Reuters reports that cutting the share of nuclear power in the French electricity mix from 75 to 50 per cent by 2025 is not the most important issue in a planned energy law, Energy Minister Segolene Royal said. In October, 2014, the lower house of the French parliament passed a much-delayed energy transition bill that included the 2025 target and capped nuclear power production at current levels. But earlier this month the senate, in which the conservative opposition has a majority, and which has the power to amend but not block laws, scrapped the cap and removed any reference to 2025. Removing the cap would allow state-controlled utility EDF to open its new Areva-designed EPR reactor, under construction in Normandy, without closing one of French ageing nuclear plants. For the moment, that date, the 2025 horizon, is no longer specified.
But in a certain way it is still in the law, since what has also been voted is a share of 40 per cent of renewable energy in the mix by 2030, so we are not far off, she said on French television BFM. Royal also said that she was not in favor of quitting nuclear power and added that France needs to continue investing in it, particularly in fourth-generation reactors which will consume less nuclear fuel and recycle nuclear waste.
Original Working URL: https://af.reuters.com/article/commoditiesNews/idAFL5N0VX2OB20150223
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