On January 18, 2011, AREVA CEO Anne Lauvergeon and Gilbert Marchiol, chairman of the Union of Metallurgical Crafts and Industries of the Rhone (UIMM), inaugurated a training platform in Lyon dedicated to the nuclear maintenance profession.
The training program is the culmination of a partnership begun five years ago between AREVA and the UIMM training center: the Association of Professional Training for Rhone Industry (AFPI).
With a strong base in Lyon and the Rhone-Alps region, the group has an ongoing need for technicians to maintain nuclear power plants in France and abroad to ensure that they operate well and to enhance performance and safety.
To meet this need, AREVA and the AFPI set up a customized work/professional training program that led to the hiring of 80 young technicians over a period of three years. With a technical or professional associate degree and two to three years of work experience, or a French baccalaureate degree and two years of higher education, these young people underwent one year of training in various maintenance techniques, both onsite and in AREVA's and AFPI's training centers in Lyon.
On the occasion of the inauguration, the CQPM (certificate of dual qualification in metallurgy) was given to the nuclear maintenance technician class of 2009-2010, their passport for employment with AREVA.