LEBORGNE

FRANCE (see also List of Individuals)

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19.3.1927 Rennes/F - 6.5.1989 Pipriac/F

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Philippe Leborgne graduated from Ecole Centrale des Arts et Manufactures to enter Electricité de France EDF in 1952. From there, he also continued education at Ecole Supérieure d'Electrotechnique. He passed his entire career with EDF and was active in about all French catchments of hydraulic power production. He headed the regional River Rhine production group from 1977 and in 1982 was promoted to deputy head of the EDF hydraulic power production. He was a Council Member of Société Hydrotechnique de France SHF from 1983 and left it four years later because he had accepted presidency over Société Française des Mécaniciens SFM. During his earlier membership and as president, Leborgne linked the knowledge of hydraulic laboratories with the needs of the French hydropower industries. He also initiated various items in that Society, such as the Lettre de la SFM. Leborgne passed away due to a strike that occurred while driving from the West of France to Paris.

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In the early 1950s, Leborgne contributed to the modernization of dams erected in the 1920s and 1930s. In 1956, he was transferred to the Savoy Department to reorganize the maintenance of hydropower plants owned by EDF. In 1962, then heading a group of engineers, Leborgne was in the Dordogne River catchment to improve several turbines, based on laboratory experimentation at the Neyrpic Laboratory in Grenoble. In 1965, Leborgne took over direction of the EDF department Technical coordination, where he integrated novel technologies in existing power plants. He was also involved in the execution of the Rance hydropower plant on the Atlantic Ocean. From 1971 to 1974, he was the vice-director of the Massif-Centrale EDF group and there modernized eleven power plants producing a total of 2,750 MW. During the 1970s and 1980s, Leborgne contributed significantly to the normally annual French national conferences Journées de l'Hydraulique and to Société Hydrotechnique de France SHF.

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_{Anonymous (1989). Philippe Leborgne. La Houille Blanche 44(5): 338.}

_{Anonymous (1990). L'histoire de l'hydraulique à travers la vie d'un hydraulicien: Philippe Leborgne. EDF: Paris. P}

_{Dat, R. (1989). In memoriam: Philippe Leborgne. Revue Française de Mécanique 28(1): 133. Leborgne, P. (1986). Les lacs de retenue et leur géstion. 19 Journées d'Hydraulique Paris V: 1-9.}

_{Leborgne, P. (1989). Système de gestion des aménagements hydro-électriques du Service de la production hydraulique. Revue de l'Energie 40(3/4): 184-189.}

_{Pelce, V. (2004). Philippe Leborgne. Personal communication. P}