ArcelorMittal - Areva in €70-million special steels pact to aid Burgundy Nuclear Partnership

03 July 2008

Luxembourg: ArcelorMittal and Areva have announced €70-million joint investment to boost ingot-production at Le Creusot in the Burgundy district of  France, that would increase the steel maker's ingot production capacity for forging nuclear components.

At a cermony attended by French  President  Nicolas Sarkozy, in the village of Le Creusot, where 80 per cent of the components required to build an EPR can be produced, Areva CEO Anne Lauvergeon and Aditya Mittal, chief financial officer of ArcelorMittal, signed the investment agreement that aims to increase production at the ArcelorMittal group subsidiary, Industeel. 

This investment will benefit all the nuclear players in the Burgundy who have joined forces in a competitiveness cluster known as Pôle Nucléaire de Bourgogne or the The Burgundy Nuclear Partnership.

For ArcelorMittal the deal is part of multi-year steel plant development programme in France, which it promised the government to overcome French resistance to Mittal Steel's battle for the acquisition of its No2 rival Arcelor SA. The programme will be implemented at a total investment of €1 billion notably in Dunkirk, Fos and Florange.

With the signing of the agreement between nuclear power and steel giants, 100 per cent of the components for reactor vessels would be made at Le Creusot, Areva said. The investment, which will be staggered between 2008 and 2010, will increase ingot production capacity at Industeel significantly (from 35,000 tons to 50,000 tons per year.

The AREVA group will also be investing in its Creusot Forge subsidiary to increase the production of forged parts used to manufacture nuclear reactor components, such as vessels and steam generators.