C 334/86
EN
Official Journal of the European Union
1.9.2022
(29)
The deployment of utility-scale renewable energy projects in France, in particular onshore and offshore wind farms and solar photovoltaic projects, suffers from restrictive regulation and high administrative and permitting barriers.
Under-investment in the electricity grid at national level has also led to a scarcity of access points, increasing grid connection costs and delays in grid connection that can currently last up to several months.
Onshore wind farms are not permitted to be built within 5–30 km of surrounding meteorological, military and civil aviation radars, leading to some 45 % of new projects struggling to find suitable locations.
Procedures should be improved to avoid safety-related military obstructions at a very late stage of a project’s development.
An approval process involving national, regional and local administrations means that frequent requests for updating urban planning documents must be reflected in lower-level documents as well, generating additional administrative burdens.
The permitting process could be accelerated by allocating to it more human and financial resources in central administrations at regional levels (i.e. for decentralised State services) as well as competent authorities and grid operators, closer involvement of regional and local administrations in spatial planning, and swifter application of tendering procedures.
Reinforcing mechanisms for public participation and decentralisation would reduce third-party complaints, a source of major delays in commissioning new projects.
A stable regulatory framework at national level would provide more investor certainty, particularly for longer-term planning.
(30)
Boosting energy efficiency and reducing energy consumption will help reduce emissions and reliance on fossil fuels.
In France, the construction and use of buildings represents 25 % of all greenhouse-gas emissions.
The recovery and resilience plan dedicates a full component to energy renovation for buildings, helping tackle associated challenges with a broad, cross-cutting approach.
Measures cover all types of buildings, with a priority for public buildings, but also significant action to renovate the private building stock and social housing, and to increase the energy efficiency of small businesses.
In the context of its national resilience and recovery plan, France is reinforcing the support mechanisms for renewable heating in buildings, e.g. by increasing the ‘heat fund’ by EUR 150 million and the subsidy for installing renewables-based heating by EUR 1 000.
The French National Low-Carbon Strategy (Stratégie Nationale Bas Carbone) defines an ambitious trajectory to reduce emissions from buildings and achieve complete decarbonisation of the energy consumed in buildings by 2050.
The current scheme called ‘Ma Prime Renov’, targeted at households, mainly subsidises single renovation actions.
To encourage more significant energy-efficiency gains, the policy framework could be improved to incentivise deep renovation and help France further increase the energy efficiency of its building stock.
The climate and resilience law adopted in August 2021 aims to reduce energy consumption in many ways, e.g. by providing bonuses for electric bicycles and creating low-emission zones in metropolitan areas.
(31)
Further support for cross-border electricity interconnectors (under development or planned) remains of crucial importance for the integration of large shares of renewables.
Frontloading investment in energy infrastructure, both domestic and cross-border, will help reduce dependence on fossil fuel and in particular Russian gas.
New infra­ structure and network investments are recommended to be future-proof where possible, in order to facilitate their long-term sustainability through future repurposing for sustainable fuels.
Interconnections are crucial for an efficient functioning of the internal energy market by pooling resources to achieve overall security of supply.
(32)
While the acceleration of the transition towards climate neutrality and away from fossil fuels will create significant restructuring costs in several sectors, France can make use of the Just Transition Mechanism in the context of cohesion policy to alleviate the socioeconomic impact of the transition in the most-affected regions.
In addition, France can make use of the European Social Fund Plus, established by Regulation (EU) 2021/1057 of the European Parliament and of the Council (19), to improve employment opportunities and strengthen social cohesion.
(33)
The Council has examined France’s fiscal policies, taking into account the Commission’s 2022 spring forecast, and its assessment is reflected in particular in recommendation (1).
(34)
In view of the close interlinkages between the economies of euro-area Member States and their collective contribution to the functioning of the economic and monetary union, the Council recommended that the euroarea Member States take action, including through their recovery and resilience plans, to implement the recom­ mendations set out in the 2022 Recommendation on the euro area.
For France, this is reflected in all four recommendations.
(19) Regulation (EU) 2021/1057 of the European Parliament and of the Council of 24 June 2021 establishing the European Social Fund Plus (ESF+) and repealing Regulation (EU) No 1296/2013 (OJ L 231, 30.6.2021, p. 21).