Less than two months before the start of meteorological winter, the news struck a chord. Last Friday, La Tribune revealed that the executive was working on a draft decree to experiment this winter with a “temporary limitation” of the electricity consumption of 200,000 residential customers whose available power from Linky meters would be reduced to 3 kVA for a few hours in one day before March 31. As in the case of power outages, such a mechanism would only be activated “if all other levers were insufficient to prevent a widespread power outage (blackout),” as the Ministry of Energy Transition underlined.
It is thus a tool that would make it possible to avoid scheduled outages, the famous load shedding, in case of extreme tension in the network and this experimental project “has no relation to the situation of the electrical system for this winter”, according to the ministry: “We are entering winter in much better conditions than last winter”, with a “tension level in the electrical system (…) currently lower than last year in the same period”, thanks to lower consumption and increased in the power of the nuclear fleet. However, the message from the government and energy actors is, indeed, to encourage a reduction in consumption or, in any case, a maintenance of the level of sobriety achieved during the winter of 2022-2023.
The heating instructions remain the same.
Last Thursday, the Government announced new measures to anchor sobriety in habits, following the savings made last year amid a price rise. La minister de la Transition énergétique Agnès Pannier-Runacher n’a pas fixé de nouvel objectif chiffré de baisse pour cet hiver, lors d’un colloque à Paris, mais a souhaité que l’effort accompli depuis un an an devienne “structural” et ” a habit.” According to her calculations, gas and electricity consumption decreased by 12% between August 1, 2022 and July 31, 2023 compared to the same period in 2018-2019, before Covid.
Among the non-coercive measures, homes will be encouraged to equip themselves with programmable thermostats, which cost “between 650 and 1,000 euros per unit”, according to Agnès Pannier-Runacher. This equipment, of which there are still approximately 27 million homes to be equipped, reduces consumption by 15%. The purchase and installation will be assisted up to 80%. “I asked DIY brands to make turnkey offers for homes,” the minister announced. In fact, heating is the main source of energy consumption during winter periods and a thermostat helps reduce it to overcome peak electricity periods.
According to RTE, the percentage of French people who report having heating at 19°C or lower has increased to 50%, but many still do not know the temperature of their home. “19°C is good” and “no more than 17°C in the room” for falling asleep, doctor and television presenter Michel Cymes explained during the conference. A few hours earlier, on the set of Télématin, the Minister of Energy Transition had already recalled that the 19-degree “rule” continued to apply, even having to lower the temperature to 16 degrees for unoccupied rooms.
For their part, energy providers will offer consumption management tools and new price reduction offers, as long as customers reduce their consumption during network voltage peaks, a few days a year. Several of them (EDF, Engie, TotalEnergies, EniGas Alpic, ES Energie Strasbourg and GEG) announce gifts or bonuses on the bill to encourage gestures of sobriety.
Reiterating last winter’s drop in consumption seems difficult
GRTgaz, manager of the French gas network, estimates the fall in public gas distribution, excluding industries and gas power plants, at -9.5% between August 1, 2022 and July 31, 2023 in weather-corrected data, compared to the same period in 2018. 2019. During the same period, RTE, which manages French electrification needs, estimates the drop in consumption at -7.4% compared to the 2014 period. 2019. But recording a new significant drop in the winter of 2023-2024 seems difficult due to the lack of significant investments or changes in habits. Last winter, the risk of power outages due to insufficient nuclear production by EDF was an additional incentive for discipline.
Nor does he expect a relaxation because “people have been very aware of gas and electricity prices and tend to consider that they have to be careful.” But if the investments were not made during the summer, “there is no reason for the winter to be different,” according to the head of GRTgaz. In the housing sector, it is never too late in winter, but energy renovation is the victim of increasingly high costs and too high out-of-pocket costs for households. The market for boilers, radiators and even heat pumps has registered a “slowdown” since January, says the thermal industries union Uniclima.
“The sobriety actions seem to have continued in spring and summer,” says RTE, which believes that they will “be amplified, even this winter.” In June, RTE estimated that the thermostat had been lowered by 0.6°C last winter, through an unprecedented survey of thousands of respondents.
Uncertainty remains over gas supply
While residential electric heating is gaining ground, gas heating remains a little more widespread in France. However, the International Energy Agency (IEA) recently warned of possible tensions in Europe on the gas market, particularly in the event of a cold winter and new restrictions on the transport of Russian gas by gas pipelines. “Despite the gradual rebalancing of gas markets, risks and uncertainties weigh on the outlook for winter 2023-24,” underlines the IEA in a report on the market outlook for 2026.
The European Union’s gas storage facilities can be almost 96% full at the start of the heating season, even in France where they are 95% full, but the IEA is cautious about the security of supply, in the center of major shortage fears in 2022 following the invasion of Ukraine. “A cold winter combined with lower availability of ‘shipped’ liquefied gas (LNG, nlr) and a further decline in Russian gas pipeline deliveries could reignite tensions in the market, especially towards the end of winter 2023-24,” explains the OECD agency based in Paris.
Since the invasion of Ukraine in February 2022, Moscow has significantly reduced its gas pipeline deliveries to the EU, pushing states to urgently reorganize their supplies. Thus, they increased their LNG purchases by 70% last year, more than 40% coming from the United States but also from Russia (17% of European purchases from January to July 2023). “We are in a better position” this year, but Europe faces “at least two major challenges,” said IEA head Fatih Birol on September 18 in Paris. “Premièrement, si l’hiver est beaucoup plus rude que l’année dernière (…). Deuxièmement, l’Europe reçoit encore du gaz de Russie, et il peut être coupé d’un jour à l’autre”, soulignait -He. Some Eastern European countries continue to receive some Russian gas through Ukraine.
Source: BFM TV
