After a first phase of consultation until January around the vast project of new very high voltage lines in the Seine valley, between Eure and Seine-Maritime, groups of local residents are being formed to better promote their interests in the rest of the process.
In Trouville-la-Haule, a village of 800 inhabitants in Eure, which is on one of the three zones envisaged for the future new 400,000 volt overhead line between Rougemontiers and Port-Jérôme, a petition was launched .
“We feel vulnerable in terms of the choice of route, since we are still, in my opinion, the most logical target,” explains Aurélien Costes, spokesperson for the collective Voisins Engagés pour Trouville-la-Haule (VETH) .
Along with around thirty other people, he believes he was informed too late about the first phase of the consultation and is worried about the future.
“I became aware of all this two weeks ago,” he explains.
RTE had mandated a service provider to distribute information leaflets to us but there was a failure.
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Aurélien Costes claims to have been unaware, like other residents, of the consultation meetings organized since the end of November in his sector by the prefecture with RTE.
“We all know that we need energy, that we need electricity, we won't be able to fight on that, since we also use it every day,” continues the Trouvillais.
But we are without information and we fear that the consultation will only be consultative, that we will not have our say.
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On official documents, so-called "lower impact" zones give an approximate idea of the location of the future new high-voltage overhead line between Rougemontiers (Eure) and Port-Jérôme (Seine-Maritime).
Among the collective's main fears, the impact of these lines on health.
“RTE says that measurements have been taken and that we are three times below the legal thresholds.
But we know very well that it still has impacts, even if we are not able to measure them,” insists Aurélien Costes.
“In the collective,” he explains, “we have a resident who has horses and who sees a lot of differences in behavior when they are in the meadows over which the (existing) lines pass.
» A high-voltage line, due to be dismantled, already exists between Rougemontiers and Port-Jérôme.
The Voisins Engagés pour Trouville-la-Haule collective also calls for the foreseeable real estate devaluation that could result from new installations to be taken into account and expects public authorities to “put in place measures to mitigate the impacts on the real estate value of neighboring properties.” ".
“Otherwise, fears Aurélien Costes, we run the risk of having people leave the village, therefore class closures, perhaps the grocery store too... The project can also have economic repercussions and I am not not very sure that the public authorities have taken these aspects into account.
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The chosen time zone will be revealed in April
The last demand of the petition concerns the way in which the consultation is carried out and the collective calls for a review of the method, for more dialogue.
“We just want to have someone who takes our call into account and can tell us:
Don't worry, it's planned
.”
On the side of public authorities, this call for dialogue is very officially heard.
“This expression of the public is precisely what we were looking for: the inhabitants, the actors of the territory, whoever they may be, must express themselves on each of these areas”, assures the prefect of Eure Simon Babre.
Designated prefect coordinator of the project, he recalls the calendar and the new phases of consultation to come: “A new stage of the discussion will begin mid-year, from the determination of the
zone of least impact
, and that is there we will resume discussions.”
From the decided zone, new - more in-depth - studies and consultations will take place to define tighter bands and, ultimately, the exact location of the route.
Between now and April, when Simon Babre makes his decision on the “least impact zone” chosen among the three options presented this winter, the collective intends to continue to come together and mobilize.
Starting with Friday February 16 in Trouville-la-Haule, where a “walk” is organized with the members of the collective, to continue the door-to-door campaign.
“Come take a walk with us.
Let's go under the existing 400,000 volt line and the 225 line to be able to see the feeling, hear the crackling of these lines,” says Aurélien Costes to his neighbors by way of invitation.