French President Emmanuel Macron is calling for a sharp 10% reduction in the country's energy use in coming weeks and months to avoid the risk of rationing and cuts this winter, amid tensions with supplier Russia over the war in Ukraine .
Speaking after a videoconference Monday with German Chancellor Olaf Scholz, Macron announced a plan to boost gas supplies to Germany from France to make up for a drop in Russian gas supplies from the east. In exchange, Macron said Germany will continue supplying electricity to France to compensate for shortages caused by maintenance underway on many French nuclear reactors.
The leaders spoke before an emergency European Union energy ministers meeting Friday about how the continent can coordinate to keep warm this winter if Russia cuts off gas supplies. Macron said France and Germany support the idea of requiring energy companies that are making big profits on recent spikes in gas and oil prices to make a “contribution” to public coffers.
French activists and opposition politicians have been calling in recent days for a tax on oil and gas companies making “super-profits” amid Europe’s energy crisis.Macron avoided using the word tax, instead saying he and Scholz support “a mechanism of European contribution sought from energy companies whose production costs are much lower than the market sale price.
“I don’t understand why we are jumping like Pyreneen goats on this subject to say this would solve the problem. It’s false,” he said. “We need more electrical interconnection. I’m not convinced we need more gas interconnections, whose consequences, particularly on the environment and ecosystems, are greater,” he said.. Meanwhile the EU is seeking to move away from gas altogether over the long term.
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