According to the Sustainable Environment Federation, the 8,000 wind turbines in the French park are not capable of running 10% of the country’s air conditioners.
On 7 August 2020 at 6 pm, when the 40°C bar was locally exceeded in part of the country, the 8000 wind turbines supplied 690 MW, i.e. 1% of the national electricity consumption, which at that time amounted to 47,781 MW.
They did not turn one tenth of the air conditioners present in French homes, whose total installed capacity is estimated at 8,745 MW.
As usual, the security of the electricity network was ensured by dams and nuclear power, which are reliable and non-intermittent sources of electricity.
These figures show the uselessness of these “giant industrial fans” which cannot cope with either cold waves or heat waves, i.e. at the critical moments in a high-pressure period when a country’s electricity becomes vital.
The obstinacy of the President of the Republic Emmanuel Macron to want to pursue the installation of wind turbines by brandishing them as “standards of ecology” can only be explained for electoral reasons and not for the higher interest of the Nation believes the president of the Federation of Sustainable Environment, Jean-Louis Butré.
(1) Air conditioning
In France, according to the ADEME, 961,000 homes are equipped with air conditioning, i.e. a rate of 3.1%.
According to INSEE, figures published in April 2015, the average surface area of French housing was 91 m².
It is nowadays considered that you need an output of 100 W per m2* to cool a room in summer or a living/dining room of around 30 m2, so you will need an air conditioner with an output of more than 3,000 W. (Engie)
https://particuliers.engie.fr/economies-energie/conseils/bien-choisir-ses-equipements/puissance-climatisation-100-m2.html
The order of magnitude of the French air-conditioning fleet would therefore be estimated at 91m² x 961,000 x 100W = 8745 MW.
MW= MegaWatt (= 1000KW)
(2) Electricity production by sector
https://www.rte-france.com/eco2mix/la-production-delectricite-par-filiere
RTE Eco2mix
