A situation “more favorable than at the beginning of autumn”. This Tuesday, December 20, 2022, the electricity transmission system operator, RTE, presented the update of its outlook for winter 2022-2023. The war in Ukraine, the unavailability of part of the French nuclear fleet and the delay in renewable energies form a cocktail conducive to tension on the network.

In this unprecedented energy context, sobriety is essential and efforts are required of everyone to reduce the country’s overall consumption. Efforts that have borne fruit, it seems, since “the trend towards lower electricity consumption is now firmly established”, says the company.

Industry, residential, tertiary… All sectors confirm this overall drop in electricity consumption. In a press conference, Thomas Veyrenc, director of strategy at RTE, was formal: “The fall in electricity consumption is not a pipe dream. It is real, measured, distributed between individuals and businesses, and meaningful”.

In addition to the adoption of eco-gestures, there are also European interconnections – which allow the country to import electricity – and the strengthening of production potential in France thanks to the restart of several nuclear reactors. Together, these three elements allow RTE to provide a favorable update of its outlook for winter 2022-2023. Should we still fear load shedding this winter? Check out the details in our slideshow below.