(Montel) EC raises pressure on France to meet renewables target

For the original publication, please click here.

The European Commission has urged France to take immediate action to comply with its rules on renewable targets.

The EC reminded France of “the importance of complying with its legal obligations and taking appropriate measures without further delay”, a spokesperson for the 27-member bloc’s executive arm told Montel.

France failed to hit the EC target of having renewables account for 23% of the country’s total power consumption by 2020. Last year, renewables made up for just 20.7% of the power mix.

Despite the shortfall, the French government still had not officially communicated any measures to rectify the situation, the EC spokesperson said, adding that “infringement proceedings” had not yet been launched.

However, France was not the only country to have missed the 23% objective, Klervi Kerneis, a European energy policy research fellow at France’s Jacques Delors Institute, told Montel.

“Actually, six member states haven’t reached their 2020 target, but all except for France have purchased ‘statistical volumes’ of renewable energies to member states, which exceeded their goal, enabling them to respect their commitment,” she said.

Insufficient deployment

Under the EU’s renewable energy directive (RED), member states can opt for statistical transfers where an amount of renewable energy is deducted from one country’s books and added to another’s.

This is simply an accounting procedure “as no actual energy changes hands”, according to the EC.

A spokesperson for the French energy ministry said it was in talks with the EC over the issue and hoped to find a solution.

The ministry and the EC were unable to provide more details on the discussions. France needs to cover at least 42.5% of its energy consumption with clean power sources by 2030 in line with the European objectives.

“The current deployment rate of renewable energies – about 4% each year – is insufficient and below the objectives of the multi-annual energy programme in force,” said Sean Vavasseur, director of strategic foresight and territories at French renewables lobby SER.

Indeed, it was “very likely” that France would remain short of the renewable target at the end of this year, Kerneis said.

“Political cost”

As well as potential sanctions, missing that goal also carried “a political cost”, she said. “This is a matter of credibility. On the one hand, France wants to assert its interests, but on the other, it doesn’t respect its goals.”

Earlier this year, France’s push for a greater recognition of nuclear power delayed the approval of the EU law on renewable energy.

And more recently, energy minister Agnes Pannier-Runacher said the country would reform its own power market at a national level if it could not reach an agreement with the EU over reforms.