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Good afternoon, and thank you for inviting me to be part of this prestigious panel examining the opportunities for nuclear energy around the world.

Con permiso , I would like to give my presentation in Spanish. I apologize for my accent, but I will give it my best effort.

I am delighted to be in Madrid. I toured the city this weekend, and I was greatly impressed with its cultural, architectural and artistic achievements. While I am here, I hope to see some of the exhibits at the Prado, such as the one there now commemorating the 400th anniversary of the birth of King Felipe IV.¹

As I understand it, Felipe didn’t live a happy life. One account says he was only seen to laugh publicly three times. But he became king almost 170 years before my country had its first president, and he was a great patron of the arts.² It is humbling to see such visible reminders of how much the so-called “new world” still has to learn from the “old world,” and to see how comfortably the treasured culture of the past blends here with technologies of the present.

Spain is a country that preserves buildings like the marvelous old post office—even as it creates such modern, high-tech structures as Trillo, Cofrentes, Santa Maria de Garoña and other Spanish nuclear plants.

In a nation that so easily mixes history, tradition and culture with high-tech industries—including energy—there seems to be a harmony that is uniquely modern.