How is France's economy resisting energy price shocks?
Core argument: Nuclear power production returning to normal capacity from ~33% below 2022 levels drives France's electricity prices lower than gas-dependent European.
France’s economy is relatively well positioned to cope with the increase in energy prices. The first reason is that it is less manufacturing-oriented, and its industry is less energy-intensive than elsewhere in Europe (Exhibit 1, left). Second, nuclear power production is back to normal, after having fallen a third below capacity in 2022 following repairs and outages in 2022 (Exhibit 1, right). We recently showed that France’s large nuclear fleet (close to 70% of all power production) makes electricity prices much less sensitive to gas prices than in other European countries.

