Storm in a glass of water or alarm signal? The appointment of Dominique Voynet to the High Committee for Transparency and Information on Nuclear Safety (HCTISN), an organization responsible for producing information reports on the nuclear sector, divides. In a letter addressed to the president of the National Assembly Yaël Braun-Pivet, Raphaël Schellenberger and Antoine Armand, respectively president and rapporteur of the parliamentary inquiry on the loss of energy independence of France, denounce an incomprehensible and worrying decision, recalling the fierce opposition to the nuclear of the former Minister of the Environment. A disproportionate reaction, retort certain members of the HCTISN who insist that Dominique Voynet will do little damage within a plural structure, including both members of the nuclear sector and associations hostile to the atom, and which has no decision -making power.
For Fabien Bouglé, author of Energy war (Editions du Rocher), the epidermal reaction caused by this affair especially reflects a fed up and the beginning of a real change: French energy policy, marked by many “Stop and Go” and unhappy ideological choices, can no longer continue as before.
L’Express: How do you explain the eddies created by the appointment of Dominique Voynet? HCTISN is not an institution used to making waves …
Fabien Bouglé: It’s true. One might think that Madame Voynet will not have much influence on the content of the work of this umpteenth committee Théodule. But it is only a symbol, the tip of the iceberg on the question of the presence of antinuclear personalities in all the cogs of our institutions. This is the concern. Opponents of the atom, we find it at the Court of Auditors, the Ademe, the Ministry of Ecology and even the DGEC (General Directorate of Energy and Climate). This presence creates a kind of psychological blockage on the question of nuclear in France.
Look at the last report of the Court of Auditors, which says that we are far from ready for the recovery. It is a stab on the back of the French nuclear sector. Another example, on the next multi -year energy programming, which gives pride of place to renewable energies, the government now wants to go through decree and thus avoid a parliamentary debate.
In fact, there is no political will today to truly put the package on the revival of nuclear. When the Notre-Dame cathedral had to be rebuilt, this political will was manifested and the building was quickly restored. On nuclear, we are told that blocking comes from the significant cost of investment. Except that it is above all a political decision. We had to wait for the last nuclear policy council – three years after Belfort’s speech! – To have the contours of the financing of future EPRs. In the current context, this controversy around Dominique Voynet can open a national debate on our energy policy and the institutional cogs that block it. Several senators, as well as alumni in the energy sector, grow in this sense today.
Two years ago, the publication of the report following the parliamentary committee on the energy independence of France showed the many flaws of our policy. Has our country have made progress since then?
This report had accomplished a very good work of highlighting the issues. In particular, by pointing to sabotage our energy system by some people. Representatives of the nuclear sector were able to express themselves. Sometimes hard. Like the former boss of EDF, Henri Proglio, who believes that the Germans pushed to destroy the French energy giant, and that they succeeded. But Antoine Armand and Raphaël Schellenberger did not want to dig this question of foreign interference, to avoid, according to them, a sterile controversy. However, we always pay for this lack of lucidity in the face of maneuvers of other countries, which they aim to destabilize or pre -empt markets.
France will not be able to save a major survey on interference in the French energy field. We can see, for example, the offensive carried out in Europe for a few years by the actors of the American nuclear sector. In 2023, former Secretary of State John Kerry went to Romania to launch the Phoenix project, which aims to replace coal power plants in Eastern countries with American technology reactors. Why this plan? Americans rightly think that technological domination in nuclear provides an energy vassalization for decades. In the same vein, Westinghouse and Ukraine signed a contract for the construction and development of nine nuclear power plants.
This is the reason that pushes Donald Trump to get his hands on the Ukrainian nuclear power plant in Zaporijia?
The issues are considerable! Control of Ukraine energy facilities allows political control of the country. Above all, Washington does not want to let Vladimir Putin be the master of the game in Europe. I don’t think the latter will let go of Zaporijia. If the Donbass region is annexed, the Russian president will need electrical resources to supply it. But other transactions are taking shape. Via a possible control of Nord Stream 2, America wants to become the Russian gas distribution office in Europe. A kind of broker that takes its tithe with each transaction. Also, let’s not forget that 75 % of Ukrainian energy facilities were destroyed by the war. So there is a huge market to take.
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