“We are starting from a distance. We have fallen behind.” By presenting his plan for the energy future of France, Thursday, February 10, Emmanuel Macron recognized that wind power was struggling to have the wind in its sails in the country. The announcements of the Head of State, two months before the presidential election, raise questions about the results of his five-year term in terms of the environment. Between the various ministers who have succeeded each other in office, communication on the subject, progress and renunciations, franceinfo goes up the thread.
Voluntarism perceived as opportunism
Ecology is not in Emmanuel Macron’s DNA. “He is a former finance inspector who believes in the state, a productivist state”recalls Bruno Cautrès, researcher at the CNRS. “He has a Saint-Simonian side. He believes in industry, progress and technology.” However, Emmanuel Macron will quickly realize the importance of the ecological question and its political interest. “We can clearly see in his career and in his campaign that this subject is not in the foreground, but once at the Elysée, he realizes that it is an important issue.notes political scientist Daniel Boy. Especially since some of the greens voted for him, so we have to pamper this electorate.
“Ecology is the fight of the century”, we hammer at the Elysée. Emmanuel Macron wants to show his leadership on the subject and opposes, for example, Donald Trump in 2017, after the announcement of the American withdrawal from the Paris agreement, by launching “Make Our Planet Great Again” (“Make our planet great again”) to attract foreign researchers to France.
—Emmanuel Macron (@EmmanuelMacron) June 1, 2017
“Simple display”we accuse at EELV. “He only did the com’: the ‘Make Our Planet Great Again’the One Planet Summit or the ecological defense council created a few days before the European elections to send winks to the green electorate…”castigates the boss of the Greens, Julien Bayou. “He uses ecology to fuel his political strategy. He could have been a Kennedy of the climate and he was not at all”adds the ecologist deputy Matthieu Orphelin, ex-LREM.
Emmanuel Macron responded to these criticisms in an interview with Brut in December 2020. “No one has done as much as in three years, no one! I haven’t taken any laws for ten years from now”he was annoyed. “But he shifts the problem by saying that!”, gets carried away Matthieu Orphelin. “If need be, so much the better if he has done more than his predecessors, but he shifts the debate. The only worthwhile thing is what he has done in relation to the findings of scientists. However, we cannot not say that France is the champion of the climate, it would have been necessary to do five times more”judges the elected official of Maine-et-Loire.
A waltz of environment ministers
“It was a pretty clever political move”, believes Daniel Boy. In May 2017, Nicolas Hulot joined the government as Minister for the Ecological and Inclusive Transition. A big catch for Emmanuel Macron, who gives a media and popular face to the fight against climate change. The ecologist, former host of the program “Ushuaia”, had nevertheless refused all the offers made to him by the former presidents. His appointment raises many hopes, which will quickly be disappointed.
In August 2018, Nicolas Hulot resigned resoundingly. “I do not want to give the illusion that my presence in the government means that we are up to the task on these issues, and therefore I am making the decision to leave the government”he launches on France Inter, without having taken the care to inform the executive. “He took a year to realize that his hands were tied, but all environment ministers have their hands tied!”quips Daniel Boy.
“With Nicolas Hulot, Emmanuel Macron attempted a political coup which did not succeed.”
Daniel Boy, political scientistat franceinfo
The result is hardly encouraging. The president of the National Assembly at the time, François de Rugy, replaced him in September 2018 but had to leave a year later, after the lobster scandal. The Minister of Transport, Elisabeth Borne, takes over for a year before being replaced in turn by the ex-EELV Barbara Pompili. A waltz of ministers that provides a perfect angle of attack for the opposition. “What is Macron’s record in terms of the environment? It’s four ministers in four years. Do you think we can do a good job?”tackle Bruno Retailleau, the boss of the LR senators, on Public Senate.
“Unfortunately, on ecology, this waltz of ministers, it’s quite usual, we often have chronic instability”, remarks Matthieu Orphelin. This close friend of Nicolas Hulot had left the LREM group in 2019, very disappointed with the policy carried out on the subject of the environment. “What struck me was the weakness of the various tenants against Bercy and Matignon in the arbitrations that were lost. And then the two Prime Ministers [Edouard Philippe puis Jean Castex] were not environmentalists”he said.
Some notable successes and advances
Emmanuel Macron has however well implemented several emblematic promises of his campaign. Several examples: the ban on shale gas and new hydrocarbon exploration permits, the organization of the States General on Food, the obligation to offer 50% organic products, quality or local labels, in collective catering, the creation of a scrapping bonus of 1,000 euros or the launch of a 4 billion euro renovation plan for public buildings.
Matthieu Orphelin also welcomes the abandonment of flagship projects such as the airport of Notre-Dame des Landes (Loire-Atlantique) or the stopping of the EuropaCity project (in Val-d’Oise). He also cites the mobility orientation law and the anti-waste law for a circular economy. Emmanuel Macron is also at the origin of the creation of the High Council for the Climate (HCC), installed in November 2018. This independent body, made up of experts, is responsible for evaluating and guiding environmental policies.
