Following the press conference on 14 November 2023, the government launched a consultation on 22 November 2023, setting out the arrangements envisaged to guarantee the protection, stability and predictability of electricity consumers' bills in France after the end of the ARENH on 31 December 2025.
The consultation covers the system envisaged to ensure a longer-term electricity market providing more stable prices in line with the cost structure of the French electricity mix, while giving EDF the means to ensure its development and make the expected investments necessary for the success of the energy transition.
This system is based on the deployment of the long-term commercial policy envisaged by EDF and on economic regulation of existing nuclear power.
EDF will implement a new sales model based on medium and long-term contracts:
- firstly, market contracts with a 4-to-5-year term: these are sales contracts, open to all market players, for the delivery of electricity for a period of one year at these terms. Since September, EDF has been offering electricity for the years 2027 and 2028 in the form of auctions open to all market players ([1]). The development of market liquidity at these dates will enable suppliers who so wish to offer their customers medium-term supply contracts;
- secondly, industrial partnership contracts backed by nuclear power plants and "PPA" contracts backed by renewable assets;
- finally, medium-term supply contracts with its own customers based on market price references, in addition to standard market offers and regulated tariffs whose price is set by the public authorities.
To provide additional protection in the event of high market prices, the government plans to levy a charge on revenues ([2]) from EDF's existing nuclear power plants, based on two thresholds:
- 50% of revenues in excess of an initial threshold would be levied. This first threshold is currently estimated at €782022/MWh and
- 90% above a second threshold set at €1102022/MWh.
These thresholds are expressed in 2022 currency and are indexed.
The amounts levied would be redistributed to consumers, providing them with additional protection against episodes of high market prices.
The text of the public consultation is available here (in French only):
https://www.ecologie.gouv.fr/sites/default/files/Consultation_publique_NRN_vf.pdf
At the end of this public consultation, the terms of the levy scheme will have to be translated into law.