French EU election list leaders spar over bloc’s electricity market, nuclear

French candidates topping the lists for the EU elections in June laid bare their differences on nuclear energy and the EU electricity market in the first televised debate of Public Sénat on Thursday (14 March).

Read the original French article here.

Eight list leaders, from the far left to the far right, joined in the live debate broadcast on Public Sénat. During the debate, the leading candidates clashed on several issues, including the EU’s effort to find a way out of the energy crisis.

Nuclear energy and the EU electricity market divided the contenders, with four opposing camps emerging: those in favour of the EU electricity market and nuclear power, those in favour of one or the other, and those against both.

EU electricity market

Both the far-left and far-right railed against the European legal framework governing power markets.

Manon Aubry of the far-left La France Insoumise (GUE/NGL) called for an end to the EU electricity markets, while Thierry Mariani, an MEP of the far-right Rassemblement national (ID), who replaced for the debate the head of the RN’s list for the EU elections, Jordan Bardella, suggested that France should withdraw from the market to bring down prices, citing the example of Spain and Portugal.

However, while the two countries obtained a derogation from EU market rules, they did not leave the market. Spain and Portugal instead capped the price of gas, effectively reducing the price of electricity on the wholesale market.

The move did not affect energy bills, as the measure was financed by a tax passed on to consumers in the final price of electricity.

In 2022 France became an electricity importer from its European neighbours for the first time in 42 years. These imports compensated for dramatic reductions in nuclear and hydropower generation and helped to moderate energy price spikes.

Except from the communist (GUE/NGL) Léon Deffontaines, the other candidates defended the EU market, with François-Xavier Bellamy of the conservative Les Républicains (EPP) describing the 2023 reform as “successful”, in particular, because the means of price regulation it was designed to provide also applies to nuclear power.

The reform offers the possibility of using protective contracts for producers and consumers of nuclear energy.

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Nuclear

The candidates also weighed in on nuclear power, a particularly hot issue in France.

Valérie Hayer of President Emmanuel Macrons’ Renaissance defended the record of her group and the French government, particularly the “inclusion of nuclear power in the Renewable Energy Directive”, which sets targets for its development.

However, the directive, which was revised in March 2023, does not mention nuclear power directly but recognises that EU member states with a carbon-free mix, like France, which uses nuclear, will be able to benefit from arrangements to achieve their renewable hydrogen production objectives under certain drastic conditions.

Mariani and Marion Maréchal of the far-right Reconquête! defended a very proactive nuclear policy and strongly criticised anti-nuclear EU countries such as Germany. Maréchal called Germany’s energy policy a “complete and utter fiasco”, pointing out that it had shut down its last nuclear reactors in the midst of the energy crisis.

Bellamy, who was equally critical of Germany, praised his party and the French Communist Party for being “the only two families that have never changed their position on nuclear power”.

Industry and renewables

According to Marie Toussaint of the Green Party, the EU should focus on renewable energies, where she claimed it is lagging behind the United States and China.

However, Raphaël Glucksmann from the joint Parti socialist – Place publique (S&D) list was highly critical of the situation in China, pointing out that the country’s hegemony in the production of photovoltaic panels, for example, has been achieved at the cost of subsidies and loss-making sales, and at the expense of respect for the human rights of the Uighur minority.

Glucksmann argued for reinvestment in the industry on EU soil, as stated in the EU’s Net Zero Industry Act recently agreed by the EU member states and the European Parliament, which aims to develop production of the technologies needed for the bloc’s energy transition.

According to Glucksmann, industrial renewal could be partly financed by taxing the huge profits of energy companies, as well as an EU tax on high earners, as advocated by the Greens.

Toussaint also repeated her three points: “green VAT”, “green protectionism”, and an EU funding plan.

[Edited by Donagh Cagney/Zoran Radosavljevic]