How do intermittent renewable energies affect the environment? - Fact sheet, November 2021. Environmental impact of intermittent renewable energies - Fact sheet, October 2022

Energy sector policy reduces environmental protection issues to the reduction of greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions, presenting the massive deployment of intermittent renewable energies as an effective means of achieving this. However, as France's electricity mix is already 92% decarbonized, wind power (13.2 gCO₂e/kWh) and photovoltaics (55 gCO₂e/kWh) are not indisputable contributors to decarbonization, and even less so as these two technologies need to be supplemented by gas-fired power plants emitting 418 gCO₂e/kWh. These activities, which do not contribute to reducing CO₂ emissions, also have a negative impact on the environment in which they are located, not to mention the additional impacts resulting from the multiplication of their connections: soil artificialization, impacts on water and wetlands, impacts on avifauna and chiropterans and their habitats, impacts on landscapes, heritage and culture, impacts on the health and living environment of local residents