2024-02-13 07:30:18
According to the annual study “Companies in France”, the energy bill for industrial companies with at least 20 employees doubled between 2019 and 2022. Faced with this new situation, companies are adapting.
Faced with rising electricity and gas prices, companies are adapting their operations to consume less. While the time for cheap energy is over, reducing production costs in the long term, investing in more efficient devices and remaining competitive with the competition is a question of survival. To see the scale of the challenge,INSEE annual study “Companies in France”published in December 2023, is rich in lessons.
If establishments with 20 or more employees in industry have managed to reduce their energy consumption by 5% in 2022 (- 9% for gas and – 3% for electricity), their energy bill increased by 54% between 2021 and 2022, indicates INSEE. This surge comes following an increase of 40% in 2021. If sobriety has not penalized production as a whole – up 1% at the national level – it has had significant effects on the most energy-intensive manufacturers.
The major energy consumers most affected
More affected by the rise in prices, the most energy-intensive industries are those which have had to make the most efforts to reduce their consumption (- 7%). This situation is explained in particular because of the type of energy contracts of these companies, shares INSEE. If the smallest establishments often have fixed price contracts between one and three years, the establishments with the highest consumption more frequently have a contract indexed to the market price. This is the case for 37% of establishments that consume large amounts of electricity, compared to 8% for small consumers, and 51% for gas, compared to 13% of small consumers.
Between 2019 and 2022, the average price of gas purchased by companies doubled, but it quadrupled for the most consuming companies, those consuming more than 278 gigawatt hours (GWh) per year. “ While this was not the case before [jusqu’en 2020, NDLR]companies consuming a lot of gas now pay more per unit than companies consuming little gas », underlines INSEE.
Between 2019 and 2022, the price of electricity increased by 38%. “ On the other hand, the price of electricity remains higher for small consumers, but the gap between small and large consumers is narrowing significantly. », Specifies INSEE. Indeed, if the price paid by the most consuming companies (90.2 €/MWh) remains significantly lower than that paid by the least consuming (161.8 €/MWh), the ratio is only 1 .8, compared to 2.8 in 2019.
Declining production for the most energy-consuming
To achieve such reductions in consumption, the most energy-intensive industries had to reduce their production. In the second half of 2022 compared to the second half of 2021, production fell by 17% in the manufacture of basic chemicals and by 16% in the steel industry. Consumption also fell by 11% for the manufacture of pulp, paper and cardboard and by 8% for other non-ferrous metals.
This decline continued in the first half of 2023, underlines INSEE. In particular, production fell by 28% for the steel industry, and by 24% for the manufacture of pulp, paper and cardboard. The manufacture of glass and glass articles, which had until then not been affected by the drop in production, recorded a drop of almost 7% in its production in the first half of 2023.
Complementary strategies
Faced with these increases in energy prices, 52% of industrial establishments increased their prices. At the same time, 45% compressed their margins and 30% drew on their cash flow. In addition, 29% have invested to reduce and optimize their energy consumption in the medium term.
This trend has the beneficial effect of affecting companies least engaged in their energy transition. “ During the second half of 2022, the companies which improved their energy efficiency the most would often be those which had demonstrated the least sobriety between 2018 and 2021 », underlines INSEE.
The institute notes other adaptation strategies. In particular, some establishments partially replace gas with fuel oil, the price of which increases less. For others, the strategy was “ closure for a few weeks, or even a few months “. But not sure that these emergency solutions can have a long-term future.
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