French government hurries new wind power tariffs to re-ignite growth

London (Platts)--29May2014/719 am EDT/1119 GMT

The French government will implement in coming days a new tariff for onshore wind power, approved by the European Commission, which should remove a major deterrent to investment, energy minister Segolene Royal said late Wednesday.

The move follows the cancellation Wednesday by France's Council of State of the previous tariff decree set in 2008 -- widely expected after an initial verdict by the public magistrate earlier this month.

French anti-wind lobby Vent De Colere (wind of anger) and 11 other groups had filed appeals saying the subsidised rates were not correctly submitted to the European Commission as state support.

The government's decision to replace the tariffs, and back-date them, "puts an end to a long period of uncertainty which was destabilising the sector" and will mean that new projects will benefit from the same state-supported prices, Royal said.

"Renewable power must increase in importance and new tenders will soon be launched," she added.

SER, France's renewable industry association, has said the firmer legal status of the tariffs should allow for a pickup in connections this year.

France had 8.1 GW of wind power capacity at the end of December after installing just 630 MW of new projects in 2013.

This compares with 33.7 GW of wind capacity in Germany, 23.0 GW in Spain and 10.5 GW in UK, according to figures from the European Wind Energy Association.

In anticipation of the Council of State's verdict, the French government resubmitted its onshore wind tariffs to the European Commission classifying them as state aid, and these were approved by the EC on March 27, 2014.

The French government is planning to implement later this year new incentive mechanisms for renewable power which would see plants receive a wholesale market plus premium price for output.

Tariff rates would be continued in parallel with the new market-based mechanism.

--Robin Sayles, newsdesk@platts.com
--Edited by Jeremy Lovell, jeremy.lovell@platts.com

Similar stories appear in European Power Daily See more information at http://www.platts.com/Products/europeanpowerdaily

 

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