Professional fishermen from Côtes-d'Armor asked President Emmanuel Macron on Friday to “
cancel
” the project for an offshore wind farm in the bay of Saint-Brieuc, the work of which is due to begin next month.
"
The State must have the ambition to cancel this project
" because "
several years of consultation have not led to the construction of a project that would be in line with the preservation of marine resources and activities of associated fishing
”, wrote in an open letter Alain Coudray, president of the Departmental Committee for Maritime Fisheries and Marine Breeding of Côtes-d'Armor (CDPMEM).
Read also: In Charente, anger is mounting against a wind farm project
“
The cancellation of this project would be a reassuring signal sent by the State to the profession which would no longer feel like a simple spectator of the deployment of marine energies.
This would indeed show that the State wants seafarers to be full players in this energy transition,
”continues Mr. Coudray, recalling the common position of the French fisheries committees on the issue of marine renewable energies (MRE).
The fishermen of the bay of Saint-Brieuc reproach in particular the project leader, the Spanish group Iberdrola, through its French branch Ailes Marines, for not having respected its commitments in terms of consultation with a view to the planning of the works.
"
It is regrettable that between 2012 and 2020, we did not have a single meeting on the planning of the construction phase
", writes Alain Coudray, considering that the fishermen "
have been betrayed
".
A hydrogen park activated by the swell.
It seems "
perfectly utopian to want to combine the fishing activities of the bay of Saint-Brieuc and this wind farm whose acceptability by the profession has been reduced to nothing by the developer
", he considers, denouncing "
l 'incompetence, contempt and arrogance
' of the promoter.
"
The Costa-Rican fishermen will do all they can to legitimately stop this project
" which is located "
on spawning grounds, nurseries and migrations of many species, managed by example for many years by professionals
", continues the text.
In particular, the bay of Saint-Brieuc is home to two large deposits of scallops, the fishing of which is highly regulated.
In January, the fishermen proposed an alternative to the Iberdrola project, a hydrogen park activated by the swell.
Ailes Marines is officially the bearer of the current offshore project, one of the seven awarded by the State since 2012, consisting of 62 wind turbines over 200 meters high fixed to the ground.
Controlled during the call for tenders at 30% by the Caisse des Dépôts et Consignation and 70% by Iberdrola, Ailes Marines is now 100% under the Spanish flag.
