Anne Lauvergeon, Areva

Monday 15th March 2010

Whatever way you cut it it’s a huge achievement for a French woman to be hired as chairman of a high profile French nuclear-engineering company – all before reaching that crucial threshold, 50. Lauvergeon though has been embedded deeply in France’s industrial energy and nuclear industries since the early eighties. She’s also the non-exec of Vodafone Group as well as a director at Total. Clearly a high achiever and also one of the most powerful women in France.

In many ways France is still a very conservative place for women in the work place, which makes Lauvergeon’s achievements all the more impressive. She’s also well aware of how the nuclear industry is perceived from the outside: secretive; controversial; high risk. Part of the problem for nuclear players too – and Lauvergeon must know this – is that safety and research standards vary hugely globally. Which means the industry is often judged by the least conscientious. But there’s an “in-the-air’ perception that the global nuclear industry is somehow sorting itself out, despite concerns regarding safety fears.

The perception turnabout is helped too by the issue of oil, or rather its lack. The cost of carbon fuels – oil, natural gas – has pushed the nuclear issue back on the agenda and is now being given serious headroom in places like China; even places like the UK, Germany and Scandinavia are now revisiting their old prejudices. Certainly it is marketed heavily by the French government; almost everywhere he goes Sarkozy pushes the technology, from the UN to India, Libya and Scandinavia.

Change agent
So how did Lauvergeon get to the top of the world’s biggest nuclear player? She’s the daughter of a historian. She grew up in Orleans studying chemistry and physics at university before joining Paris’ engineering school, the École des Mines. Then came stints at steel company Usinor (now part of Arcelor Mittal) and she’s also done time as a partner at Lazard Frères. She’s even served as an aide to Francois Mitterrand.

But now she leads a huge public multinational born out of quite a tangled relationship between the French state, Siemens and an assortment of other players. The complex web of interwoven relationships is more or less credited to her own making.

But you have to roll back to the end of the nineties to see Lauvergeon really staking out her territory. In 1999 she was CEO of Cogema, the state-owned nuclear processing services company. And it was at Cogema that Lauvergeon started to up the nuclear PR game. She knew she had to take the argument against nuclear power to the enemy and confront them on their own terms. Challenging environmentalists, she made clear the need for an alternative for oil and gas. It was a clever tack that saw many people increasingly take the debate of nuclear power more seriously.  
In an interview with Utility Week she said the industry simply had to come out of the closet after a pretty rough ride lasting at least 15 years. “A good illustration of this,” she told the trade magazine, “is to look at what’s happening in America. Nuclear power stations are now being bought for ever higher prices. Why? Because the perception of what the industry has to offer is changing. In fact the Clean Air Act has tended to help us – because our stations don’t pollute the environment. I mention this because what happens in the States often tends to be a precursor for what happens elsewhere. So I am confident of a rosy future for our industry. But not through shirking difficult issues or trying to sweep awkward questions under the carpet – as may have been the case in the past.”

Statements like this simply blew much of the critics away. Or at least forced them to reassemble their arguments while she took the initiative and the agenda.

Safety – the big nuclear worry
So what about Lauvergeon’s safety record? Nuclear energy critics waste no time into laying into the company. Areva had to respond pretty sharply when it discovered an underground pipe had burst at a plant in Romans-sur-Isere, southeast France, run by an Areva subsidiary recently. The pipe, inspectors discovered, had been broken for some years causing a uranium leak. Another leak at the Tricastin site near Avignon also caused a great deal of concern when liquid containing unenriched uranium leaked from a factory managed by Socatri, another Aveda subsidiary. This leaked into the ground and into two local rivers. There’s also been concern in Finland where regulators have complained of a lack of information over the Olkiluoto 3 plant. To cap all this, a new generation of French nuclear power reactors have come under attack after three nuclear safety bodies insisted on design changes – nuclear safety bodies in France, Britain and Finland were concerned that there was a lack of independence between the normal day-to-day and emergency systems.

Yet Lauvergeon’s influence is certainly changing perceptions in places like the UK. Almost all eleven sites nominated by the nuclear industry as suitable for new nuclear power stations have been approved by the British government. The only location that has been rejected was Dungeness in Kent. It’s still not known whether Areva or a Westinghouse-led consortium will build a raft of new nuclear reactors worth more than £10bn. A decision is expected around Easter.

Harnessing the sun
A possible move into public ownership for Areva could have occurred back in 2005. But both Lauvergeon and France’s finance minister at the time, Thierry Breton, failed to get on. The two have endured public spats. Certainly when Lauvergeon is riled, she sticks to her guns. “I have a little bit of the peasant in me,” she has said. “When someone promises me a kingdom, I get suspicious.”

She was certainly promised a kingdom of sorts back in 2004. That was when Sarkozy wanted Lauvergeon to bail out troubled engineering operator Alston. She declined, despite huge pressure. On the other hand, she did purchase Alstom’s electrical transmission and distribution business for $1.2bn (Sarkozy was hoping for more than $2.7bn at the time). So she’s a tough nut. Part of this toughness is often readily recognised at meetings. She’s direct, with a sharp sense of humour; she can do the hauteur many French CEOs display; she’s studied with the elite and knows their tricks. Very little escapes her.

She also usually has her eye on the ‘Next Big Thing’. Before going to press Areva announced it had bought Californian company Ausra, which specialises in harnessing energy from the sun. What Ausra has developed is a system of reflectors that can use the sun’s energy to create steam and therefore power a turbine. Expect, then, more similar acquisitions like these in future. Acquisitions like these are also a philosophical match. For some time Lauvergeon has stated that Areva is not a nuclear power company; rather it is a leader in CO2-free energy.

But Areva, under Lauvergeon, still has a bit of the wild child in it. One difficulty Lauvergeon does have is getting on with home-grown rival EDF. The rivalry between the two energy companies caused the French government to pull the two warring CEOs, Lauvergeon and Henri Proglio, together for a dressing down at the start of the year. That was difficult: tension was high after Areva was turned down for a $20bn contract to build up to four nuclear power plants in the United Arab Emirates. Co-ordination – or its lack – between Areva and EDF was one of the alleged reasons for the job rejection. “This is pathetic,” said Senator Ladislas Poniatowksi, from Sarkzoy’s UMP party to Reuters later.

So Lauvergeon isn’t perfect. But for many French women, she comes very, very close.

Commments

Anne is an impressive and dynamic woman! Fascinating to hear her interview with Charlie Rose today!

Posted by lynn hansen

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