“Our energy future is being played out now. The observation is clear: at a time of soaring bills for households and businesses, where climate change is asserting itself, there is an urgent need to act at all levels and to accelerate the control and efficiency of energy, as well as the production of renewable energies to get out of our dependence on fossil fuels. If the energy scenarios aimed at carbon neutrality in 2050 highlight the need to develop the share of electrical energy in our energy mix, they also confirm that the 100% renewable option is realistic, both technically and economically, with a controlled additional cost.
We are therefore faced with a major choice: to commit to a 100% renewable future or to relaunch nuclear production. This choice requires a national and transparent debate. France’s energy ambition must be shared, understood and taken on collectively.
Choosing the 100% renewable mix, as we are proposing, amounts to investing more in current renewable technologies but also in favor of research and innovation, in order to develop new clean energy resources accessible to all, with better storage and more efficient network management. And, thus, adopt a more responsible mode of production and consumption.
Do not deprive the French of a democratic debate
Choosing nuclear revival, as the rights carry it (Christelle Morancais, president of the Pays de la Loire regional council, and LREM), is to continue on the same model adopted 50 years ago without asking any questions. And yet, how will we invest elsewhere if we build new nuclear power plants “whatever the cost”? As a reminder, the cost of the Flamanville EPR has been multiplied by nearly 6, going from 3.3 to 19.1 billion euros, with a delay of at least 11 years!
It is wrong to say that nuclear is clean energy since it does not emit CO2. Should we recall our dependence for the supply of uranium, the conditions of its extraction? Today there is no satisfactory and lasting solution for waste management. Should we remember that in Mayenne and in the Segréen, the populations and all of their elected officials, including on the right, strongly refused a landfill center?
Its supporters assure that the only possible choice lies in the combination “nuclear / renewable” with the development of new EPRs and nuclear power plants known as SMR (Small Modular Reactors). However, this technology only exists on paper and will be available at best in 2040. What immediate solution for the Cordemais coal-fired power station and its 350 employees when it will stop its activity in 2026? Do not let them choose alone and in our place!
What immediate needs? What long-term vision? Getting out of nuclear power within twenty years is possible, with the will and the necessary conditions to jointly prepare a sober, happy future that respects humans and the earth.
It is urgent to embark on the path of sobriety, so as not to see our children and grandchildren suffer from current decisions, and it is essential to open a democratic debate, to define a collective decision. The French should not, as in the 1970s, be deprived of it! “
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