It's odd to pretend that renewables are all talk when at the moment I'm writing this France's power grid is 28% renewable[1]. And France still has lots of opportunities to expand, both solar and wind. You'd think with >4000km of coast line there'd be lots of space for offshore wind.
[1] https://www.electricitymap.org/zone/FR and 60% nuclear, but the point still stands
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=l3-SXFtPYe0
This was a [prototype 750 kW (KiloWatt) plant operating at Orkney Islands and near Portugal](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pelamis_Wave_Energy_Converter) - as a reference, it took wind power plants more than 20 years of enthusiastic development until the installed power reached 500 kW.
It is a shame that this development was shut down (while the design has been reported to be picked up by, guess whom, the Chinese), while being owned by E.ON. But I am sure more developments will follow, as the design is an excellent idea.
I mean, I don't doubt that that's true, but at the same time a single modern wind turbine generates 2-5 MWp, up 8 MWp offshore.
It's disingenuous to point at 28% renewables as if it's a sudden victory of good wind and solar against bad old nuclear.
Particularly when we know that gas power plants will be built to partially replace Fessenheim.
Installed capacity for solar and wind is a parameter that seems pretty meaningless. For example (according to Wikipedia) the Agua Caliente solar project in Arizona (an ideal location), has an effective output of less than 30% of its installed capacity. A PV plant more comparable with France's conditions, the Lauingen Energy Park in Bavaria, has an output of 12% of its installed capacity.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Capacity_factor#Photovoltaic_p...
Grandparent claimed that the bulk of renewable energy produced in France is hydro (and called me disingenuous). I just cited some statistics -- installed capacity as well as current effective output! -- to put his claim into context. Here are some more[1]: Energy production by source in France, 2019, Hydro 55.5 TWh, Wind 34.1 TWh, Solar 11.6 TWh. Obviously anybody is free to assign whatever value one wishes to terms like "bulk of", but those are the numbers.
[1] https://www.statista.com/statistics/768066/electricity-produ...
Comparing installed capacity without discussing average load factor is also utterly meaningless.
The coal plant was actually commissioned in the early 2000s, construction started 2007, but finished only recently in May 2020 [0].
It was supposed to replace 3 older ones that already went offline back in 2014. As such it has literally nothing to do with the Fessenheim 2 closing, the article trying to spin it like that is quite misleading.