Published: Less than 20 min ago
The extreme heat has led to historic drought in France.
Over 100 municipalities have run out of tap water.
– This drought is the worst we have ever seen, says Prime Minister Élisabeth Borne.
France is in its third heat wave this summer.
Pretty much the entire country is affected. On a map that Le Monde published, large parts of the country glow crisis red.
Water restrictions have been imposed in almost all of the mainland’s 96 regions. In 62 of them, there is an acute water shortage and crisis situation, according to Le Monde.
In a statement, Prime Minister Élisabeth Borne called the situation a “disaster for our farmers, our ecosystem and biodiversity”.
Affects nuclear power plants
According to the forecasts, it could possibly get even worse in the next 15 days.
The government has activated a crisis group. Everyone is encouraged to conserve water.
However, golf courses are still allowed to be watered, even in regions with a crisis warning, which has received strong criticism.
In more than 100 communes in the south-east of France, it is particularly bad – the inhabitants lack water in the taps, according to the minister of ecological transition Christophe Béchu, who recently visited the region.
According to him, drinking water needs to be transported there by trucks.
– The worse the situation gets, the more we will prioritize drinking water over other uses, he says according to AP.
In addition, the French energy giant EDF may be forced to reduce activity at several nuclear power plants because the river water is too hot to cool the reactors.
40 degrees “new normal”
Several records have been broken during this summer’s extreme heat waves in France. According to data from Météo-France, temperatures of over 40 degrees are on the way “the new normal”.
In the first few days of August alone, the 40 mark has been crossed 52 times at the weather service’s stations.