Tribune du Monde: the renewable energies that hide the forest from carbon

Emmanuelle Ducros 08:54, January 15, 2024

An op-ed published this weekend in the newspaper Le Monde provoked a reaction from Emmanuelle Ducros. According to her, it points to hypocrisy. That of those French environmentalists who, between two struggles, the fight for the climate and the fight against nuclear power, finally choose the latter.

Emmanuelle Ducros was interested in this op-ed because the head of the obscure association Renewable Energies for All, which signed it, is the former Minister of the Environment Corinne Lepage. Right from the headline, something is wrong: "The defence of nuclear power as a low-carbon energy weakens the European Union's action against climate change". Nuclear power is factually an energy that emits an infinitesimal amount of CO2. It is hard to see how its development could harm the climate. To paraphrase Orwell, the op-ed tells us that peace is war. And freedom is slavery.

What is the purpose of this article?

Officially, the forum is intended to talk about European energy policy. In fact, this is a totally secondary subject. For the authors, an energy policy boils down to imposing percentages of renewable energies in the electricity mix.

The real target is the French government. He wants to develop nuclear power, because (I quote) "according to him, it is the only 'dispatchable' carbon-free energy, a characteristic that he considers essential for managing electricity grids."

It deserves our attention: the fact that nuclear power is the only controllable carbon-free energy that we can currently develop is not a political fable: it is a scientific and technical fact. To twist reality to such an extent is worrying.

And so, what does this column reproach the French Government with?

France has the audacity to "demand that the EU assign to member countries low-carbon energy targets, and not renewable energy targets as it has done until now." I'll let you ponder: the authors of the op-ed quietly admit that what matters to them, who claim to be ecological, is not the reduction of carbon emissions. This is the percentage of electricity obtained from renewable energy. It doesn't matter what the outcome is. Even if, like Germany, we supplement with coal.

It's absurd.

You know the expression "when you're a hammer, everything looks like a nail"? The authors are slapping the nail on the head, as if they were deaf. However, the facts are stubborn: the ugly France of nuclear power produces the most carbon-free electricity in Europe, sells it to its neighbors. It doesn't hurt the climate, but it does hurt the dwindling little shop and its owners. They have thrived on the fear of nuclear power for decades, they feel they are losing ground, as the climate goes haywire and the urgency becomes clear to all.

This is a problem, a problem for all of us. These influential activists lobby intensely in Brussels. They still hope, through this kind of forum, to turn the tide. We now know that they would rather openly sacrifice the climate than admit that they were wrong.