• The increase in the cost of energy penalizes all French municipalities and local authorities.

  • Gravelines, which houses the largest nuclear power plant in France, is not spared.

  • Between the explosion of gas and electricity prices, and the drop in local and national grants, the city's financial situation is "difficult".

Everyone knows what they say about shoemakers.

The adage could also apply to the town of Gravelines, near Dunkirk, in the North.

Hosting the largest nuclear power plant in Western Europe on its territory will not prevent the city from seeing its electricity bill explode for the coming year, forcing the city council to adopt a drastic energy sobriety plan.

The increase in energy bills is a fatality for which all French communities are preparing for the months, even the years to come.

But in Gravelines, the pill is all the more difficult to swallow because of the presence of the six nuclear reactors of the EDF power plant on the municipal territory.

However, the public procurement rule also applies to energy, and the city has just awarded gas and electricity contracts for the next three years.

The key is a gas budget that goes from “665,000 euros per year to 2.38 million euros for equal consumption”, details the mayor, Bertrand Ringot.

The same for electricity, of which "the net cost in a full year will go from 1.36 million euros to 2.28 million euros", continues the elected official.

"Return to the liberalization of the energy market"

These additional three million euros to spend, without consuming more, Bertrand Ringot would have done something else.

“We already have to deal with the deletions or reductions in national and community allocations.

There, we expected an increase in the cost of energy, but not to this dizzying height, ”deplores Bertrand Ringot in a letter addressed to his constituents.

He recognizes that this puts Gravelines in "an unprecedented and difficult financial situation", leading to new savings to be made.



To try to reduce energy bills, the city has therefore adopted a sobriety plan.

And the first sacrifice will be the temporary closure of the municipal swimming pool.

Other closures will follow, in particular of certain equipment during holiday periods and in winter.

The city will generally lower the temperature in public buildings and facilities and cut off public lighting between midnight and 5 a.m.

So many measures that will not allow Gravelines to halve its consumption.

So the mayor also appeals to the State: "The government must find the ways and means to mitigate the effects of this crisis", insists Bertrand Ringot.

And, for him, this must go through “questioning the liberalization of the energy market.

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