“Every 10 minutes, a Frenchman dies prematurely due to pollution, in particular due to the dust deriving from the combustion of fossil energies. It is a massacre of 48.000 dead a year, more than those of traffic accidents, suicides, homicides, drownings and domestic accidents combined”. With these words, published on his Instagram profile, French President Emmanuel Macron reiterates the need not to step back on the carbon tax, while reaching out to the gilets jaunes, the protest movement which in recent weeks has garnered the anger of hundreds of thousands of citizens (especially motorists) throughout France, triggering demonstrations and incidents which resulted in dozens of injuries and even deaths.
The straw that broke the camel's back, which seen from Italy seems trivial since fuel prices are currently higher in Italy, was the increase in excise duties on petrol and diesel that Paris intends to trigger from 1 January 2019: +2,9 cents per liter for petrol and above all +6,5 cents per liter for diesel, the favorite fuel of deep France, which travels by SUV, does not enjoy alternative mobility services like those in large urban centers and feels the issue of climate change to be very distant from his daily life.
There had already been increases at the beginning of 2018, by 6 and 4 cents respectively, and according to quick calculations at the end of the five-year period, things being like this, diesel will cost 30 cents more per litre, not exactly a detail: it will become more expensive than petrol going from the current average of 1,40/1,50 euros per liter to 1,70/1,80. And Macron's plan, which instead cares a lot about the energy transaction, as demonstrated by the (vain) attempts to convince Trump to sign the Paris climate agreements, does not stop there: ecological taxation will also concern heating, with the cost of gas going from 6 euros per MWh in 2017 to 16 euros MWh in 2022, with a percentage increase of +166%.
An impact that according to some parliamentarians has been estimated at 313 euros of extra costs per year for every single citizen, in 2022. But for those who, like the gilets jaunes, use diesel and travel many kilometers a day, it can reach 538 euros a year to be charged only to fiscal policies aimed at the environment. Precisely for this reason, while acknowledging the validity of the operation, the French president, whose consensus is at an all-time low (and lower than that of his predecessor François Hollande at the same point in his mandate), understood that this could not go on. And he opened the door to three months of concertation with a movement that exploded suddenly and spontaneously, according to some destined to become an organized political entity, somewhat on the model of the 5 Stars in Italy.
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The leaders of the yellow vests, although courted by Marine Le Pen who immediately winked at the protest, then distancing himself from the violence, have in fact repeatedly reiterated that they do not recognize themselves in any political alignment. Most of them feel very distant from politics and voted blank in the last election. Also for this reason Macron, who is expected in six months from the complicated challenge of the Europeans, has opened the doors of the Elysium to them, saying he "understands anger" and promising to adjust excise duties according to oil price trends. In recent weeks, however, the price of crude oil has started to fall again and therefore it is not a promise that risks having an impact in the short term. And in the meantime there is also the ecologists not to be dissatisfied, a certainly smaller and less noisy fringe of the population, but which besieges Macron on the opposite front.
On the table there is always the closure of nuclear power plants, announced by the previous government (in which Macron was Minister of Economy) with a plan to 2025, which however has now been extended to 2035, the year by which 14 nuclear power plants out of the current 58 will be closed, so as to decrease the share of the atom in energy production to 50%. A postponement that environmentalists obviously don't like, to whom Macron however reaffirmed his commitment to electric cars and wind power, also launching the High Council on Climate, a new body of experts that will have to monitor the controversial energy transition. And to avoid the young president from tripping over an issue that has never been so divisive.
