France launched a plan of action to deal with the drought that already caused water restrictions in 72 of the 101 departments of the country in order to keep the agricultural and nuclear power plants operating as smoothly as possible.

 

France launched a plan of action to deal with the drought that already caused water restrictions in 72 of the 101 departments of the country in order to keep the agricultural and nuclear power plants operating as smoothly as possible.

The Minister of Agriculture, Marc Fesneau, accompanied by the Secretary of State for Ecology, Bérangère Couillard, made a visit this Saturday to the department of Charente, in the west, to meet with leaders of agricultural unions or professional bodies to hear them send some messages and express their support.

«The truth is that I do not know any territory in which agriculture can be maintained without water», stressed Fesneau, who in statements to the press insisted that «the question is the reasonable management of resources».

The minister recalled that irrigation and water extraction devices for the sector are necessary for livestock, horticulture, fruit trees and sometimes even for vines and cereal crops.

He pointed out that a number of works have already been done and discussions have taken place. Now, he added, we need to move on to concrete solutions. We are in a particularly severe year in terms of drought».

The Government has presented a plan of action and anticipation that is concretized in five axes, starting with the preservation of the maximum resources for priority uses by imposing restrictions on the rest, explained the Department of Agriculture in a statement.

The others are to foresee the needs for animal feed, take measures for the prevention of fires in crops, structural plans to make the agricultural sector more resilient to the consequences of climate change and to structure specific drought monitoring.

The minister described the current situation as «very worrying for all our agricultural world» and stressed that its adaptation to the effects of climate change is «one of the great challenges of our century» and with it is at stake the maintenance of production and «our food sovereignty».

The electricity company EDF and the network operator RTE have indicated that they have obtained a temporary derogation so that three nuclear power stations can continue to operate despite the heat wave that has been affecting the south of France for days.

With this derogation, which will be in force until 8 August, the Golfech, Blayais and Saint Alban power stations will be able to discharge cooling water from their reactors into the rivers at a temperature higher than the environmental regulations in force since 2006.

Temperature limits were then established to preserve the fauna and flora.

The measure comes at a time when half of the 56 nuclear reactors in France, which normally generate 70% of the country’s electricity, are stopped by maintenance work or by detected failures, which is forcing France to import a lot of electricity from neighboring countries like Spain.

This Saturday there are 16 departments in the south of France on orange alert for the heat wave and a score more in yellow alert. Indoor temperatures are expected to be above 35 degrees and promptly around 40.

SOURCE: LAVANGUARDIA.COM