Back to power generation: testing citizen newcomers at producing electricity

By Arnaud Assié
English

French renewable energy citizen-led projects considerably increased in the last decade. These projects find their origins in the rejection of both nuclear energy and dominant liberal practices in the field of renewable energies. However their motivations are multiplying with the number of projects. The article aims at analyzing the trials that project leaders encounter by working, at various scales, namely when creating groups of people interested in electricity production and when developing power generation plants. The article also refers to some project-development mechanisms, and to the emergence of the very idea of citizen-led power generation, in an ill-adapted regulatory framework, and highlights how projects development interweaves with the constitution of national networks dedicated to experience-sharing and advocacy.

  • renewable energies
  • electricity
  • grassroot projects
  • citizens
  • networks
  • arrangements
Go to the article on Cairn-int.info