) paid a visit to OL3*. This week, we will host Tom Cochran of the Natural Resources Defense Council (NRDC) at our La Hague and MELOX recycling facilities in France. In the end, we believe that this openness is a key to the ongoing success of AREVA and the nuclear energy industry in general.

* We erroneously published earlier that Ed Lyman of UCS had visited OL3. We apologize for the mistake.

by Jarret Adams

As the House considers the American Clean Energy and Security Act, we want to point out that AREVA supports legislation that will encourage more investment in new sources of clean energy. As the world leader in CO2-free power generation, we would like to see greater interest in sources of electricity that do not produce greenhouse gases.

We are delighted to join with many of our partners and competitors in our support for this legislation, including Constellation, Duke Energy, Exelon, FPL Group, PG&E Corp., PSE+G and GE. In fact, Constellation issued a press release yesterday calling for passage of the measure.

Approaches that would help us reduce our nation’s greenhouse gas emissions are critical to addressing climate change. It is also important to recall how important nuclear energy is helping prevent CO2 emissions. America’s 104 nuclear power plants represent nearly 75 percent of our CO2-free generation. Each year, these plants avoid the production of some 700 million metric tons of CO2.

Today U.S. nuclear plants only produce 20 percent of our electricity. Even a small increase in nuclear generation could have a significant impact on CO2 emissions. While nuclear energy will remain the largest CO2-free energy source in the U.S. for years to come, we do not believe it is the only solution.

AREVA also has a rapidly growing renewables business. Our ADAGE joint venture with Duke Energy plans to develop a fleet of biopower facilities that can play a major role in helping meet renewable generating standards. We just announced the location of the first potential plant west of Jacksonville, Fla., a few weeks ago.

We are also actively looking for locations for our 5 MW offshore wind turbines along the U.S. and Canadian coastlines or in the Great Lakes.

Thus, we urge Congress to support climate legislation that recognizes the important roles nuclear energy and renewables play in helping prevent CO2 emissions and protecting our environment.

——-

UPDATE: We are happy to see that this legislation passed the House (219-212) and now will move on to the Senate process.

We missed this last week because of the excitement of the Ohio announcement, but we wanted to make sure we highlighted a panel discussion of nuclear bloggers at the American Nuclear Society meeting in Atlanta that happened last week. Several of our colleagues in the nuclear energy blogging community participated: Rod Adams (Atomic Insights), John Wheeler (This Week in Nuclear), Kirk Sorensen (Energy from Thorium), and Dan Yurman (Idaho Samizdat).

From Dan Yurman’s write-up on the panel discussion at The Energy Collective, an excellent summary of how nuclear energy bloggers are changing the nuclear energy news landscape:

There are not many serious bloggers in the U.S. who cover the nuclear industry on a full time basis. There are perhaps fewer than a dozen who do blog frequently about the topic. The difference for this group is a commitment to consistent high quality content and in-depth analysis despite not being part of the nuclear trade press. That doesn’t mean we’re not capable of heavy lifting when it comes to explaining the key issues of the nuclear industry. . . .

What has happened with nuclear energy and the new media is that substantive news and analysis, often with industry thought and opinion leaders, is now available online without having to come up with the equivalent of several months of car payments. This means that some of the news and the “so what” analysis is now reaching an audience composed of mostly of the general public. What’s interesting is that according to Google Analytics, most of the same utilities and EPC firms are also reading the blogs.

The rest of the write-up includes some very interesting thoughts on the differences between nuclear energy bloggers and the future of nuclear energy blogging… but we couldn’t pass up a favorable mention of this blog by John Wheeler:

Wheeler noted that Areva’s recent forays into outreach to bloggers may cause other large nuclear firms to take a look at their efforts toward public transparency. According to Wheeler, these firms may decide they don’t need to talk to bloggers and are perfectly satisfied with how they are interacting with the public.

We’re glad our efforts in reaching out to the blogging community are being recognized, and we’re especially glad to be part of the nuclear energy blogging community. You can read the rest of Dan Yurman’s write-up on the panel here.

In an editorial yesterday in the Ironton Tribune, Ohio Senator George Voinovich said clearly and strongly: Ohio must engage in the nuclear renaissance.

