Before the legislative elections (June 30, July 7), the RN promises to lower the price of energy. Is this realistic? How can he achieve this?
The RN promises the French cheaper energy, in the event of victory in the legislative elections and an absolute majority in the National Assembly. How is he going to do it? He has two priorities. The first, to reduce VAT on electricity, gas, fuel oil and fuels from the first weeks, knowing that France is one of the countries which taxes these energies the most in Europe. The second is to reconnect with a French electricity price aligned with the real production cost of our power plants, and obviously our nuclear power plants since 80% of our electricity comes from nuclear power.
Today, the price is set at European level according to the production cost of the last power plant called to produce to balance supply and demand, most often a gas power plant.
Is it feasible? Lowering VAT at least temporarily requires authorization from Brussels, but it is possible. Energy is not one of the prohibited sectors (tobacco, alcohol, weapons, etc.) and VAT, overall, would not become lower than the European average. Reducing it from 20% to 5.5% would save households between 40 and 50 euros per month on average. But to all households, even those who don’t need it.
New nuclear power will be more expensive
On the other hand, disconnecting from the European price would be very complicated. Spain and Portugal were able to do it, but they are geographically at the end of the chain. And that wouldn’t necessarily be beneficial. It should be remembered that the European price is only 15% of the electricity bill. In this, there are a third of taxes, a third of network costs, and 15% already for the cost of French nuclear power.
Today, the European market price is lower than the production costs of French nuclear power (50 vs. 60 euros per Mwh). New nuclear power will be more expensive and we risk running out of renewable energy, which is becoming cheap. So it’s not a good calculation.
