Thread by @ThPellerin

Breaking: Macron wants 1) a French IRA-like cleantech tax credit and 2) an "EU regulatory break".
Here is are my take-aways, from Macron's speech at the Elysée Palace, with a closer look at Europe and #CleantechEU.

First, here is Macron assessment of the situation.
1- France lost more industry than others. Because it didn't do "the reforms" other did in 2000s (not mentioned, but incl. Hartz IV in Germany).

According to Macron: no welfare state without industry. Trade deficit in France is due to deficit in 1) energy, 2) industry, so speeding up industrial development should reduce French trade deficit.

N.B. Macron kind of forgets that this loss virtually stopped from 2008 onwards, where it stagnated, both in terms of jobs and GDP share.

2- Macron sees three big changes that happened in the world in the last few years. 1) massive climate challenge (which Macron describes as something new, I kid you not), 2) technological development speeds-up (AI, quantum etc.). 3) geopolitics.

On the geopolitical angle, Macron details: China invests massively, with a State-centred approach; and US has a “new approach” that is America first, and “over-subsidises” industry esp. tech and cleantech. France/Europe need to speed-up its current course to react.

Then Macron highlithed what he considers to be France's strenghts. Good infrastructure and a "very decarbonised energy mix" -where Macron is making the common confusion between energy (only 35% of France's energy is decarbonised) and electricty (where the number is closer to 85%)

Macron has a four pillar strategy to reindustrialise France. 1) A competitiveness policy with less taxes on capital (that he already cut by ~30Bn€/y), less labour regulation, more apprentices. 2) Investment.

Macron's third pillar to reindustrialise France is an EU industrial policy. France led a "doctrinal revolution" that led to the IPCEIs and a European Council Versailles Agenda to speed-up technological sovereignty. He further praise Fit for 55 -esp. CBAM and Social Climate Fund.

N.B. Macron takes a lot of credit for the EU successes. To be fair, he was largely supportive of most -but not all- the EU successes he mentionned, such as the 2035 end of internal combustion vehicles, that he opposed in 2021 before becoming more pragmatic.

4th pillar is territory. But I missed anything new he might have said in that speech.

In what I thought was a conclusion, Macron listed a wide range of technologies. Cleantech-wise he mentions hydrogen, CCS, batteries, but neither wind power nor heat pumps are mentionned.
He also defended his pension reform -but I will refrain from commenting on this.

Macron wants more tax cuts, more electrification, more nuclear and renewable electricity, and a reform of the EU electricity market.

To speed up industrialisation, he wants to guarantee a maximum 9months period to get a permit -likely for *any* factory built in France. By contrast, the Commission's Net Zero Industry Act aims for 12-18m, and focuses this on 8 cleantech sectors.
i4ce.org/en/net-zero-in…

BUT. No later than this very morning, Macron said in an interview that “The wrong method is to simplify the rules everywhere, for everyone. You have to differentiate.”
By simplifying permits for everyone, Macron would fail to provide cleantech with a competitive advantage.

Macron also annouces a French tax credit for the cleantech industries flagged in EU law -most likely endorsing the scope of the Net Zero Industry Act. Unclear how big this would be -and it can be a game-changer.

He then dropped a rhetorical bomb. He wants an "EU regulatory break" (pause réglementaire européenne). I don't know what this means in practice, since he did speak about a lot of stuff that require more EU regulations (batteries, net zero industry act, crowd-in investments).

He also annouced a change in the French automotive subsidy to stop funding Chinese batteries. This would ban subsidies to the Renault-Dacia Spring -France's cheapeast EV. And wants a French Public Procurement to stop buying non-EU goods.

In what was a genuine conclusion, he underlined the need to act for France's sovereignty and jobs. END