By talking about how the industry meets key concerns about jobs and the economy, Voinovich brought up the opportunities from the new Clean Energy Park Alliance announced for southern Ohio.
 

I was also excited to join Duke and AREVA to announce a large scale clean energy production center coming to Piketon, Ohio. This means thousands of jobs for Ohio, which will be part of the finest nuclear workforce in the world.

 
Voinovich also does the math to show just how many jobs are in the works, which is reflected by the boom in applications to the Nuclear Regulatory Commission for new nuclear reactors.
 
“This means more than 200,000 manufacturing jobs will be created to supply the needed parts and components for the 30 nuclear reactors that are currently planned here in the United States.”

But Ohio isn’t the only state with energy concerns, and it certainly isn’t the only state that could use more jobs. Much of what Voinovich expressed is true for the rest of the U.S. – especially when the goal is dependable, reliable carbon-free energy.

Today, there is a huge energy gap between the renewable electricity we would like to have and the reliable, low-cost electricity we must have.  Nuclear is the best power source we have available to meet our energy needs while also curing emissions of greenhouse gases.

Here in the US. Our 104 nuclear plants provide 20% of our electricity.  That represents over 70 percents of the nation’s emission free generation portfolio.  Meanwhile, only 1.4 percent of our emission free power comes from wind, and only .08 percent from solar.

 
Voinovich outlined why nuclear energy is going to be a large part of the future.
 

Everyone is starting to get it – nuclear is a three’fer: Without it, we will not be able to reach our goal of reducing carbon emissions; Without it , we will not be able to provide the base-load electricity our growing country will demand; And, without it, we will not be able to rebuild our manufacturing base.

We’d like to give a warm welcome to some newcomers to the neighborhood!  Adding to a blogosphere already diverse in background and discussion, they bring opinions on the subject that shake up the conversation on nuclear energy.

It’s really great to see the dialogue on nuclear energy growing.  There’s a lot to discuss, and there will be a lot more to come.  So keep writing and we’ll keep reading!  We’ve added these blogs to our “Blogs We Read” section in our sidebar. Check these folks out if you have a chance:
 
Nuclear Brunette - A nuclear engineering student at Georgia Tech University writing about nuclear energy
  
Clean Energy Insight – Young professionals from the North American Young Generation in Nuclear (NA-YGN) who came together to educate and raise awareness of nuclear energy

What is Nuclear? - A great new resource site, explaining some of the finer points of nuclear power in easy-to-understand terms.

The Energy Collective – Not really a new blog, but we don’t think we’ve highlighted them on here before.  It’s a great resource for discussion and debate over the big picture of our 21st-century energy future.

We hope you’ll stop by and give them a read!

While we’re glad the newspapers are sitting up and taking notice of nuclear power’s place in our 21st-century energy mix, we’ve also seen a lot of attention on the new Piketon project from the nuclear energy blogging and news community. We’re proud to present a round-up of some quick reactions to the news from the nuclear energy bloggers and news sources… and we’re looking forward to more in-depth coverage and analysis from our friends in the community in the coming weeks and months!

Rod Adams at Atomic Insights:

At the risk of overloading you with new posts from Atomic Insights – three in one day is a bit much – I have to share one more story that kind of caught me by surprise. Apparently there is going to be a major announcement staged at Piketon, Ohio, the site of a former enrichment facility, on Thursday, June 18. When I first saw the link to the story in my Google Alert, I thought there must have been a misunderstanding by the journalist at the Columbus Dispatch. That does not appear to be the case . . .

All of the publications have pointed to the importance of creating as many as 4,000 new construction jobs in southern Ohio, a region that has been hit hard by the economic recession since it was already having challenges before our current crisis began.

Dan Yurman at Idaho Samizdat:

If you want to know how serious Areva takes this project, consider the fact that Anne Lauvergeon, the CEO of Areva, was in Ohio for the announcement. She said in a telephone interview with the NYT that nuclear power was the only choice for reliable, low-carbon energy.

From World Nuclear News

A new energy project was launched today based around a new nuclear power reactor on the site of the former uranium enrichment plant at Piketon, Ohio.

