L’Winter promises to be harsh, and with temperatures already cooling, fears of power outages are growing. Faced with the current energy crisis, and to allow the French to better manage the situation, France Télévisions undertook on Friday 23 September to make viewers aware of the measures to be taken to avoid power cuts this winter, in particular by broadcasting Ecowatt , the electrical weather forecast, on their antennas.
The president of the public audiovisual group, Delphine Ernotte, and her counterpart from RTE (Electric Transport Network), manager of high and very high voltage lines, Xavier Piechaczyk, signed this Friday an “unprecedented association” in this regard.
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France Télé will thus display on its antennas, when the time comes, pictograms designed as part of the Ecowatt system, which allows users to see in real time the level of electricity available in the country thanks to a signal in three colors: green (normal), orange (tense) and red (very tense, synonymous with unavoidable cuts if nothing is done to reduce consumption).
Specifically, viewers will be invited to modify their practices according to the pictogram on the screen, with the red one pushing them to moderate their consumption during peak hours, between 8 a.m. and 12 p.m. and between 6 p.m. and 8 p.m.
“Pay attention when necessary”
If you don’t need to turn off your TV, which doesn’t consume much energy, “you can, for example, turn on your washing machine at 10 p.m. instead of 7 p.m.,” Delphine Ernotte tells AFP. You can also postpone the cooking of your “zucchini gratin” from 7:00 p.m. to 7:45 p.m., Xavier Piechaczyk abounds, remembering that heating and cooking consume a lot of energy.
So many gestures that the public of France Télé will be made aware of, that is, “4 out of 5 French people each week”, in particular during information programs or “weather and climate” bulletins, according to Delphine Ernotte, who calls for a service public mission.
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It is not a question of “paralyzing France”, but of “being careful when necessary”, insists Xavier Piechaczyk, who hopes to “save at least 5% of electricity in the afternoon at 7:00 p.m.”For France Télé, this initiative is part of a broader “environmental change” to respond to “the climate emergency”, with, in particular, the creation of a “climate team” among journalists or the “regular relocation” of the 13: 00 hours of France 2 in places hit by the crisis…
The group also undertakes to respect various internal energy sobriety measures, such as turning off the lights in all its buildings after 9:30 p.m., and to work with production companies that meet certain criteria, especially in terms of carbon footprint.