There are significant consequences. At Fukushima first. The situation must be stabilized rapidly. AREVA is without a doubt part of the solution. The second consequence is the end of “low cost, low safety” nuclear power so highly vaunted just a little while ago. The growth of nuclear power always means increased safety and increased security. The third consequence is the audits all over the world, and the necessarily more concerted approach between safety authorities. The fourth, and not the least, relates to public confidence. Different countries have extremely different reactions. The emotional epicenter is in Germany, but the French have also felt a strong “aftershock”. Elsewhere, the reaction is generally more pragmatic. We’re going to have to rebuild confidence.

But doesn’t the decision of a country as big as Germany signal an irreversible withdrawal from the atom?

Countries bigger than Germany such as China and the United States have confirmed their nuclear power programs, as have South Africa, India and Great Britain. Germany has simply reverted to the decision the Schröder government made in 2000. We weren’t counting on Germany for our long-term development! Naturally, with that mixture of fascination and competition typical of our ties with Germany, France is overawed at the Chancellor’s decision. But she isn’t saying how, in practice, the Germans will feed their growth while reducing their carbon impact.

Read the rest of the interview (as translated from the original article here)

Still, don’t you think that others could emulate it?

Some will try to draw inspiration from it. Especially in France. It’s very good for Germany to bet on renewable energies. AREVA is investing in them, too. And so we’re in a good position to know that they are by nature intermittent, while demand for electricity is continuous. A wind turbine operates on average 25% of the time, for example. To ensure continuous access to electricity, wind farms have to be backed up with gas or coal facilities. That’s more costly and not so efficient in terms of fighting CO2 emissions.

In the wake of Germany and Switzerland, Italy is turning its back on nuclear power. Is France alone now?

Alone with Great Britain, the Netherlands, Hungary, Sweden, Finland, Poland, the Czech Republic, Slovakia. Just taking the European Union, it’s crowded being alone! In Italy, a referendum had already been held in the wake of Chernobyl, in the same emotional context, and sealed the phase-out of nuclear. There was another round after Fukushima, with a strong dose of internal politics added to the mix. The result is no surprise.

But all the same, aren’t some countries hesitant, like the United States?

President Obama clearly reaffirmed that nuclear power is an integral part of the current and future energy mix of the USA. Right now, the price of shale gas extracted with few environmental restrictions makes it very competitive. And as always, the first deposits are the least expensive to extract. That will be less and less true in the future, and prices will naturally rise. The competitive advantage over the new nuclear is destined to recede.

There was a “nuclear winter” after Chernobyl. Don’t you think this will be the case after Fukushima?

No, I don’t think so. In the 1980s, investment in nuclear power had already slowed before the Chernobyl accident because prices for fossil fuels were unbeatable at that time. They’re much higher today and no one foresees a prolonged drop in the future. Nor was climate change a concern in 1986. It’s a major factor in the 21st century.

However, we’re expecting project schedules to slip because the safety authorities want to draw lessons from Fukushima. We’re talking about a few months or even a year in some countries, but in the end their requirements will move towards the generation 3 that AREVA bet on.

What is the impact on the group?

More than 80% of our revenue comes from the installed nuclear base. AREVA could continue to thrive even in the absence of new construction – a prospect I don’t believe for a second. Certainly, we’re going to have to do without the Japanese and German reactors that have been shut down, and to which we had supplied products or services. But the safety authorities’ audits are going to lead to investments in improvements. We’ve drawn up a list of suggestions, sort of a “Doctor AREVA’s prescriptions”, that we’re offering to our customers. Our integrated model enables us to offset the shift in some projects and to react quickly. Moreover, our gamble on renewable energies turns out to be the right one, in Germany as well! We’re also adapting our capital expenditures and continuing to reduce our overheads.

Your term expires at the end of June. You’re a candidate for another term. What’s your plan?

