Towards a new increase? The UFC-Que Choisir denounced the reform of the electricity market in France from 2026 which will mechanically lead to a “massive increase” of electricity prices “to the detriment of consumers”. This calculation is “biased”, reacted Bercy.
The association estimates that the mechanism chosen by the government in the finance law to replace the current system, which goes out on December 31, 2025, will lead to “making the French pay their electricity at high prices”. “This reform, negotiated on the sly between the government and EDF, will mechanically lead to a massive increase in electricity prices, to the detriment of consumers,” said the UFC-Que Choisir.
An increase of “19 % per year”
This would result in consumers by an increase in the bill “on average 19 % more, up to up to 250 euros per year for an average home” if the reform applied this year. The UFC-Que Choisir justifies to base its evaluation over the year 2025 by the uncertainties on the parameters which will be taken into account to determine the level of the regulated electricity sales prices (TRV) in 2026 and in particular the prices which will be Observed by the end of the year on the wholesale markets.
By way of illustration, a household at the regulated rate consuming 6,000 kWh of electricity per year would have had an annual invoice 17 % higher than that based on prices today actually practiced, which represents an additional cost of 233 euros.
The association also deplores that in spite of the government’s commitment to redistribute to households part of EDF’s profits, which “will be very limited”. “Only a small fraction of household consumption will be concerned. The taxation of EDF’s profits will remain insufficient to compensate for the outbreak of prices, “she said.
For Bercy, the “is biased” calculation
The Ministry of the Economy rejected these conclusions by considering that “the calculation thus carried out is biased”. The study published by the UFC-Que Choisir offers a calculation associating current data with a mechanism which will only come into force in 2026, without taking into account other parameters. According to Bercy, the simulations carried out show that “the repayment to the consumer provided by the finance law for 2025 leads to a level of TRV on January 1, 2026 almost identical at the current level”. “This result indicates that the expected repayment works,” he said.
For the UFC-Que Choisir, one of the major differences between this new regulation and that still applied this year concerns how to calculate the costs of the electricity supply. Today, part of the supply is ensured via a mechanism called ARENH (regulated access to historic nuclear electricity), which constitutes the share of the supply in connection with the costs of EDF nuclear production.
“From now on, the supply will go completely through the market,” sums up the association. For Bercy, “the smoothed over two years makes it possible to amortize market fluctuations and participate in the general price stability objective. »»