Renunciations, failures and questionable choices
The progress made during the five-year term is totally eclipsed by setbacks and misses, accuses Greenpeace, which denounces a “catastrophe assessment”. “One step forward, two steps back”judge for his part Climate Action Network (document in PDF). On the side of broken promises, we can cite the doubling of the capacity of wind and solar energy, the definition of a timetable providing for the gradual elimination of pesticides or the banning of endocrine disruptors.
The flip-flop on the glyphosate ban is also seen as a major waiver of the five-year term. At the end of 2017, Emmanuel Macron assured that France would ban glyphosate by the end of 2020 at the latest.
I asked the government to take the necessary measures so that the use of glyphosate is prohibited in France as soon as alternatives have been found, and at the latest in 3 years. #MakeOurPlanetGreatAgain
—Emmanuel Macron (@EmmanuelMacron) November 27, 2017
But at the beginning of 2019, the head of state was forced to recognize that France would not be able to do without “100 %” glyphosate within three years. The president’s strategic choices are also criticized, such as the 17 billion euros put on the table to support the aviation sector hard hit by the Covid-19 pandemic. “Now is not the time to support aviation at all costs”had estimated the HCC, calling on the executive to condition public aid on “precise plans” to preserve the climate.
Emmanuel Macron’s five-year term is also marked by convictions from the French state in environmental cases. In the “Case of the Century”, France was condemned in 2021 for its climate inaction. In October of that same year, the state was ordered to take “all useful measures”by December 31, 2022, to repair the damage caused by the non-respect of its climate commitments.
The commitments of the Paris agreement far from being respected
The court convictions all point in the same direction: non-compliance with the Paris agreement, signed at COP21 in 2015. With this text, France has adopted a roadmap for the climate : the National Low Carbon Strategy (SNBC). The main objective is to reduce greenhouse gas emissions in order to limit global warming to 1.5°C compared to the pre-industrial era, and to achieve carbon neutrality by 2050. But France is far off. Emmanuel Macron conceded it himself, during a declaration on the occasion of the five years of the text.
“We have to face the facts: as far as CO2 emissions are concerned, we are not there today.”
Emmanuel Macronduring a speech at the end of 2020
After COP26, which was held in the fall of 2021, the HCC looked at the decisions taken at the summit and their implications for France. The independent body has drawn up a severe assessment of climate commitments.
“The sum of the new ambitions does not make it possible to limit global warming [selon les objectifs de l’accord de Paris].”
Corinne Le Quéré, President of the High Council for the Climateduring a videoconference
To compensate for this delay, the HCC estimates that France will have to “virtually double” reducing its greenhouse gas emissions. To rectify the situation, Emmanuel Macron, who defends both the atom and renewable energies, recently announced several measures: the establishment of 50 wind farms at sea by 2050, the construction of six new next-generation EPRs (EPR 2) and the study of the construction of eight others, as well as the extension beyond 50 years of “all the reactors that can be”.
The Citizen’s Climate Convention, a disappointing highlight
The Citizens’ Climate Convention (CCC) met for the first time on October 4, 2019, after a draw of 150 citizens responsible for working on five themes (moving, housing, food, production and work, consume) by interviewing scientists and experts. The goal: to propose to Parliament a series of measures for the environment. With one condition: that all these avenues make it possible to achieve the objectives set by the 2015 Paris agreement.
“The CCC is a success in the sense that it is a democratic exercise which has shown that citizens were able to make ambitious proposals, acceptable and recognized by the scientists present”, believes Guy Kulitza, retired, who participated in this experience. On the other hand, this inhabitant of Haute-Vienne says to himself “disappointed and angry” how parliamentarians and the government took up the proposals. Same feeling for Eloise, who was in her final year when she was drawn.
“I am angry because this convention had raised a lot of hope. And, in the end, we end up with proposals that have been emptied of their meaning, which do not have the right ambitions. All lack of ambition.”
Eloise, member of the Citizen’s Climate Conventionat franceinfo
What happened ? While Emmanuel Macron had promised to submit the proposals to Parliament “without filter”, they were ultimately reduced, or even eliminated, by parliamentarians or the executive. An example: the CCC advocated a bonus-penalty system when purchasing vehicles weighing more than 1,400 kg. But the government did not follow it. He decided to raise the threshold claimed, so that only vehicles weighing more than 1,800 kg are concerned. “1,800 kg, it’s still a niche car. The average new car sold in France weighs 1,240 kg”tance Isabelle Autissier, president of WWF France.
>> Citizen’s climate convention: how has Emmanuel Macron’s speech on the proposals evolved?
In total, only 10 of the CCC’s 149 proposals were included as such in the “Climate and Resilience” bill. Faced with this observation, the participants present at the time of taking stock of this CCC gave catastrophic marks to the work of the government on the consideration of their proposals. Parliament finally adopted the text on July 20, 2021. If the government has touted a “ecological turn”NGOs and the left have criticized him for his “lack of ambition”.