PARIS: France will shut down all its coal-fired power plants by 2023, president Francois Hollande has announced.
Speaking at an annual UN climate change conference on Wednesday, Mr Hollande vowed to beat by two years the UK’s commitment to stop using fossil fuels to generate power by 2025.
Mr Hollande, a keynote speaker at the event in Marrakech, Morocco, also praised his US counterpart Barack Obama for his work on climate change, and then appeared to snub president-elect Donald Trump.
Mr Trump is reportedly seeking ways to withdraw from the Paris agreement, a global treaty to limit climate change.
“The role played by Barack Obama was crucial in achieving the Paris agreement,” Mr Hollande said, before adding, in what has been perceived as a dig at Mr Trump, that becoming a signatory to the treaty is “irreversible”.
“We need carbon neutrality by 2050,” the French President continued, promising that coal will no longer form part of France’s energy mix in six to seven years’ time.
France is already a world leader in low-carbon energy. The country has invested heavily in nuclear power over the past few decades and now derives more than 75 per cent of its electricity from nuclear fission. It produces so much nuclear energy, in fact, that it exports much of it to nearby nations, making around £2.5 billion each year.
The mood in Marrakech has been described as defiant, with more world leaders backing the Paris agreement plan to cut greenhouse gas emissions, which came into force on 4 November, since Mr Trump’s remarkable victory.
