The former Heads of State have swept aside the reproaches made to them on the reasons for the current difficulties of the nuclear fleet.
Former presidents Nicolas Sarkozy and François Hollande posed Thursday, March 16 as promoters of nuclear power during their mandate, defending themselves before the deputies for being accountable for the difficulties which today weigh down the fleet of French reactors. The parliamentary commission of inquiry launched in October 2022 at the initiative of LR deputies to “to establish the reasons for France’s loss of sovereignty and energy independence” closed its work on Thursday with the extremely rare hearing of former presidents, for more than five hours.
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Unsurprisingly, the right-wing former president Nicolas Sarkozy (2007-2012) first made a plea in favor of nuclear power, defending all the decisions taken in this direction during his mandate, such as the development of EPRs. “I wanted France not only to be energy self-sufficient, but to be able to export”notably supported the former president. “A few weeks later” the Fukushima accident caused by a tsunami in Japan on March 11, 2011, by announcing that France was going to “continue to invest in nuclear for the production of electricity, I cause an outcry”he explained, when Germany had made another choice.
“EDF’s investment in the power stations was tripled during my period, I will not allow it to be said that EDF sold off the maintenance of the power stations, because if it had sold it off, the safety authority would not have she protested?”, he continued. Since the end of October 2021, EDF has had to juggle problems with cracks in its reactors which have seriously disrupted its nuclear production in 2022, which fell to 279 TWh, its lowest level for 30 years.
François Hollande challenges a “lack of investment”
Invited to speak about EDF’s difficulties, François Hollande mentioned a “addition of incidents”excluding any link between the drop in production and a “lack of investment” or some “political decisions” dating back 10 years, when LR deputies regularly criticize his policy, as well as Emmanuel Macron’s first five-year term, due to the closure of the Fessenheim nuclear power plant.
During the 2012 presidential campaign, Nicolas Sarkozy and François Hollande clashed over nuclear power during the debate between the two rounds. The outgoing president had accused the socialist of having “sacrificed” this industry for “a miserable deal” with the Greens, providing for the gradual closure of 24 power stations. François Hollande had told him that he had partially freed himself from this agreement by demanding an energy mix between nuclear and renewable energies.