French government has pledged to slash the time required to develop offshore wind farms by half. Ministers of the Economy, Bruno Le Maire, and Roland Lescure, Minister Delegate for Energy and Industry, declared the current timeframe as detrimental to sector growth and outlined ambitious plans for expeditious progress.
Le Maire emphasized the urgency, stating, “You have to take a giant step. Today is twelve years for a wind farm between making the decision and then applying the decision. Technologies become obsolete and very often lose their profitability. We want to halve the deadline for it to go from 12 years to six years.”
Lescure echoed concerns over bureaucratic inefficiencies, lamenting, “At each stage, there are two, three, four months too long, and when you add two, three or four months to each procedure, you end up with years of instruction even before we start designing and building.”
In a bid to fortify the domestic offshore wind turbine industry, Le Maire unveiled measures to shield it from global competition. These measures include incorporating new criteria into tenders to prioritize greener supply chains.
“A turbine wind blade which is manufactured in Saint-Nazaire, with decarbonised energy under very satisfactory environmental conditions and which has not made thousands of kilometres before coming here, has a carbon balance which is better than a blade which has been brought from 6,000 to 8,000 kilometres,” Le Maire emphasized, highlighting the significance of local production for environmental sustainability.
Reiterating France's ambitious offshore wind targets, Le Maire and Lescure reaffirmed the goal of producing 18GW by 2035 and 45GW by 2050. Additionally, plans were announced to unveil new areas suitable for offshore wind development over the next decade, along with tender specifications for floating wind farms in the Mediterranean.
Despite progress, discussions regarding financial guarantees for the 250MW tender in South Brittany are still ongoing. Jules Nyssen, President of French Renewable Energy trade association SER, lauded the government's commitment, stating, “The Government has confirmed its desire to place France at the forefront of floating wind power in Europe and the world.”
Nyssen also praised the government's industrial ambition, equating the strategic importance of the renewable energy sector to that of the automobile industry. “Today is a great day for renewable energy,” Nyssen concluded, expressing optimism for the future of France's renewable energy landscape.
