In a further industry consolidation, BNFL has bought ABB’s nuclear business for $485 million. The deal follows the recently announced merger between Siemens and Framatome (See NEI, Jan, p2) and BNFL’s purchase of Westinghouse last year. As a result of these moves there remain only two global players offering nuclear plant engineering and development, as well as fuel manufacturing, waste processing and decommissioning.
Based in Connecticut, ABB Combustion Engineering (the two companies joined forces to form ABB-CE in the early 1990s) will be integrated within Westinghouse Electric. In purchasing ABB-CE, BNFL has strengthened its hand in the BWR market and gained a much stronger position in Asia. Most recently, ABB-CE has provided Korea with eight BWRs, four of which are still under construction.
“The acquisition expands our technology portfolio by bringing ABB’s boiling water reactor systems into our product mix,” said BNFL chief executive John Taylor. “This move also allows us to further expand our activities in the US, Europe and Asia, enabling us to provide our customers with a broader range of product and service offerings supplied by an expanded global sales and service organisation.” In the US, ABB-CE plants include Palisades, Maine Yankee, Fort Calhoun, Palo Verde, Waterford, St Lucie, Calvert Cliffs and Millstone.
ABB-CE employs about 3000 people, including 750 at the global headquarters in Windsor, Connecticut and 1000 at Västeras in Sweden.
