The vote was expected to be tight. After a technical breakdown that delayed the ballot, the renewable energy acceleration bill was finally adopted by the National Assembly on Tuesday, January 10, by 286 votes against 238. Good news for the climate? The executive, which is betting on this text for France to catch up in this area (and to green its image at the same time), is convinced of this. What is striking, however, on reading the bill, is the lack of real progress it contains.
This text had one objective: to reduce installation times for wind and photovoltaic projects, so that they can be deployed more quickly. This is indeed one of France’s main weaknesses: it takes, for example, five to seven years today to complete an onshore wind project, compared to three to four years in Germany. As a result, renewable energies (RE) – wind, solar, wood, hydraulic – represent only 19.3% of our gross final energy consumption, far from the target set at 23% that we should have reached in 2020.
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Will this text make it possible to really go faster? “We can legitimately doubt that it will accelerate anything”analyzes Andreas Rüdinger, energy transition coordinator France at the Institute for Sustainable Development and International Relations (IDDRI).
“ While it was necessary to simplify, the legislator could not prevent himself from adding new obligations which will be as many additional brakes with the rapid deployment of these energies. »
But also so many new potential sources of litigation…
A still “fuzzy” device
One of the key measures of the text, the creation of “acceleration zones”, priorities for deploying renewable energy projects, does not convince the expert at all. He even worries about it. “This new device is so vague that it could add a layer to the existing mille-feuille, with the risk that it becomes a right of veto for local elected officials. » To be effective, it would, in his view, have been wiser to set up a quota of “priority areas for wind power” by territory, as Germany did recently, with a rule set at 2%.
“Especially since this quota could have taken into account the already existing projects, to ensure a good distribution of the projects on the territory and to avoid the phenomenon of saturation. »
For this specialist in ecological transition, the text presents above all the major weakness of never tackling the main reasons for the French delay: the backlog of administrative justice, overwhelmed by cascading litigation, the delays in connecting to the network often too long, due to insufficient means, or even the numerous military constraints, which severely limit the areas of deployment.
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Finally, the text does not introduce significant progress on so-called “local governance” projects either. “However, by involving local authorities and citizens directly in the governance and financing of these projects, we could promote their acceptance and territorial integration, including with regard to the impacts on biodiversity. »
It is difficult, under these conditions, to hope for an acceleration commensurate with the challenges in the coming years.
“The French delay will continue”
How can this lack of ambition be explained? Associate researcher at the Energy and Climate Center of the French Institute of International Relations (Ifri), Cédric Philibert (author of “Aeolian Islands, why so much hatred?”, to be published on March 2, 2023, ed. Les Petits Matins) carefully followed all the debates. He wasn’t really surprised by the attempts “heartbreaking” of the right and the extreme right to weaken the text, as they have for years made their opposition to ENR a strong political marker. He is surprised, on the other hand, by the reluctance of the left on the subject. “In the name of the defense of biodiversity in particular, rebels and ecologists pushed in favor of a very strict supervision of renewable energies, and in particular of photovoltaics. »
“As the climate and energy crisis serves as a reminder of how valuable these renewable energies could be to us right now, it is striking that almost all political forces, albeit to varying degrees, see these energies as a burden. »
“Who could have predicted the climate crisis? Well, many people, Mr. President…
“One would have thought that the energy crisis, the strong tensions on the electricity system, and the fight against climate change push the deputies to a spirit of responsibility on the subjectabounds Andreas Rüdinger. But that was not the case. The French delay will therefore continue. » With consequences for the climate and purchasing power.
Renewable energies being the only ones that can be deployed in the next fifteen years (the new nuclear reactors will not produce electricity before 2037, at the earliest), this ” missed appointment “ will further slow down our exit from fossil fuels“by forcing us to import gas, which could have been saved in the heat and electricity sectors”, recalls the IDDRI researcher. Which means, concretely, CO emissions2 additional costs and, in a context of skyrocketing electricity and gas prices, a significant financial cost. For the year 2022 alone, these imports represented a loss of around 6 to 9 billion euros…
