The renewable energy acceleration bill, which the government wants to have adopted in the fall to catch up with France’s great delay in wind and solar power, is welcomed with cautious satisfaction by the sector but raises concerns. among some environmentalists. On the menu of the text of 20 articles: transitional measures for 48 months to simplify procedures (relief in environmental assessment obligations or extension of public voting by electronic means), the multiplication of possibilities for installing solar panels (obligation to equipment on large car parks, possibility of installation on abandoned roads), pooling of discussions by seafront for offshore wind power.
The text further encourages thevalue sharing» renewable projects with local residents, who would thus be more favorable to them. The Council of State and the National Council for Ecological Transition have just been seized of this text, which should be presented to the Council of Ministers in mid-September. “France is lagging behind“, compared to its European neighbors, recognizes the text in its explanatory memorandum, calling into question administrative and legal red tape. It takes 10 years to develop a wind farm at sea, twice as long as elsewhere. France has just produced electrons from its first marine park, off Saint-Nazaire.
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The host country of the Paris agreement against global warming is generally behind on its plan to reduce greenhouse gas emissions, and Emmanuel Macron announced in February an increase in targets on renewables. France wants to multiply solar capacity by ten to exceed 100 GW and deploy 50 offshore wind farms to reach 40 GW by 2050. The doubling of onshore wind capacity to 40 GW will, however, be slower than expected, in 10 years instead of 30.”There are many good ideas” in the bill, greets Jean-Louis Bal, president of the Union of Renewable Energies (SER). “On the simplification measures we are obviously very favorable, especially on offshore wind power“:”it can significantly shorten project development times“, he notes. But he remains cautious:Many things will be decided in the decrees“.
“Indefensible” projects for the Bird Protection League
On the other hand, the reception is much more negative at the League for the Protection of Birds (LPO), which regrets a project “purely sectoral” who “completely forget about biodiversity issues“. “How can we put wind power in protected natural sites, Natura 2000 sites, migration corridors?“, annoys Yves Verilhac, director general of the LPO. “The IPBES (UN biodiversity experts) says that the artificialization of environments is the first cause of the collapse of biodiversity. But what are we proposing? To install full-field photovoltaic panels in sectors where it was impossible before, by derogating from the mountain law, the coastal law, etc.» «The best allies of renewable energies, such as the LPO, are dropping out. It’s indefensible“Judge Yves Verilhac.
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Some measures also raise legal issues, such as the possibility ofraise more easily the thresholds for submission to systematic environmental assessment», written in the text. The idea is to exempt small projects from this long and costly procedure. A measure that would go against the principle ofno backwards stepwhich stems from the 2016 Biodiversity Act. This principle states that the protection of the environmentcan only be subject to constant improvement“. The law project “neutralizes it by explaining that it is a symbolic, decorative principle, and that we can no longer rely on it before a judge“, explains the lawyer Arnaud Gossement.
“This is the first time in the history of environmental law that the legislator would have to neutralize a general principle of law that it has just created.»; “it’s very dangerous because it sets a precedent“, he believes. According to the lawyer, it is possible to simplify impact studies without unraveling this principle of environmental law, for example by reducing the study or by pooling the costs. A debate that parliamentarians will have to decide in October if the government calendar is maintained.
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