France stays top EU power exporter in H1 with 31% rise

Paris: France remained Europe’s top physical net power exporter in the first half of the year at 40.8 TWh – a 31% jump from the second half of 2023, a Montel Analytics report showed this week.

The surge was due to increased nuclear output, a surplus of hydropower generation and persistently low demand, despite French solar and wind plants “frequently ramping down during periods of negative prices”, the report said.

In 2023, France regained its position as Europe’s largest net power exporter after becoming a net power importer for 2022, at around 17 TWh, for the first time in more than 40 years.

Most power from France flowed to Britain, which received 11.7 TWh, while Italy, Germany and Switzerland received 9.4 TWh, 8.8 TWh and 7.4 TWh, respectively.

Sweden was the second largest net power exporter in Europe in H1, at 15.3 TWh, and the Netherlands overtook Norway to become the third highest, at 8.8 TWh.

“An increase in solar capacity and new offshore wind farms coming fully online were key reasons why the Netherlands leapfrogged Norway,” said Jean-Paul Harreman, director at Montel Analytics.

“In contrast, Norway’s hydro reserves dropped… which reduced the pressure to dump cheap power into neighbouring countries.”

Meanwhile, Italy remained Europe’s largest net power importer at 25.4 TWh, of which 9.4 TWh came from France and 10.3 TWh from Switzerland. Britain ranked second, taking in 18.9 TWh of imports.

Italian power prices were likely to increase amid new cuts in French power exports, analysts told Montel last week.

French TSO RTE said last week that France’s net electricity exports on commercial exchanges in H1 reached a record 42 TWh and could break the record set in 2002 if the trend continued in H2.