The Constitutional Council censured a provision of the 2022 amending finance bill that raised the limit of payments requested by the State from renewable electricity producers in a context of skyrocketing market prices.
In its decision on Thursday, the institution, submitted to the Council of State for a priority question of constitutionality (QPC), “censures the insufficient precision of the provisions” that establish this removal of the maximum limit. On the other hand, it does not question its material conformity.
An appeal filed before administrative justice
To support renewable energies, since 2015 the State has established “additional remuneration contracts” between producers and EDF, to guarantee them a price.
If market prices increase and exceed this guaranteed price, producers pay the difference to the State. Some of these contracts, however, set a limit on these payments, within the limit of the total aid received by producers, which the government wanted to eliminate as of January 1, 2022.
France Renouvelables (formerly France Energie Eolienne) filed an appeal before the administrative courts, challenging the retroactivity of the decision and pointing out “a disproportionate attack on the right to maintain legally concluded agreements.”
In its decision, the Constitutional Council considered that the legislator did not sufficiently specify its provisions, which “are limited to referring to a ministerial decree the setting of a threshold price according to which the payments due are calculated.” Therefore, “the legislator did not understand the scope of his competence in the conditions that affect the right to maintain legally concluded agreements,” he judges.
“An objective of general interest”
However, in essence, “in a context of sharp increases in electricity prices (since the end of 2021), the legislator intended to correct the unexpected effects from which producers who received public support benefited, in order to mitigate the detrimental effect of this increase on the final consumer, thus pursuing an objective of general interest,” he says.
Neither Bercy nor representatives of the renewable energy sector were able to provide an estimate of the state budget deficit. According to Les Echos, this could represent between two and three billion euros for 2022 and 2023. Looking to the future, Bercy indicates “studying the decision of the Constitutional Council”, estimating that “it is still too early to make a comment.”
“If this provision is modified, it will have to be done in coherence with the sector”, in particular to define the threshold price, asks Michel Gioria, general delegate of France Renewables, highlighting the “investment wall” that awaits the sector. in a context of inflation and rising interest rates.
Source: BFM TV
