The French Budget Law for 2025 provides for measures to adapt RES contracts in order to address the phenomenon of negative wholesale electricity prices and the participation of RES in the mechanisms for balancing the electricity system.
The opinion published by the French energy regulator CRE in early December on the draft decree implementing the budget law mainly concerns the conditions for applying decisions to suspend parks that are subject to obligations to purchase the energy they produce during periods of negative prices. Once the decree enters into force, obligated purchasers will be able to request the suspension of wind installations with a capacity of more than 10 MW and solar installations with a capacity of more than 12 MWc during these periods, in order to reduce not only the support costs in the budget, but also the depth and frequency of hours with negative prices. Producers will be compensated for the loss of generation capacity.
The CRE supports this draft decree and recommends its rapid adoption. It welcomes the measures aimed at distributing shutdowns and recommends reviewing the effectiveness of this measure by the end of 2026.
It considers it desirable to cover as many large installations as possible with support that may be forced to limit their production during periods of negative prices. In this regard, the regulator notes the 12 MWp threshold for the participation of photovoltaic installations, but strongly recommends that it be reduced to 10 MWp.
Another recommendation made to the draft decree is to change the amount of compensation paid to electricity producers from ground-based installations in the event of a shutdown, so as to take into account the dynamic coefficients from 2028 onwards. This will allow for a more accurate reflection of the level of loss of production capacity of the installations. The operational implementation of the provisions of the decree will have to be specified by the CRE, in particular within the framework of the methodological discussion on the assessment of public service costs in the energy sector (CSPE).
You can read what else the French regulator recommends here
Energy purchase obligations: Legislation and regulations in France require EDF and local distribution companies to purchase electricity produced by certain production sectors (wind energy, photovoltaic energy, biomass, etc.) under imposed tariff and technical conditions.
