“Protect the French”. This Tuesday, the Minister of Ecological Transition Barbara Pompili announced that there will be no increase in electricity prices over the year 2022, while market prices continue to increase. The latter are indexed to those of gas, which explode with the upturn in global demand, on the sidelines of the post-containment economic recovery.
“We are committed to protecting the French by offering them a tariff shield and we will keep this commitment,” said the minister, guest of the morning BFMTV. “The increase in electricity will be maintained at 4% as announced, throughout 2022,” she said, in accordance with the government’s promises made at the end of 2021.
The minister also spoke of additional measures to avoid a postponement to the year 2023, if the rise in market prices continues. A track already mentioned this Monday by the Minister of the Economy Bruno Le Maire, on LCI “It is not a question of saying to the French: we will try to hold out until the presidential elections and after that we will make a brutal increase “, He indicated.
No general blackout
At the end of September, Prime Minister Jean Castex pledged to limit the increase in electricity prices to 4%, in order to prevent the purchasing power of French households from shrinking. “The negotiations have not yet been definitively concluded, the discussions are continuing. I think that by the end of the week, we will have the technical solution to protect both the French and businesses, ”Bruno Le Maire said on Monday.
In the long term, France hopes for a reform of the European electricity market so that the prices reflect more faithfully the real prices in each country, while they are now set on the costs of gas and coal power plants.
These are now peaking because of the supply tensions observed this winter and also because of the rise in the prices of CO2 allowances on the carbon markets, on which companies are exchanging allocated “rights to pollute”. in number limited by the authorities.
The Minister of Ecological Transition also explained that there would be no general blackout despite the shutdown of four reactors in the French nuclear fleet, depriving France of 10% of its production capacity through of these plants. If the promise is made, the government is currently working to clarify the methods used to limit price increases to 4%.