39 municipalities and 87,000 inhabitants concerned. 73 for, 4 against. The Agglomeration of Agen has chosen the party of the central party. Last Thursday, in community council, one of the big pieces of the meeting was that of the question of the support of the Agglomeration of Agen for the application of Golfech for the expansion of its power plant with the reception of an EPR (European pressurized reactor). Regarding the EPR2 program, after the 2021 decision to create 3 pairs (Penly, Gravelines and Bugey), there remain four sites to designate. Each will receive two new generation reactors. In the South-West, two sites are in competition: Blaye and Golfech. The decision should be taken by the government at the end of 2026. Golfech’s candidacy, supported by the community of municipalities on both banks, is also supported by the Occitanie Regional Council, the Tarn-etGaronne Departmental Council, the Chambers of Commerce and Industry of Lot-et-Garonne and Tarnet-Garonne. “The difficulty of this file for us lies in our proximity: we are more Occitan than Aquitaine, as was the case for the LGV”, underlined the president of the Agglomeration Jean Dionis. “We were asked by Jean-Michel Baylet, president of the community of communes of both shores, for support for this issue. » The support of the Agglomeration of Agen and its central city is indeed decisive for the relevance of this candidacy. The Agglomeration brings together more than 58% of the population affected by the power plant’s security perimeter. “It is clear that Golfech cannot be retained without the support of Agen. You need industry, land, water… but also a level of service to accommodate the plant staff. With its range of services for an agglomeration of more than 100,000 inhabitants (jobs, health, accessibility, education, etc.), the Agglomeration of Agen complements in a very positive way the attractiveness of the Golfech site for future employees of the site and the plant as well as for their families. »
“A civic and ecological reason”
Indeed, the Golfech site has been designed to accommodate 4 units (2 are operational to date) with the space available for this purpose. An additional land reserve of nearly 100 ha makes it possible to advantageously support the construction of a pair of EPR2 reactors on the site. This extension of the site would generate some 7,000 jobs over 8 years. A significant influx of population for the Agglo, as was the case many years ago, an example given by the president with the La Goulfie district, built largely to accommodate some of the power plant’s staff. However, it is above all a “citizen and ecological reason” which pushes the president of the Agglomeration to support this candidacy. “It is a clean energy that can help meet our decarbonization commitments from an energy point of view. We are on a trajectory where we want to be neutral in our greenhouse gas emissions. There are no other strategies than nuclear power and renewable energies. We need to make nuclear power safer and safer. »
The question of water in advice
If support for this candidacy was approved, both in the Urban Council and in the Municipal Council of the City of Agen (34 for, 5 against), it nevertheless mainly raised questions about water. In the Agglomeration Council, it was in particular Laurence Lamy (Bon-Encontre) and Francis Garcia, whose commune, Le Passage, voted against in the municipal council, who raised this water issue. “We can legitimately wonder if the low water level of the Garonne, historically low and which will continue, or even get worse, is well suited to the cooling of a second tranche for Golfech. » Laurence Lamy also raised this question: “The issue of a sufficient water resource for cooling and preserving the water supply is essential and I find it a shame that we do not condition our deliberation on the result of the technical and in-depth study which must take place. We display blind confidence in our deliberation without conditioning it on these technical studies. » Nevertheless, Bon-Encontre still gave his voice to the project. The president chose to reassure by relying on the figures delivered by EDF. “For two EPR2s, we preserve 10 m³/s for 2 m³/s which evaporate and therefore 8 m³/s returned to the Garonne. At low water, the volume is 80 m³/s and it must be remembered that in summer, the Garonne is supported by the Pyrenean dams if the flow has to be increased. »
