“Stop the destruction of EDF! Employees of the group will be on strike on Wednesday against the request of the State-shareholder to sell more electricity at low prices to its competitors in order to contain the electricity bill of households and businesses.
Faced with soaring energy prices, the government has drawn up an arsenal of measures to contain bills, and honor its promise to limit the increase in regulated electricity prices to 4% in 2022, in a sensitive context a few weeks before the presidential election.
The four main unions mobilized
At the energy company, the latest measure announced sparked an outcry: the government asked EDF to increase by 20 terawatt hours (TWh) the volume of nuclear electricity sold at a reduced price to its competitors, to increase it from 100 to 120 TWh on an exceptional basis. This measure will have “a cost for EDF of between 7.7 billion and 8.4 billion euros depending on market prices”, indicated the Minister of the Economy, Bruno Le Maire.
After this announcement, the four main unions in the energy sector called for a strike by EDF employees on Wednesday, while the group is already struggling with new delays for the EPR in Flamanville (Manche) and with the extension to new reactors of a corrosion problem on safety systems.
“At the end of the day, those who will pay will always be the citizens, through their bill. Through their taxes too, because, if there is a recapitalization and others, all these billions which are squandered, it is somewhere the average citizen who also pays it, ”estimated to AFP Fabrice Coudour, for the CGT. “This day of the 26th is a mobilization for the employees to affirm to the State that they are not ready for their company to be broken up”, declares Amélie Henri, national secretary CFE-Unsa. Energies for EDF.
The minister promises to be “alongside EDF”
During a trip to the north of France at the end of the week, the Minister of Industry, Agnès Pannier-Runacher, assured that there was “no question” of “weakening” EDF. “EDF’s main shareholder is the state. So it is the regulatory state that takes its responsibilities and defends the French people, their jobs and their purchasing power. And the State shareholder will take its responsibilities and will be alongside EDF to ensure that EDF gets through this period and can strengthen its situation,” she said.
Without intervention to force EDF to supply electricity at lower prices, the government says 150 French companies could have closed due to soaring electricity prices. Regulated prices would have jumped 45% on February 1, according to the regulator, which calculates annual increases based on market prices.
“Preserving our business”
A rare fact, this government measure moved even the highest levels of the company: in an internal message to EDF executives, CEO Jean-Bernard Lévy strongly criticized the government’s decision, which he “fought” and which he described as a “real shock”. The inter-union hopes Wednesday “a mobilization rate as high as possible, as we have known in the past,” said Ms. Henri.
Gatherings are planned, in particular in front of certain nuclear power plants of the group, such as Golfech (Tarn-et-Garonne) and Gravelines (North). Cuts in electricity production are possible, in the opinion of all union sources interviewed by AFP, but they should not penalize households and businesses. “We are not in a logic of breaking our working tool, since our claim is to preserve our company,” said Ms. Henri.