VINCI - 2005 annual report

CONSTRUCTION / ACTIVITY
Soyuz project in French Guiana
The European Space Agency awarded
the construction of the ground infrastructure
for the Soyuz programme in French Guiana
to a consortium led by VINCI Construction
Grands Projets. The €135 million contract
covers construction of the preparation zone,
a launch pad and a launch centre, with a
20,000 sq. metre built area and 86,000 sq.
metres of roads. Work is to be completed for
a fi rst launch scheduled at the end of 2008.
VINCI companies have worked on a large
number of projects at the Kourou site,
including several launch complexes
for Ariane launchers, since the 1960s.
96
VINCI 2005 ANNUAL REPORT
DAMS, MARITIME WORKS. In Egypt, the Naga Hammadi dam project
on the Nile, on which some 2,000 people are now working, entered full
production. In Algeria the Ghrib dam extension project, involving the
installation of 20 fusegates with a height of 4.50 metres to increase water
retention capacity by 70 million cu. metres, got under way. On Reunion
Island, a consortium made up exclusively of VINCI Construction companies
won the €73 million contract to extend the island’s Port-Réunion commercial
shipping port, which includes construction of a 635 metre pier with an
underground cut-off wall. In New Caledonia, the group won the €61 million
contract to build a port serving the future Goro Nickel mining operations in
Prony Bay. In Qatar, DEME is performing the dredging work to build the Pearl
of the Gulf artifi cial island and an airport. In Belgium, DEME also won a
six-year renewal of its coastal maintenance contract.
HYDRAULIC ENGINEERING. In France, business in the hydraulic engineering
sector consists of a very large number of recurring local projects
carried out by Group subsidiaries, alongside major projects such as utility
network re-routing in conjunction with the tramway construction projects
in such cities as Paris, Bordeaux and Nice. In a further demonstration of
the company’s civil engineering capabilities applied to water treatment, VINCI
Construction took part in the construction and/or modernisation of purifi cation
plants (27 under construction or modernisation, in addition to 23 new
orders) including the very large Valenton and Achères units in the Paris area.
In the United Kingdom VINCI PLC signed a fi ve-year national framework
agreement to renovate drinking water plants and sewage treatment works
(£9 million in contracts awarded in 2005). The Group is also building
the drinking water treatment plant in Hradiste, a city with a population
of 250,000 in the Czech Republic; building the drinking water and sewer
systems in Entebbe and Kabale, Uganda; renovating water systems in Jamaica;
and building 11 pumping stations, 9 reservoirs and 8 water towers in Ouagadougou,
Burkina Faso. In Libya, the Group is taking part in the third phase
of the Great Man-Made River project, building two pumping stations with
a unit capacity of one million cu. metres per day and two storage reservoirs.
MAJOR ENERGY AND INDUSTRIAL FACILITIES. Several major projects
called on the complementary expertise of VINCI Construction business units,
particularly in the former French overseas territory regions. In French Guiana,
the Group won the contract to build the launch pad for Soyuz launch vehicles,
and in New Caledonia the €60 million contract to build the new Goro Nickel
ore treatment plant comprising some 20 industrial structures spread over
10 hectares, in addition to orders for the port at this site and the ongoing
work on a 2 x 50 MW coal-fi red conventional thermal power station. Activity
was also strong on the developing market for liquefi ed natural gas (LNG)
tanks, with a 140,000 cu. metre project under way in Qatar and two complexes
with two 160,000 cu. metre unit capacity tanks to be built in Italy and Mexico.
In the nuclear sector, the Group is providing the prestressing for the newgeneration
European reactor (EPR) being built in Olkiluoto, Finland, and it is
taking part in the construction of a test reactor (the RES project) in Cadarache
in southern France and an underground laboratory (two 500 metre deep
shafts) to be used for experiments in deep storage of nuclear waste.