French ecology minister Delphine Batho
After months of uncertainty, French Ecology Minister Delphine Batho finally announced last week the second phase of a call for tenders for the construction of €3.5 billion worth of offshore wind farms to generate 1,000 megawatts of electricity.
The announcement followed up on a promise made by French Prime Minister Jean-Marc Ayrault during a government-hosted conference on the environment in September at which he and President François Hollande promised a plan to kick-start the renewables industry in France.
According to Batho, the projects will create 10,000 industrial jobs. The wind farms are planned for construction near Treport, in northern France, and near the Noirmoutier and Île d’Yeu islands on the Atlantic coast.
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Right at the end of last year, on 29 December, wind power in France covered a record 10% of the country’s electricity demand, the French blog “habitat durable” reported. France’s wind power fleet reached a power production equivalent to 5,982 MW – the same level as six nuclear reactors.
During the month of December in general, wind energy met 4% of France’s electricity needs, and in 2012 the average level was 3% – meeting the electricity needs of 6 million people.
“Wind energy production during recent weeks illustrates the characteristic trait of French wind energy: every year, wind energy production is higher during the coldest months,” the blog said.
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Stephane Bourgeois, Head of Regulatory Affairs at EWEA
It had the potential to be a battle, but in the end renewable energy projects look set to receive the lion’s share of €1,500 million of EU funding set aside for renewables and carbon capture and storage (CCS).
At least €1,210 million of the total should go to 23 renewables projects, including six wind energy proposals, according to a draft decision submitted to the EU’s Climate Change Committee meeting on 13 December. Originally, most of the money was supposed to go to CCS projects, but most projects failed to secure the necessary permits or additional Member State funding.
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Ana Aguado, CEO Friends of the Supergrid
Europe’s energy infrastructure urgently needs updating. In this interview published in the latest edition of EWEA’s Wind Directions magazine, Ana Aguado, CEO of Friends of the Supergrid, explores how this can be done.
What is the supergrid and why do we need it?
We define the supergrid as “a pan-European transmission network facilitating the integration of large-scale renewable energy and the balancing and transportation of electricity, with the aim of improving the European market”.
With such a definition it is stated quite clearly that in order to transform our energy systems to one that is based on clean and indigenous resources there is no other way but to build a European high voltage network able to integrate all those renewable energy sources, cope with their variability and transport electricity over long distances. We call such an EU planned network the supergrid.
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Wind and other renewable energies must be given immediate priority over fossil fuels and nuclear power if the EU is serious about its commitment to cut greenhouse gas emissions by 80-95% by 2050, says a new report by the World Wildlife Fund for Nature (WWF). Without such action the EU will only manage a 40% cut in emissions by 2050, warns the NGO.
“The spiralling economic, social and environmental cost of our current energy system, and the looming threat of climate change disaster, flip the burden of proof: anything other than sustainable renewables used efficiently should now have to justify their existence, not the other way around as has historically been the case,” says Jason Anderson, head of climate and energy at WWF’s European Policy Office.
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