France sets out renewables agenda

The early closure of the Fessenheim nuclear plant and coalition promises to boost renewables could signal that France is ready to get serious about green generation, says Simon Jones

France’s president Francois Hollande has brought forward the closure of the country’s oldest nuclear plant by six months and promised that expansion of France’s small and struggling renewables industry will be the focus of a forthcoming energy bill. He has also reaffirmed his aim to cut nuclear power’s share of France’s energy mix from 75 per cent – more than any other country – to 50 per cent by 2025.

Closure of the Fessenheim plant in Alsace, near the border with Germany and Switzerland, was part of the Socialist-Green joint manifesto in France’s presidential election earlier this year. Fessenheim has operated since 1977. Its age, location in an earthquake zone and a series of safety scares have all eroded public support for the plant, even in pro-nuclear France. A mid-October meeting of the council on nuclear policies confirmed that the 1.8GW plant’s two reactors will shut by the end of 2016. The council also announced that a third-­generation pressurised water reactor at Flamanville will be the only nuclear plant to come online in Hollande’s five-year term.

Policy tensions

Moving Fessenheim up the agenda is being done in part to ease tensions over energy policy within the governing alliance. Industry minister Arnaud Montebourg’s recent remarks that nuclear power is “a tremendous asset” and “an industry for the future” outraged many Greens. Fukushima has done little to shake such opinions among France’s political elite, mindful of potential global exports and the clout of a strongly unionised nuclear workforce. Montebourg’s views are more likely to reflect government policy over the next five years than prime minister Jean-Marc Ayrault’s claim that next year’s energy law will help “promote a complete rupture with nuclear energy”.

The new government is only committed to closing Fessenheim. Some pre-election estimates suggested Hollande’s nuclear output target threatened at least 20 of France’s 58 active reactors, but EDF chief executive Henri Proglio insists the part played by nuclear power in France is reducing anyway. He says an expanding population and rising per capita consumption mean current capacity will only cover 60 per cent of projected demand by 2025.

Renewables restructuring

Ayrault told a September conference on environmental and energy transition that “the development and restructuring” of France’s renewables sector was key to future energy policy. A second offshore wind tender for up to 1.3GW capacity at Noirmoutier and Le Treport will be announced later this year – part of a package promoting wind and solar expansion. Ayrault also promised political support for the current feed-in tariff – some payments have been on hold pending a European Court ruling – and financial backing via a state investment bank. The government will abolish red tape such as rules limiting new projects to special “wind development” zones.

Industry welcomed the measures, which aim to reverse last year’s 20 per cent drop in new wind investments. “Our voice has been heard,” says Nicolas Wolff, general manager of Vestas France and head of wind association FEE.

New tenders for large-scale solar will also be published this year. Environment minister Delphine Batho plans to increase tariffs for this depressed sector, with a possible bonus rate for panels made in Europe. Second-generation biofuel is another renewables segment set for expansion. “Renewables have immense potential and I regret France’s delayed entry into this sector,” says Hollande. “It is vitally urgent that we now agree a coherent renewables strategy.”

The French president is also calling for a 40 per cent cut in European carbon dioxide emissions by 2030, rising to 60 per cent by 2040. He says the move would encourage other states to fix similar firm targets. Measures included in the country’s draft budget will triple the taxes on some gas emissions by France’s most polluting coal-fired plants.

Hollande argues that prices “must better reflect the social and environmental costs of goods and services”. A draft law soon to be debated in parliament will apply this principle to energy usage by private households. The measure will use progressive tariffs to punish “wasteful” gas and power consumption. Energy efficiency measures include insulation of one million homes per year.

Hollande will also maintain former president Nicolas Sarkozy’s ban on fracking. He told the annual Paris environmental conference that seven licence applications to extract oil and gas from shale using hydraulic ­fracking had already been rejected.

This article first appeared in Utility Week’s print edition of 9th November 2012.

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