Part IV - The reform agenda for recovered sovereignty
4 - Energy and strategic autonomy
Energy supply security constitutes a fundamental pillar of national independence. Mastery of the energy mix, competitiveness for industry and households, and independence from external pressures are central objectives directly linked to the sovereignty and power of the State. Energy is not a market like any other: it is a lever of power, a condition of industrial production, and a question of collective survival in times of crisis.
The European pricing mechanism - a sovereign aberration
Before addressing solutions, the structural problem must be named. France produces the cheapest electricity in Europe thanks to its nuclear fleet, and yet French bills are indexed to the cost of German natural gas. This paradox is the product of the European marginalist pricing mechanism, according to which the market price of electricity is set by the cost of the last source mobilized to balance the grid: gas, always more expensive than nuclear. France does not control this mechanism. In 2022, this paradox reached its peak: at the precise moment when the war in Ukraine was causing European gas prices to explode, the French nuclear fleet was experiencing an unprecedented stress corrosion crisis on the safety injection circuits of several reactors, discovered at the end of 2021. More than half of the 56 reactors found themselves simultaneously shut down, causing production to fall to 279 TWh, its historic low. The combination of the two (decline in national production and price indexed to European gas) produced an unprecedented explosion in bills. Production was progressively restored from early 2023. Exiting the European Union puts an end to this mechanism: France sovereignly sets the price of its electricity on the basis of its actual cost of production. This is one of the immediate and concrete advantages of recovered sovereignty.
Nuclear power - a natural monopoly to be fully mastered
Nuclear power occupies a central place in the sovereign energy strategy. It is essential to distinguish between dispatchable energy and non-dispatchable energy in order to plan production effectively and ensure stable continuity of supply. Nuclear energy constitutes a structural monopoly: it rests on heavy investment, integrated infrastructure, very long-term planning, and absolute responsibility in matters of safety. Submitting it to market mechanisms and complex redistribution arrangements amounts to denying its very nature. The so-called universal nuclear payment mechanism, presented as a balancing arrangement, in reality organizes a fragmentation of financial flows, a multiplication of intermediaries, and a dilution of responsibility, where energy sovereignty requires a simple, legible, and unified architecture.
Such a monopoly can only fall under full national mastery. The splitting of EDF into several entities (EDF, RTE, and ENEDIS) has led to a duplication of competences, a blurred interlocutor, and higher costs. A single sovereign company ensures production, distribution, and maintenance, with a single responsibility and a legible decision-making chain. Any restructuring or nationalization measure is validated by the reformed Senate as a strategic instrument of the State.
Uranium - managed dependence, 4th generation as horizon
La France ne produit pas d’uranium sur son territoire en quantité significative. Cette dépendance est réelle et assumée : tant que les approvisionnements sont diversifiés entre plusieurs fournisseurs fiables, elle ne constitue pas une vulnérabilité critique à court terme. Des stocks stratégiques de long terme sont constitués et maintenus pour absorber toute rupture d’approvisionnement. La vraie réponse souveraine est l’accélération du déploiement des réacteurs de quatrième génération (de type Phénix, Superphénix, ASTRID) qui ferment la boucle nucléaire en réutilisant les déchets comme combustible. À terme, la France dispose d’un stock de déchets nucléaires suffisant pour alimenter ses réacteurs pendant plusieurs siècles sans nouvel approvisionnement en uranium. C’est la souveraineté énergétique absolue, et raison de plus d’en faire une priorité de recherche stratégique nationale.
Hydropower - maximizing what we have
Hydropower is a dispatchable, sovereign, and decarbonized energy. The objective is to renovate 100% of national dams to optimize their production and to eliminate private concessions on these strategic infrastructures. The holding of private concessions on assets as essential as dams is incompatible with energy sovereignty. Hydropower cannot be significantly extended, the territory being what it is, but it can be optimized and secured.
Intermittent renewable energies - maintenance without expansion
Intermittent renewable energies (solar, wind) are maintained within their existing fleet, but no new concession or expansion is authorized. Their intermittency, their lower yield compared to dispatchable technologies, and their dependence on imported critical materials expose the country to economic and geopolitical vulnerabilities. The priority remains a decarbonized and dispatchable energy. This position is not ideological: it is a pragmatic reading of the constraints of a sovereign grid.
