The Assembly adopted on Tuesday a series of measures aimed at accelerating the installation of wind farms at sea, by voting on one of the key articles of the bill on renewable energies, despite the reluctance of part of the hemicycle .
As in the Senate, the question of a minimum distance for these large offshore wind turbines animated the debates, but all the amendments in this direction were rejected on Monday and Tuesday, as the government hoped.
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Article 12 adopted on Tuesday, with 98 votes to 65, aims to facilitate the launch of new projects through less complex consultation procedures with local stakeholders and establishes planning for offshore wind power. A first mapping of "priority
"
areas will have to intervene in 2024. They will have to be located primarily in the exclusive economic zone, at least 22 km from the coast, but this is not an obligation, to the chagrin of deputies from various benches.
MPs Modem and Horizons, belonging to the presidential camp, unsuccessfully defended amendments limiting as much as possible the possibility of installing wind turbines at a shorter distance, in order to guarantee their “social acceptability
”
.
The Communists, more reluctant than the rest of the left on the subject, also tried unsuccessfully to "
sacralize the coastal strip
" up to this 22 km limit to "
give a signal to fishermen
" worried, argued the deputies Sébastien Jumel.
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As for the LR deputies, very hostile to the wind turbines which according to them "
disfigure
" the coastline, they tried in vain to push them back beyond the "
horizon line
" (50 km) or to reintroduce the limit of 40 km , which their fellow senators ended up giving up.
The RN deputies confirmed for their part their total hostility to the "
nightmare
" of wind turbines at sea, which "
ransack a French heritage
".
Several amendments aimed at banning wind turbines in marine protected areas were rejected.
“
It would quite simply amount to ending the sector
”, justified the rapporteur Pierre Cazeneuve (Renaissance).
Emmanuel Macron has set the objective of deploying 50 parks to reach 40 GW by 2050. This is "
the equivalent of 20 nuclear power plants
" and "
this will allow us to get out of our dependence on fossil fuels
", has insisted during the debates the Minister for Energy Transition Agnès Pannier-Runacher.
"
I have always had pro-nuclear positions
", but "
it takes 15 years to build an EPR
", she underlined, boasting with offshore wind "
abundant and cheap energy
".
The Minister assured that the planned consultation procedures will take into account the apprehensions of communities and certain economic players, such as fishermen.