In 10 years, we turned AREVA into the global number 1 in carbon-free energy, both nuclear and renewable energies. We created close to 30,000 jobs in France. The group paid 3.4 billion euros to its shareholders. It would be a pity not to go all the way. I don’t think I’m the worst candidate. Nuclear is an exacting technology, and public opinion of it just as much so. I believe I’ve shown that I’m attached to the development of a nuclear power that meets the highest standards of safety, security and transparency. I also believe I’ve contributed to a calmer discussion of this topic by leaving the religious wars behind us and working towards harnessing synergies between nuclear and renewable energies. I want to continue, with the support of a significantly renewed Executive Board.

How would you qualify your relationship with EDF and its CEO, Henri Proglio?

It’s a relationship of major supplier to major customer. It’s common for this type of relationship to be complicated. We’re working together to develop a new strategic partnership. After Fukushima, skill and efficiency are the order of the day. There can be no doubt that with Henri Proglio, we’ll see eye-to-eye on these points.

The group reported an operating loss last year and will no doubt do so this year…

AREVA has made significant provisions on the OL3 project in recent years. Look at the A380, the A350, and the Boeing 787: all major technological projects have often slower than expected starts, like the EPR. I can’t comment on financial forecasts that haven’t yet been released, but you might be pleasantly surprised! Our strategy was implemented with the support and continuous oversight of our leading shareholder, the French State.

Does nuclear power risk being affected by the French political situation?

The French Greens are hoping to succeed in reproducing the German Greens’ strategy: get the Socialist party to abandon nuclear power and ultimately see a party on the right do the same. But they’re going to run into three parameters to which the French are much attached: our country’s energy self-sufficiency, electricity rates, and the fight against CO2. Not to mention that nuclear power represents more than 400,000 direct and indirect jobs in France and 2% of its GDP, as recently calculated by PriceWaterhouseCoopers. It’s the third largest employer after the automobile and aeronautical sectors and a significant source of exports. Imagine what our trade deficit would be without nuclear power! The debate will be tough but vital for our country.

What will be the scope of the new mining subsidiary?

The mines are a major asset for AREVA and a key component of our integrated model. The nuclear policy committee meeting of February 21 last, chaired by Nicolas Sarkozy, clearly reaffirmed this. Work is in progress to combine all of the mining assets in a single entity. It will be completed by the end of the year.

In offshore wind, will you respond to the requests for proposals for all five zones in France, even if you have to work with several partners?

We’re candidates for the three zones in the English Channel with GDF Suez and Vinci, and we might compete on the other two zones with European partners. It’s an opportunity for us to develop a French industry in this technology. I might add that we’ve identified three potential sites – Cherbourg, Dunkirk and Le Havre – to host our wind turbine manufacturing plants, with more than 1,000 jobs as well.

COMMENTS MADE TO NICOLAS BARRÉ, DAVID BARROUX AND THIBAUT MADELIN

Anne Lauvergeon, CEO AREVA

She offered “her perspective on how to satisfy growing global energy needs while decreasing carbon dioxide emissions, protecting natural resources, and maintaining price stability and competition.”

Click here to access CFR’s site for the full-length video.

Ms. Lauvergeon, 51, known as Atomic Anne, is one of the most prominent female executives in Europe, and one of the most independent minded — perhaps too much so for France’s male-dominated elite. She is fighting for her job, and as usual here, the battle is as much personal as professional. At the same time, the nuclear industry she represents is facing its largest challenge since the meltdown at Three Mile Island, and how the unfolding tragedy in Japan will affect her future is anyone’s guess.

She has an ambitious, global vision for Areva, which she constructed in 2001 as a merger of other French companies. Areva is engaged in nearly all aspects of nuclear energy, from mining and engineering to construction and recycling. Ms. Lauvergeon, Areva’s first and only boss, seeks outside investors and clients, while others want to impose more centralized control over Areva, its assets and its profits, and want her gone.

Click here to read the full article.

