EDF forced to contain the electricity bill: “The French consumer will be the most protected in Europ – franceinfo

“This is very good news, the French consumer will be the most protected in Europe”, believes François Carlier, general delegate of the association Consumption housing, living environment (CLCV), while the government is preparing to force EDF to sell more electricity at low prices to its competitors, in order to keep its promise to limit the increase in the French electricity bill to 4% in 2022, despite the surge in prices. “In countries where there is no regulated tariff, the increase will be 20% to 30%.”

This measure will cost between 7.7 billion and 8.4 billion euros to EDF, according to Bruno Le Maire. “It will hardly cost the state anything”, retorts François Carlier. “This tax that the government is lowering is a tax that is used to finance renewable energies, when they are not competitive. However, with the surge in the price of the wholesale market, they are very competitive and therefore, it does not there is no need to compensate EDF for their purchases of renewable energies.”

“The eight billion that the state is giving up is money that it usually spends and that it is not going to spend. So it is an operation that is quite inexpensive for the state.”

François Carlier, General Delegate of the CLCV

at franceinfo

The consumer association encourages the French to return to the regulated sales price, “because there is a real guarantee of protection”, assures the general delegate. “In these hectic times, it is better to be on this tariff regulated and distributed by EDF. We fought for it to continue to exist. There are many European consumers who envy us.” François Carlier also denounces a “system of opening to competition out of breath”, where one “raise the price so that the competition continues to survive, because it has additional costs compared to EDF”.