Grenelle

New Caledonia and France create huge Marine Protected Area

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le-nouveau-parc-naturel-de-la-mer-de-corailMore good news people ! New Caledonia – and France – are creating a marine protected area (MPA) of huge size : 1.3 million square kilometers : the parc naturel de la mer de Corail.

This park will be amongst the largest MPAs in the world. Thanks to that, 16 percent of the waters under French jurisdiction are now under an MPAs status, compared to just four percent before.

The management and the financing will be done by the local government, while France will care about the security and police of this critical hot spot for biodiversity.

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New French President outlines his green policies

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I have to admit that I am a tad, a wee bit, late on that as this post should have been published in September. Anyway, here is my latest Cleantechies post, dedicated to the green roadmap of the new French government. Anyway, here is the introduction : ” In September, an environmental conference in France … Read more

How the EU could go for 30% emissions reduction

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Yesterday I was fortunate to attend a conference given by Nathalie Kosciusko-Morizet – known here by her initials, NKM –  the incumbent Minister for Ecology and Sustainable Development of France.

Green causes are going forward in France as she is at the top of this most important Minister and I am sure that the many achievements of the Grenelle de l’Environnement are just the beginning for a more sustainable France.

During the Q&A session after the conference, I was able to ask her opinion on how the European Union could go for more ambitious emissions reduction targets.

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France issues new regulations for large solar PV installations

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Here is my latest post for CleanTechies : “On Monday, the French Minister for Environment and Sustainable Development, Nathalie Kosciusko-Morizet, presented new regulations for large solar installations.” “(…) Let us hope these new projects will be successful as the previous attempts at creating an solar photovoltaic industry in France have been a resounding failure. ” … Read more

It is now official : France dives into offshore wind

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Do you remember my post for Cleantechies on offshore wind in France ? It is now official : ” This week French officials are announcing a plan to install six hundred wind turbines capable of producing 3,000 megawatts of energy. “

The wind turbines will be located in five main sites between Saint-Nazaire and Dieppe/Le Treport (all off the Atlantic Ocean shores). More wind turbines will come later to reach hopefully 6,000 MW of capacity by 2020.

I am particularly glad this becomes official as the Grenelle de l’Environnement has suffered many setbacks in the past few months, including the decrease of feed in tariffs for solar PV…

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Report on the French Grenelle after three years

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For my latest article on CleanTechies I decided to go back to writing on my home country, France, and this for a good reason. It had been three months I hadn’t done so. Here is the introduction : ” The French Round Table on sustainability known as the Grenelle de l’Environnement is now three years … Read more

IEA to France: increase electricity prices and competition

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After a long break I am finally back to writing for CleanTechies. The occasion was given by the International Energy Agency as it released on Monday its latest country report on France. As I wrote there : Although France has not been immune to the global economic downturn, the climate change plan known as the … Read more

Forum des Emplois Verts

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As I am still looking for a job in the cleantech sector I am attending today the Forum des Emplois Verts (French Green Jobs forum) in Paris where up to 2,000 jobs positions are proposed. This is a fantastic opportunity since as I noted earlier the Boston Consulting Group believes the Grenelle de l’Environnement could … Read more

France studying carbon tax introduction

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I have the pleasure to announce you that my second article for CleanTechies have been published. After writing about the wind energy sector in France, this one is about the future carbon tax. Here is a short extract: ” France is currently thinking of enacting a carbon tax to increase climate change mitigation efforts. If … Read more

4,000 MW of wind power in France

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wind-turbines-france I would like to announce that my first article at CleanTechies has been published today. This is both a huge pleasure and a honor to write for such a blog. Here is an extract:

According to an article [Fr] from the AFP, the installed wind power capacity in France reached 4,000 MW. In line with the targets set by the Grenelle, up to 25 GW will have to be installed by 2020.

To read the full post, please check out this link. If you have any question please leave it there. If it’s for a comment or a message of congratulations, please do it here ! 😉

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The Grenelle could create up to 600,000 jobs

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The Grenelle Les Echos [Fr], the French leading financial newspaper brought my attention to a study published by the Boston Consulting Group stating that the Grenelle de l’environnement could create up to 600,000 jobs in France in the very next years.

The majority of the job creations are due to occur in the building sector as up to 20 million of apartments and houses need to be retrofitted in our country. The transportation and renewable energies would add  most of the other jobs.

But this study doesn’t stop there as it also notes that greenhouse emissions would decrease by 2020 by 27 % compared to 2005 levels, or 14 percent by 1990 levels.

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French carbon tax delayed to 2011

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To the AFP:  ” The French government on Wednesday kickstarted plans for a so-called carbon tax on energy-hungry products, to be rolled out by 2011 as part of France’s efforts to slash global warming emissions. “ (…) ”  President Nicolas Sarkozy’s government has said it hopes to shift part of French taxes from labour towards … Read more

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