Association négaWatt is a French advocacy group based in

Valence, Drôme Valence (, ; oc, Valença ) is a commune in southeastern France, the prefecture of the Drôme department and within the Auvergne-Rhône-Alpes region. It is situated on the left bank of the Rhône, about south of Lyon, along the railway line ...

. It was founded in 2001 to promote the

negawatt A negawatt market is a proposed idea of implementation of the demand response ( balancing the electrical grid through the changes in consumption) that uses an energy market where the commodity traded is a ''negawatt-hour'', a unit of energy sav ...

concept and its application to French society. The association seeks to reduce the use of fossil fuels and

nuclear power Nuclear power is the use of nuclear reactions to produce electricity. Nuclear power can be obtained from nuclear fission, nuclear decay and nuclear fusion reactions. Presently, the vast majority of electricity from nuclear power is produced ...

. Its approach is based on energy conservation,

energy efficiency Energy efficiency may refer to: * Energy efficiency (physics), the ratio between the useful output and input of an energy conversion process ** Electrical efficiency, useful power output per electrical power consumed ** Mechanical efficiency, a ra ...

and the use of

renewable energies Renewable energy is energy that is collected from renewable resources that are naturally replenished on a human timescale. It includes sources such as sunlight, wind, the movement of water, and geothermal heat. Although most renewable energy ...

. It published a scenario that details a path to phasing out these energy sources. The association unites energy specialists in France, relying mostly on volunteer engineers. Other specialists include volunteer

sociologists This is a list of sociologists. It is intended to cover those who have made substantive contributions to social theory and research, including any sociological subfield. Scientists in other fields and philosophers are not included, unless at least ...

economists An economist is a professional and practitioner in the social science discipline of economics. The individual may also study, develop, and apply theories and concepts from economics and write about economic policy. Within this field there are ...

and

urban planners An urban planner (also known as town planner) is a professional who practices in the field of town planning, urban planning or city planning. An urban planner may focus on a specific area of practice and have a title such as city planner, town ...

, who work together to create energy transition scenarios and to suggest political steps that would need to be taken. Association négaWatt inspired local initiatives in transition towns called "Virage-Énergie," meaning "energy bend".

NégaWatt scenario

The NégaWatt scenario spans from 2012 to 2050. The scenario starts by assessing energy needs for heating, transportation and specific electricity, and suggests a transition path. It then couples the NégaWatt and the Afterterres 2050 scenarios. The association targets

agriculture Agriculture or farming is the practice of cultivating plants and livestock. Agriculture was the key development in the rise of sedentary human civilization, whereby farming of domesticated species created food surpluses that enabled people t ...

energy use and can evaluate biomass production, providing the NégaWatt scenario with realistic figures.Energy transition
website of the French ministry of environment The scenario employs the

power to gas Power-to-gas (often abbreviated P2G) is a technology that uses electric power to produce a gaseous fuel. When using surplus power from wind generation, the concept is sometimes called windgas. Most P2G systems use electrolysis to produce hydrogen ...

process to compensate for the intermittent nature of most renewable energies. The stability of the electricity network is guaranteed with a maximal time step of one hour. The scenario concludes that proven technologies are available to effect the transition.

Other countries

A Swiss NégaWatt organization was founded in 2016, on the basis of the French one.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Association NegaWatt Energy conservation in France Energy policy Sustainability organizations Environmental organizations based in France Environmental organisations based in Switzerland Non-profit organizations based in France Think tanks established in 2001 2001 in the environment 2001 establishments in France Organizations based in Île-de-France Advocacy groups in France

NégaWatt scenario

Other countries

See also

External links

References