Macron goes to Fécamp to inaugurate an offshore wind farm, before the EPR on Thursday

The Head of State must take advantage of this visit to unveil the winner of one of the current calls for tenders, relating to a floating wind farm with a power of 250 megawatts in the south of Brittany, a technology still in development to install sites further offshore.

This stage in Seine-Maritime is part of a double trip to Normandy: Thursday morning, he will attend Flamanville, in the Manche, at the end of the loading of uranium into the first French EPR in preparation for start-up, twelve years late , the most powerful nuclear reactor in the country.

Less than four weeks before the very difficult European elections for his camp, Emmanuel Macron intends to defend his energy policy defined in Belfort in 2022, which focuses on both the development of renewables and the revival of the atom.

“It is positive that the president emphasizes that renewable energies are just as important as nuclear power,” said Andreas Rüdinger, of the Institute for Sustainable Development and International Relations (IDDRI).

According to this energy transition expert, "even if France claims to be walking on its own two legs, we must make no mistake about the challenges ahead: the electrification planned by 2035 (...) will depend primarily on the ability to accelerate the development of all renewable energy sectors (offshore wind, onshore and photovoltaic)".

Feeding 700.000 French people

Bastien Cuq, energy manager of the Climate Action Network, also welcomes this support for offshore wind power, but calls not to "abandon onshore wind power", which "needs significant support in the face of attacks". because this would amount to “threatening security of supply”.

He also deplores the fact that "energy sobriety", one of last year's priorities, today seems "to have disappeared from government communication".

The executive believes that the surge in energy prices and the war in Ukraine have validated these choices which make France, he argues, one of the most externally independent countries in Europe in terms of matter.

The Fécamp park, where 71 wind turbines have been installed and which will operate at 100% during the summer for a power of around 500 MW, is one of three completed with those of Saint-Brieuc and Saint-Nazaire. It should make it possible to supply nearly 700.000 French people.

Around ten others are under construction or planned, and a huge call for tenders must be launched in 2025 for the production of 10 additional gigawatts by 2035 -- the equivalent of the annual electricity consumption of 10 million homes.

At the beginning of May, the Minister of the Economy Bruno Le Maire recognized a "delay in ignition" in terms of offshore wind power, while reaffirming the government objective: to increase production to 1,5 GW in 2024. to 18 GW in 2035 and 45 GW in 2050 (i.e. around fifty parks).

Thursday in Flamanville, Emmanuel Macron will attend the end of the loading of uranium into the EPR tanks that EDF hopes to see produce electricity from the summer, for a total bill estimated by the electrician at 13,2 .XNUMX billion euros. This operation began a week earlier.

Looking out to sea, on the tip of Cotentin, the 1.600 MW reactor which will power nearly three million households will be the most powerful in the French nuclear fleet which will now number 57.

At a time when the government wants to build up to 14 reactors in France, this is a major step for the sector which wants to turn the page on a laborious 17-year project, punctuated by multiple problems and colossal additional costs.