Europe 1 with AFP 4:18 p.m., October 06, 2022

“There is an urgent need to act, the fight will not stop in the winter of 2022-2023,” said Minister for Energy Transition Agnès Pannier-Runacher on Thursday in her speech launching the sobriety plan, calling for the "general mobilization".

For the winter, "our collective action would allow us to avoid more restrictive measures", she added.

Save energy, now: the French government launched Thursday a "chosen" sobriety plan developed with the major sectors of the economy and daily life, with "15 key measures" to spend the winter without cuts, but also to prepare the French for the much larger savings demanded by the climate emergency.

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"General mobilization"

"There is an urgent need to act, the fight will not stop in the winter of 2022-2023", declared Thursday the Minister for Energy Transition Agnès Pannier-Runacher in a pavilion at the Parc des Expos with a view of Paris and the Eiffel Tower, in a high mass with ministers, bosses and other officials.

The minister sounded the "general mobilization" of the whole country, to achieve in two years "10% reduction in energy consumption", compared to 2019, a "first step" to reach the trajectory of 40% recommended for 2050 by climate experts.

From public services to businesses, via sport, housing and transport, this "general mobilization" at all levels must immediately make it possible to face an energy winter under heightened vigilance.

A "chosen" sobriety, far from "punitive ecology"

The main measures include the call for less heating and less lighting, the encouragement of telework in the administrations (companies are more shared), the financial incentive for carpooling or even the cut off of hot water in the administrations. ... A sobriety which will be "chosen", far from "punitive ecology", because this plan is the fruit of "work in concert" with the whole of the economic world, underlined Agnès Pannier-Runacher.

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At the heart of the recommendations is also the famous maintenance of the interior temperature at 19°C, in the energy code since 1978, but "there is no obligation in the sense that there will be no temperature police," said Agnès Pannier-Runacher.

A 15-day offset from the start and end of the heating period is also requested.