[She] has been the guiding force behind her country’s massive push into nuclear energy, which today fuels 75 percent of all its electricity. And now, she believes, nuclear’s next big global moment has arrived. “The cheap price of oil and gas is over for the future,” she tells NEWSWEEK. “Nuclear isn’t the only solution, but it is part of the solution.”

The piece includes a few hiccups. For example, Anne Lauvergeon never said she was “an icon”. And the writer’s mention seems gratuitous that a recent AREVA agreement in Saudi Arabia for solar energy development with the Saudi Binladen group — the nation’s largest engineering firm — has a famous relative named Osama. The more relevant point is how beneficial AREVA’s solar thermal technology could be in the deserts of the Arabian peninsula.

But it is overall a good piece and worth reading.

Below is the English translation of an opinion piece written by Anne Lauvergeon, CEO of AREVA, and published today in the French daily Le Monde.

Reindustrialize!

Anne Lauvergeon, CEO of AREVA

Anne Lauvergeon

The French are the world champions of pessimism. In my mind, this is the result of politically correct thinking that either theorizes our complete decline, erasing France from the history books, or conveys a slick illusion of France to the world in a Western-centric reflex. We’re gripped by this schizophrenia.

In one case, the fear of a changing world, with emerging countries bursting onto the international scene, produces irrational anxiety that clouds our reason. In the other, our heads in the sand, we continue to speechify, thinking that at the worst France and at the best Europe will be able to hold onto the dominance acquired during the industrial revolution. Since it’s fashionable to cry out¹, here’s my two cents:

I’m tired of these horsemen of the apocalypse, many of whom come from the elite, who reduce our common destiny to a dire alternative: suffer or die.

I head up an industrial group that is a global number one in nuclear power, ranked first in Europe and the US and expanding quickly in China and India.

I have developed a strong conviction from this experience: industry is the priority.

Let’s be lucid. The decades to come will continue to be decades of globalization, but also of a new phenomenon: deglobalization. Increasingly, the economies of the emerging countries and of the Western world are interlinked, but the progress of these new powers will also be determined by how their internal needs are met. This will effect profound change in the international division of labor and intelligence. If we don’t react now, we’ll suffer lasting decline together. In those circumstances, whether we are fatalistic or cry out, the effect will be the same.

I advocate a third path: one of pragmatism. By repeating that these are uncertain times, we have lost all our certainty. And yet the figures speak volumes: of the 500 leading companies in the world identified by Fortune magazine in 2010, 39 are French!

There are a few prerequisites to opening the debate on French industrial policy. First of all, because the debate affects the lives of several million people, it must be completely transparent and cannot be reduced to the interests of a few experts. Secondly, the time frames for industry, and particularly for the nuclear industry, are long. Changes of direction whenever the wind blows, petty compromises and personal quarrels do not deal with the challenges. “France Inc.” needs a sound, long-term strategy.

In the next 20 years, 250 new nuclear power plants will be launched around the world. French industry will have to fight to maintain its ranking as global number one. Nuclear power is thus a major national cause. Within this sector, AREVA is a great asset. It took us ten years to create an integrated group, from mining to power plant construction. Ten years of work and innovation to offer diversified products and services in nuclear power and renewables suited to each customer’s needs.

In my mind, with more than 80% of its capital held by the public sector, AREVA is a little piece of France. Everyone owns it, and its guidance, its strategy and its leaders cannot be chosen under cloak of darkness. It’s no secret that I’m a candidate for a new term at the head of this group. And I’m ready to discuss what needs to be done for the French nuclear industry, because at the same time I want to make my own contribution to its renewal.

In a world where one must rely on one’s own strengths above all, it is urgent for France to reindustrialize. But in our heads first. The word “industry” has been banished from our vocabulary for more than twenty years: the painful closings of primary industries, the excessive financialization of the economy and the need for environmental conversion have led our elites, our businessmen and our citizens to turn away from this development model, admittedly associated with a “glorious” past, but now out of date. And yet innovation has changed this sector radically. Safer, more value-producing technologies have substituted for brute human strength. Few have perceived this change and, with the notable exception of the energy sector, industry is struggling to attract young engineers. More proof? France’s deficit in industrial investment is put at one hundred billion euros. But industry can’t live on words; it needs examples.

