France will withdraw from the Energy Charter Treaty (ECT), a 30-year-old international agreement very protective of private investment in fossil fuels, President Emmanuel Macron announced on Friday. This treaty is supposed to apply for another 20 years after the withdrawal of a signatory country.
France will withdraw from the Energy Charter Treaty (ECT), a 30-year-old international agreement very protective of private investment in fossil fuels, President Emmanuel Macron announced on Friday. “France has decided to withdraw from the Energy Charter Treaty, which was an important point requested by many,” said the Head of State on the sidelines of a European summit in Brussels. This treaty is supposed to apply for another twenty years after the withdrawal of a signatory country.
In an opinion issued on Wednesday, the High Council for Climate (HCC), a French consultative body, considered that this text undermined the commitment of the signatory countries “on a trajectory of decarbonization of their respective energy sectors by 2030 and living up to the ambition of the Paris Agreement”.
A treaty signed in 1994 which brings together the EU and around fifty countries
The Energy Charter Treaty was signed in 1994, at the end of the Cold War, to offer guarantees to investors in the countries of Eastern Europe and the former USSR. Bringing together the EU and some fifty countries, it allows companies to claim, before a private arbitration tribunal, compensation from a State whose decisions affect the profitability of their investments, even when it comes to political pro-climate.