Geothermal energy - a massively underexploited sovereign resource
Geothermal energy is dispatchable, non-intermittent, decarbonized, and free from import dependence. It constitutes for France an exceptional sovereign resource at two distinct levels.
In metropolitan France, low-energy deep geothermal power (exploiting hot aquifers at depths of 1,000 to 2,000 meters) is already a reality. The Paris basin has the Dogger aquifer, one of the most exploited in the world, with 58 plants supplying heat to several hundred thousand homes in Île-de-France. The Aquitaine basin presents a similar potential that is still largely unexploited. For 1 kWh of electricity consumed, these installations produce approximately 20 kWh of heat: an unmatched yield. This resource mechanically reduces dependence on imported gas for urban and industrial heating, wherever geology permits. The massive thermal renovation of the building stock, piloted by the Planning Commission in cooperation with departmental prefects, completes this strategy by reducing the energy needs to be covered.
Dans les territoires volcaniques d’outre-mer, la géothermie haute énergie produit directement de l’électricité : pilotable, non intermittente, au coût parmi les plus bas des énergies renouvelables dans le monde. La Guadeloupe dispose depuis 1986 de la centrale de Bouillante qui couvre 6 à 7% de ses besoins électriques. Ce chiffre est appelé à progresser massivement : le BRGM documente un potentiel de plus de 50 MW supplémentaires exploitables sur la seule Guadeloupe, de quoi couvrir plus de 30% des besoins électriques de l’île dès les années 2030-2035. La Martinique, La Réunion et Mayotte présentent des potentiels géothermiques similaires, insuffisamment explorés à ce jour. Le contexte est celui d’une dépendance énergétique aux fossiles importés qui dépasse 85 à 90% dans ces territoires : une vulnérabilité stratégique et économique inacceptable pour des territoires français. Les seuls obstacles actuels sont administratifs et financiers ; la CDC et le Commissariat au Plan ont précisément pour mission de les lever. La géothermie haute énergie, en combinaison avec l’hydraulique existante, constitue la base pilotable souveraine d’un mix qui vise l’autonomie électrique complète de ces territoires à l’horizon 2050.
Marine energies - a complement for the most exposed territories
For territories where geothermal energy remains insufficient, France has a second sovereign lever still largely unexploited: marine energies. Wave power, which converts wave energy into electricity, presents real potential for Atlantic and Pacific islands exposed to regular and powerful swells. Ocean thermal energy conversion, which exploits the temperature difference between surface and deep waters, constitutes a dispatchable and continuous resource particularly suited to tropical territories. These sectors do not have the industrial maturity of nuclear or geothermal: their horizon is ten to twenty years. But France has an exceptional maritime domain, active research laboratories on these technologies, and a dependence on imported fossil fuels in these territories that exceeds 85% in some cases. Massively financing research now means guaranteeing the energy autonomy of these territories in the next generation. The Planning Commission coordinates these research priorities in conjunction with energy industry actors and the relevant territories.
Oil dependence - active reduction through algae
France imports virtually all of its oil: a strategic dependence that exposes the national economy to geopolitical tensions and global market volatility. Long-term strategic stocks are constituted to absorb short-term supply disruptions. The long-term sovereign response is the active reduction of this dependence through progressive substitution, of which the algae sector is the main lever. Microalgae present oil yields 30 to 120 times superior to terrestrial oilseed crops and can be produced anywhere across our maritime territories without consuming arable land. France possesses the second largest maritime domain in the world: this is a strategic asset for this sector. The algofuel research workstream is addressed in the research and university workstream as a national strategic research priority, with a realistic industrial horizon of 10 to 20 years. In the meantime, French refineries, protected by the sovereign golden share, remain operational within the current framework.
Strategic resilience
The Planning Commission ensures the mapping and securing of critical dependencies in the energy sector, identifying the essential components and materials whose absence could compromise national sovereignty. It anticipates shock scenarios (major outages, attacks on critical infrastructure, supply chain disruptions) and ensures that strategic arrangements preserve the functioning of the national energy system in all cases. The HCEP ensures independent and continuous monitoring of these arrangements.
All of these choices aim at a simple and non-negotiable objective: that France should never be at the mercy of an external decision to turn on its lights, heat its homes, and keep its factories running.