France Cleantech Industries and France’s Energy Savings Certificates

France Cleantech Industries and Energy Savings Certificates

France’s Energy Savings Certificate scheme—known as CEE—is designed to encourage energy suppliers to promote lower energy consumption. Obligated suppliers must meet savings targets. They may improve their own assets, encourage customers through information or financial support, or buy certificates generated by eligible energy-efficiency work.

Individuals and organisations that achieve verified energy savings receive certificates based on the kilowatt-hours saved and can sell them to obligated suppliers. CEE therefore provides revenue to those investing in efficiency.

Certificates are measured in “kWh cumac” of final energy saved. The term combines the French words for cumulative and discounted: savings are calculated across the product’s lifetime and discounted by 4% per year.

The national scheme has existed since 2006. From 2019, following France’s PACTE law, factories covered by the EU Emissions Trading System also gained access. Funding the most energy-intensive factories to consume less energy is crucial to the industrial technologies developed by FCI’s energy-efficiency members.

FCI’s view of the CEE scheme

France Cleantech Industries strongly supports the scheme. It is a valuable source of finance for cleantech and already benefits members across different technologies. Certificates can support companies recovering waste heat as electricity—such as Enertime, Entent, Hevatech, ANANKÉ and CIXTEN—as well as companies such as Eco-Tech Ceram that use or store recovered heat directly.

For FCI, the scheme’s technology neutrality is particularly important. It rewards the overall reduction in energy consumption rather than prescribing one method, creating fairer conditions for a diverse, sustainable and efficient French industrial base.

Industrial waste heat illustrates the opportunity. ADEME’s 2017 study estimated a French resource of around 109.5 TWh, equal to 36% of annual industrial fuel consumption, including 52.9 TWh rejected above 100°C. A technology-neutral mechanism can accelerate all relevant solutions, including those that are less visible. ORC modules, thermal storage and high-temperature heat pumps can be combined to recover factory heat as electricity or useful heat.

A critical industrial lever for sustainable-development goals

Reducing greenhouse-gas emissions also requires more efficient use of low-carbon electricity. Demand will rise in the years ahead, while intermittent generation can place pressure on the grid. A sustainable future therefore needs diverse, complementary solutions.

This point is especially relevant in France. The country’s historically low-carbon electricity mix, supported by nuclear power, could otherwise weaken incentives for efficiency. CEE helps correct that by encouraging stakeholders to adopt lower-energy practices.

Energy efficiency today enables deeper decarbonisation tomorrow. Efficient products and services turn industrial climate commitments into practical action, which is why the certificate scheme plays an important role in a more sustainable energy system.

CEE as a catalyst for French industrial excellence and exports

International market access is central to the ambition of France Cleantech Industries. FCI brings together industrial SMEs that want to build production in French regions and export high-value technology around the world.

CEE can help finance that ambition. Comparable certificate mechanisms are uncommon in the European Union; France and Italy are the principal users. Effective implementation can support economic growth and provide a competitive advantage for French industrial technology in export markets.