Ten years ago, the nuclear industry was seen as antiquated and without a future. We refused to resign ourselves to this and we took a chance. In 2000, for example, it looked like our Chalon-sur-Saône plant was doomed: orders from its only customer, EDF, were sporadic once its French reactor fleet had been built. I rejected the recommendation to shut down and elected to transform a collection of old tools into a real plant.

Ten years after the fact, the plant is still there, but bigger, with twice as many employees and ten times the revenue. Heavy industrial components are dispatched to the US, to Finland, to China and to EDF, which was able to keep its national supplier at its side throughout this internationalization.

At AREVA, the exact opposite of the declining trend in French industry is reflected in the 26,000 new hires made in 3 years, powerful research and development (10% of our revenue), and 70% of our capital spending in France, even though our sales are primarily abroad.

I am convinced that with unfailing willpower, sound choices and a common goal, we can hold our heads high: the “French decline” is not fated in the industrial field. The French decline is not fated.

© Le Monde. All rights reserved – February 2011.

The question before us is the following: what are the energy possible solutions that can meet all of our growing needs while preserving our natural resources and the climate, and remain competitive?

There are, in effect, two urgent issues which we must confront: of course, there is the issue of climate change, but also equal access to energy. This is a major challenge. Today nearly 2 billion people simply do not have access to a source of affordable and reliable energy. Living without electricity reduces life expectancy by a factor of two. This is the first issue that we must face!

Energy is inextricably linked to development. Too many countries have been bypassed by the first two energy revolutions, that of carbon and that of gas and electricity. The third energy revolution must be the time for us to engage on a sustainable development path.

The truth is that there is no one unique solution, no magic bullet that alone would assure the transition to an economy without carbon that our planet needs.

The response lies in a balanced portfolio of solutions that begins with available energies, and it is absurd to pit one against another: fossil fuels, which we cannot do without; of course, renewables; and nuclear energy when the choice is appropriate. They all have their advantages and their disadvantages. Each energy source has its use. Nothing can be done without considerable efforts in the areas of energy efficiency and R&D.

Yes, Ladies and Gentlemen, I said nuclear AND renewables. These different technologies are not incompatible. On the contrary, they complement and reinforce each other!

Read the entire speech in French here.

This was also cross-posted @ www.energy2point0.com

We would love to hear everyone’s reaction, posted either at the Energy2point0 site or at our blog… For those of you not in Montreal, we’ll work to post a transcript as soon afterward as we can.

Also cross-posted @ Energy2point0.com.

For an intriguing and informative discussion on energy, check out the video below:

From www.charlierose.com

Anne Lauvergeon

In a story posted online today, “AREVA Chief talks Power,” Forbes describes Lauvergeon’s confidence in nuclear energy despite the obstacles.

“Lauvergeon isn’t concerned. She is betting big on the U.S. Areva is building a nuclear power plant component factory with Northrup Grumman in Virginia. It recently won a $2 billion Department of Energy loan guarantee to build a uranium enrichment facility in Idaho. It is building a facility in South Carolina to transform excess weapons-grade plutonium into fuel for nuclear reactors.

And, perhaps most significantly, one of Areva’s reactor designs, called the US-EPR, is one of two favorites to win the next nuclear loan guarantee. Constellation Energy and the French utility Electricité de France are hoping to build a US-EPR at Constellation’s Calvert Cliffs site in southern Maryland.”

As the U.S. nuclear solutions leader, “Lauvergeon sees it as Areva’s responsibility to restart the nuclear industry here, from building new facilities to trying to get California to change its anti-nuke laws.”

In Forbes Woman, Lauvergeon also discussed the need for diversity and women in leadership roles, saying “If you want to be in the energy business, you need to reflect the societies as they are.”