FRENCH president Nicolas Sarkozy recently paid a visit to a factory owned by the air conditioning manufacturer CIAT.
Sarkozy met with shop floor staff and listened to the technical explanations about CIAT's latest innovations which were presented in CIAT's industrial plant and its Research and Innovation centre. The site houses the production units of high capacity heat pumps and chillers.

Jean-Pierre Falconnier CIAT chairman of the supervisory board and Francis Guaitoli CIAT chairman of the directorate, showed CIAT's range of geothermal and air source heat pumps to president Sarkozy and his ministers: Jean-Louis Borloo, minister for the environment; Christine Lagarde, minister of economic affairs, industry and employment; Chantal Jouanno, secretary of state for ecology and Eric Woerth, minister of budget.

Sarkozy, chose to visit CIAT's industrial plant in Culoz (the group's biggest production site) before delivering his speech announcing his conditions for the implementation of the carbon tax in France.

In his speech, president Sarkozy said: 'France has set itself the objective of reducing the consumption of energy in buildings and accommodation by almost 40% by the year 2020'. He then referred to the Copenhagen climate change summit in December at which a new international climate treaty will be agreed. 'Until then, France is determined to continue to argue unremittingly so that all the nations of the world volunteer to commit to the reduction of their carbon dioxide emissions', he added.

CIAT has a 2,300 strong workforce working in nine industrial plants in France, Italy, Spain, India and China. Five of its sites are based in France. The group's turnover was 366m euros in 2008, of which 50% of its turnover is generated abroad.