Lynchburg is perhaps best known as the home of the late Rev. Jerry Falwell and his Liberty University. But the city is gaining a reputation for something else, one of the highest job growth rates in Virginia.
While affected by some of the woes of the national economy — unemployment is up and home sales are down — Lynchburg is adding jobs linked to a nuclear renaissance in the United States.
Two of the area’s largest employers are nuclear services companies and they’re ramping up their facilities and staff. Areva NP, a leading designer and builder of nuclear power plants around the world, has its North American headquarters in Lynchburg. Last year it submitted for federal review a new nuclear power reactor design. It plans to build an EPR (Evolutionary Pressurized Reactor) in the U.S. by 2015.
To meet that goal, Areva in Lynchburg is hiring at least 500 engineers and other professionals over the next three years, most of whom will earn more than $60,000 per year — nearly twice the region’s average household income.
Meanwhile, Babcock & Wilcox, is preparing for increased demand for heavy forgings and other components it makes for nuclear power plants. It is also growing its work force, though it has not attached a number to the expansion.
Together, the companies already employ more than 4,500 people in Lynchburg. As that number grows, regional leaders are watching for ripple effects in the housing market, in retail sales and in other high-tech businesses. Virginia Employment Commission projections say the region could add more than 7,000 jobs by 2014, reaching 117,200 jobs total.
“This is an exciting time for the nuclear industry, and we’re seeing that manifest itself in Lynchburg,” says Rex Hammond, president of the Lynchburg Regional Chamber of Commerce. The director of Region 2000’s Economic Development Partnership, Bryan David, says the expansion of the nuclear companies is a “game changer” in the region’s efforts to attract skilled workers. “These are knowledge workers,” David says. “These are the kind of highly skilled, highly trained workers that other communities are trying to attract.”
1 comment:
This is nothing but the same old hyped-up wishful thinking and palaver the nuclear industry wants citizens to believe. Wall Street DETESTS the nuclear industry because it is so risky an investment as to be considered foolhardy; the risk being far too great to sustain any kind of reward. In addition, the majority of citizens now understand how the industry has lied to them regarding the deadly poisons it has been spewing into our environment - which includes the accidents in Lynchburg - and our bodies for decades. President-elect Obama is ramping up his renewable energy program as I write this. Finally, does VA Uranium really believe that the majority of people are stupid enough to invest in an industry that not only can't sustain itself, but whose costs are ASTRONOMICAL? THE VOTERS OF VIRGINIA GAVE YOU THEIR ANSWER LASTNIGHT: BYE-BYE Mr. Coles and VA Uranium! THE CITIZENS OF THIS COUNTY AND VIRGINIA WILL NEVER LET YOU MINE URANIUM AND WE WILL NEVER STOP FIGHTING YOU!
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