EDF Renouvelables has reached the 2GW milestone for wind and solar capacity in France, following a record year for onshore wind for the company in the country.
The company said in 2019 it had commissioned almost 200MW of onshore wind capacity and had a similar volume under construction in France.
The figures include projects on French territories, with the repowering of its Petit-Canal wind farm (pictured) in Guadeloupe recently completed.
Repowering has doubled capacity of the project to 12MW, while reducing the number of turbines to 14 from 32 previously.
EDF Group and Canadian partner Enbridge have started construction of the 480MW Saint-Nazaire offshore wind farm, which is expected to come into service in 2022.
Construction on the Fecamp and Courseulles-sur-Mer projects is expected to start next year, it said.
EDF said also that it has completed the preparatory phase of its ‘Plan Solaire’, which seeks to re-establish the company’s leading position in solar in France by targeting a 30% market share by 2035.
The company has increased secured land area seven-fold to 2000 hectares for ground-mounted solar projects.
Projects with planning consent have increased five-fold, and the number of projects successful in French energy auctions has increased six-fold, EDF said.
Roof-mounted solar – managed by its EDF ENR subsidiary – has also seen strong growth and has a 20% market share.
Plan Solaire will now move into the operational deployment phase.
EDF Renewables chief executive Bruno Bensasson said: “We are seeing a strong growth in our activities in France thanks to our teams’ commitment to working at a local level.
“For EDF Renouvelables, 2019 brought an acceleration around the world and a double rebalancing in terms of technologies – with more solar and offshore wind farms – and geography – with stronger footprint in Europe and emerging countries.
“These successes help drive the implementation of EDF’s CAP 2030 strategy which seeks to make our group a world leader in carbon-neutral electricity, drawing on both nuclear and renewable energy, particularly hydro, wind and solar.”
The growth in renewable energy in France forms part of EDF’s CAP 2030 strategy, which aims to double the group’s global clean power capacity to 50GW by 2030.