While Donald Trump announced on Thursday June 4 his intention to relaunch coal in the United States with great fanfare, with $700 million in investment, where is France in its coal exit trajectory? During his first presidential campaign, Emmanuel Macron promised to close all French coal-fired power plants by 2022. Although the war in Ukraine and the energy crisis thwarted his plans, France has still progressed on this path.
After the closures of the EDF coal-fired power plant in Le Havre (Seine-Maritime) and that of GazelEnergie in Gardanne (Bouches-du-Rhône) in 2021, there are only two coal-fired power plants left in operation on French territory: that of Saint-Avold in Moselle, owned by GazelEnergie, a subsidiary of the EPH group of the Czech Daniel Kretinsky, and the EDF Cordemais power plant in Brittany. In the context of the energy crisis in 2022, following the war in Ukraine, these two sites had in fact benefited from an exemption to postpone their closure until 2027, in the name of energy security.
0.13% of electricity production in France
The share of these last two coal-fired power plants in national electricity production, however, remains marginal. According to RTE, they produced nearly 725 GWh in 2024, or 0.13% of electricity production in France. In 2000, coal represented 5% of the national energy mix. Globally, fossil fuel still represents 35% of the energy mix. With the closure of the last two French coal-fired power plants, French electricity will only be produced by nuclear, hydraulic, wind, solar and, in certain cases, gas-fired power plants.
In 2025, the National Assembly adopted a bill on the conversion of these last two coal power plants to less polluting fuels. By December 31, 2026, EDF must therefore present a new electricity production plan for the Cordemais power plant, aiming for an emissions threshold below 550 g CO2/kWh. It will therefore have to reduce its emissions by around 40 to 50% compared to its coal operation.
Conversions on the horizon
On the Saint-Avold side, the GazelEnergie group presented its project last year to transform the site into an “energy hub”. The objective is to produce electricity (from biogas), store it and use it to power a data center located on site. “We have been holding discussions with various partners for more than a year with a view to establishing a data center, since the power plants are a privileged site for hosting this type of project,” announced the group’s president Frédéric Faroche.
In recent years, several coal-fired power plants installed in the overseas territories have also been converted. The Bois-Rouge and Gol power plants in Reunion, as well as the Moule power plant in Guadeloupe, now produce electricity from biomass (in particular by using bagasse, from sugar cane, as fuel).
This “end of coal” planned for 2030 in France concerns electricity production from this fuel but not its use in industry, even though this sector represents around 28% of greenhouse gas emissions in the country. In fact, coal is still used as a raw material in many manufacturing processes in metallurgy, or as inputs in certain chemical industries.
In the long term, decarbonizing the economy will require reducing these industrial uses, which are more difficult to replace. In the steel industry, avenues are being explored to replace coke (fuel obtained by pyrolysis of coal), using low-carbon hydrogen and natural gas or electric furnaces.