The plant is being proposed by a group dubbed the Southern Ohio Clean Energy Park Alliance which consists of site owner USEC, the utility Duke Energy, Areva and UniStar Nuclear Energy.

Thanks for the notice, folks!

AREVA CEO Anne Lauvergeon speaks at the announcement ceremony in Piketon, Ohio on June 18, 2009.

Who doesn’t like a little attention? We’re pretty flattered by the interest in the joint announcement of an alliance to develop the nation’s first Clean Energy Park as the Piketon site in Southern Ohio yesterday. Even more, we’re encouraged by the focus on nuclear energy. It’s great to see that this announcement is bringing focus to some important issues.

Rebecca Smith and Mark Peters, Wall Street Journal:

Ohio obtains more than 85% of its electricity from coal incineration, one of the highest amounts of any state. Looming federal carbon legislation could raise the cost of coal-based electricity in coming years, pushing utility companies like Duke to explore lower-carbon options.

Matthew L. Wald, from the New York Times‘s Green Inc. blog, recognizing the strong suits of the location:

Ohio officials, though, hope for a ‘clean energy park’ with a reactor and the enrichment plant. Because the old enrichment process used so much electricity, the site has strong grid connections, and cooling water is available. It is also in a region hungry for industrial development.

The Huffington Post, reprinting an AP story by Terry Kinney:

The site of a former uranium enrichment plant tucked away in the hills of southern Ohio has the necessary infrastructure for a nuclear power plant — abundant water, a power grid and bipartisan political backing.

Mark Niquette, writing for the Columbus Dispatch, on Ohio Gov. Ted Strickland’s speech:

Speaking today on a stage in front of the Portsmouth Gaseous Diffusion plant, [Strickland] said the project would help revitalize southern Ohio’s economy while creating a clean energy source for a state and nation facing climate change.

The Dispatch also picked up on a special note from our CEO Anne Lauvergeon:

I say, ‘Let’s get to work … and go Buckeyes.’

Today Ohio Governor Ted Strickland was in Piketon, Ohio at the U.S. Department of Energy (DOE) Portsmouth site for a major announcement with executives from Duke Energy, AREVA, USEC Inc., UniStar Nuclear Energy and the Southern Ohio Diversification Initiative (SODI). Together they shared news of the formation of an alliance to pursue the development of America’s first clean energy park project on the DOE site.

The clean energy park project builds on the DOE’s initiative to take former weapons sites and transform available resources for use in future clean energy production. This supports the reindustrialization and reutilization of key site assets, while aiding with site cleanup and providing sustainable economic development for the region. Gov. Strickland emphasized the multiple benefits of the project, and how it “will revitalize the region’s economy, further advance Ohio’s nuclear infrastructure, help address our energy needs and be part of Ohio’s solution to the challenge of climate change.”

The initial focus of the alliance, formally known as the Southern Ohio Clean Energy Park Alliance, will be to evaluate the DOE Portsmouth site as a potential location for a new nuclear power plant. AREVA CEO Anne Lauvergeon noted that “an advanced reactor, such as the U.S. EPR™, offers many benefits to the region including providing reliable electricity to more than one million households, without producing greenhouse gases.” The alliance will utilize the various assets of each partner, from project management, licensing, and nuclear operations. It represents a unique opportunity for all parties to transition a portion of a former DOE weapons complex into a commercial asset.

The House Committee on Science and Technology spent the morning listening to information on nuclear fuel recycling from AREVA’s Dr. Alan Hanson, Executive Vice-President of Technology and Used Fuel Management.

Some highlights include Hanson’s analysis of the main benefits and criticisms of recycling:

The main benefits associated with recycling are that it makes waste management easier, provides strategic flexibility and confidence for the long term, and saves natural resources and is able to burn plutonium, thereby reducing proliferation concerns.

• Makes waste management easier by reducing the volume of high level waste for disposal. “When such waste is vitrified, or specially-packed into a highly compact glass-like waste form for final storage, and added to the volume of compacted structural waste, the total volume necessary for final disposal is 75% less than the volume required if the used fuel is disposed directly in a repository.”

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