The bill to accelerate the development of renewable energies, which has passed its first reading in the Senate, should enable France to catch up with the rest of the world in terms of administrative procedures, the installation of solar panels on the sides of freeways and parking lots, and the massive development of offshore wind power.
Ambitious objectives
France, which has long relied on the power of its nuclear fleet, generated a quarter of its electricity from renewables in 2021, a smaller share than elsewhere in Europe.
But to the climate emergency, the war in Ukraine has now added the threat of a “blackout”, making it necessary for the government to change scale.
For 2050, President Emmanuel Macron has set goals of increasing solar power capacity tenfold to over 100 GW and deploying 50 offshore wind farms to reach 40 GW.
Emergency or permanent measures
In France, it takes an average of 5 years of procedures to build a solar farm, 7 years for a wind farm and 10 years for an offshore wind farm.
The text provides for temporary adaptations of administrative procedures to simplify and accelerate the implementation of projects, the objective being to significantly shorten deployment times.
The senators rewrote this section by creating new temporary exemptions and proposing permanent changes to the environmental assessment, public participation and administrative litigation regimes to speed up the implementation of projects.
Planning and “assent” of mayors
The Senate adopted in the hemicycle a compromise built with the government that replaces a controversial right of “veto” on this or that project, as voted in committee.
The municipalities will be able to report – in a “bottom-up” planning process – the areas likely to receive renewable energy projects.
For the application phase of these “priority” or “favourable” zones, an assent of the mayor will be required. This will give the mayors the final say.
The Senate also introduced, against the advice of the government, an assent of the Architecte des Bâtiments de France for any wind project located within 10 km of a historical monument.
More space for solar
The bill facilitates the installation of photovoltaic panels along highways and major roads.
It allows to derogate from the law Littoral, within a very constrained framework, for the installation of panels on “degraded sites”, concept preferred by the senators to that of “wastelands”, less broad, proposed by the government. It also facilitates the establishment in the mountain communities.
The bill imposed the progressive equipment of outdoor parking lots of more than 2,500 m2 with photovoltaic shades and vegetation.
The senators revised the government’s copy, substituting the notion of parking spaces for that of surface area.
Outdoor parking lots with more than 80 spaces must be equipped with either solar shading or another renewable energy production process.
The senators have injected provisions for the “reasoned” development of agrivoltaics, combining farming and electricity production.
Wind power takes to the sea
The bill proposes to pool public debates on the location of offshore wind farm projects “to improve spatial planning” and accelerate their development.
The Senate has removed the provision adopted in committee in the session to give preference to areas located at a minimum distance of 40 km from the shore.
However, “priority will be given to suitable areas located in the exclusive economic zone”, i.e. a little more than 22 km from the coast.
Rebates
The bill institutes a regime of “territorial sharing of the value of renewable energy” to facilitate its acceptability. The senators refocused the device on communities only.
The rebates on the invoices would concern the communes of implantation but also the communes from which these installations are visible.
The scheme would apply to all renewable energy installations.
