January-February 2019 NPJ

Nuclear Plant Journal, January-February 2019 NuclearPlantJournal.com 25 The I&C is a dedicated business unit with more than 1,300 people within Framatome that was created prior to the acquisition. We’ve got a large organization that’s spread out across the globe, with a large contingency in France and in Germany, and a significant amount of people in the U.S., some in Canada and in other parts of the world. We see a lot of opportunity to really be able to support the market as a full capacity I&C business unit that could do everything from the technology or system design to having multiple qualified platforms in different regulatory environments. It’s a robust organization globally. The acquisition made our pipeline and our portfolio stronger. We effectively became the original equipment manufacturer (OEM) for a lot of accounts, legacy- wise, because of what Framatome bought from Schneider. It gives us a lot of opportunity to satisfy some of the regulatory challenges that formerly required multiple companies. Framatome can now go into pretty much any regulatory framework globally with a portfolio that satisfies most of the regulatory challenges and can put together a solution that is robust and sustainable for the long term. I’m pretty excited about that, and I’m certainly glad to be the deputy of the organization leading this effort. I think we’ve got a lot of opportunities; it’s just now a matter of helping the utilities understand what they need to do over the next few years to get their plants in a condition to operate safely and efficiently over the next several years. 6. Concluding remarks. I think is important that we figure out, how to truly modernize the plants to allow them to extend their operating lifetimes. Part of the frustration has been the commercial aspects of looking at how to modernize. I&C has always been a challenge because there has always been a difficulty in demonstrating the return on investment. The Electric Power Research Institute (EPRI) is undertaking an effort to look at the costs and benefits of putting in digital systems, because there is potential for a lot of benefit, particularly on the non-safety side. When we look at the betterments or improvements on systems, especially on feedwater and steam bypass control, etc., you start capturing megawatts, and therefore you start capturing your return on investment very quickly. If you look at safety upgrades and the fact that the technologies today are much more robust, and you’re able to now take a lot more credit for the diagnostic capabilities of technology, there’s an opportunity to re-look at staffing at the plants as surveillances can be reduced or eliminated. To this point, everybody’s been looking at the pure technology challenges, which I think the industry’s done a really good job at resolving. Now it’s a matter of having the regulatory framework in place to allow the utilities to look at the complete view and the financial benefit of modernizing the plant. Ultimately, that’s IS IT TIME TO UPGRADE? 770.879.4400 www.wisgrp.com Digital Turbine Controls Crane Upgrades, Modernization & Rebuild Preventive Maintenance Upgrading to the Latest Control Systems Improves Plant Reliability, Safety, and Reduce Operating Costs Let us help you get what you need the key to getting plants where they need to be to operate safely and efficiently for a long time. I think Framatome’s experience can help the industry to get there. Contact: Framatome Media Relations, telephone: (434) 856-6560, email: media. relations@framatome.com. We NeedYour Feedback on Nuclear Plant Journal Content. Email: michelle@goinfo.com