Citizen activists in southeastern France’s Alpes-de-Hautes-Provence region have been campaigning for two years against the growing number of solar power parks in a protected natural area around the Lure mountain. The local authorities, and the parks' investors, claim the plants are “essential” projects in the fight against climate change, and in line with the ambitions of the European Green Deal. But the activists claim these projects are “destructive” for biodiversity and the landscape.
A few hundred metres above the commune of Cruis, in the Alpes-de-Hautes-Provence region, Sylvie Bitterlin, a 62-year-old actress, stands in front of the security fence of a brand-new solar farm.
“Look, they've destroyed everything,” she says.
On the 17-hectare site, the garrigue or scrubland of Provence has been replaced by several thousand solar panels.
The project has been under construction for several months and is nearly finished. According to the operator, Boralex, a Canadian renewable energy company, the site will generate 14.9 megawatt-peak hours of electricity, enough to power a community of 12,000 residents.
Boralex’s managing director, Jean-Christophe Paupe, claims the park makes “an indispensable contribution ... at a time when France is lagging behind in the development of renewable energies”.
But as the project nears completion, Bitterlin makes no secret of her frustration and anger.
Since 2019, she and about twenty other members of the local citizens group Elzéard, Lure en résistance have been fighting tooth and nail to prevent the plant from going ahead.
They say the solar park, partly installed in an area classified as a “biosphere reserve” by UNESCO, will endanger several protected species and their habitat.
Alexanor butterfly and ocellated lizard
“We're told that Provence has poor soil, that there's nothing in it. But this is totally false. We have medicinal plants, thyme, rosemary, orchids ... These are fantastic plants, home to protected species. It's all about life,” says Bitterlin, who has become the movement's spokeswoman.
“Before, this landscape stretched all the way to the top of the mountain,” she says, against the backdrop of the picture-postcard setting of the 1,826-metre-high Montagne de Lure. “What destruction! What a disaster! Where's the ecology when we raze forests and destroy biodiversity to produce energy?”
According to Pierrot Pantel of the Association Nationale pour la Biodiversité (ANB), who took up the case on behalf of the Elzéard collective, 88 animal species have been recorded in the area.
These include several protected species of birds, butterflies such as the Alexanor, with its yellow and black wings, and lizards such as the ocellated lizard – the largest in Europe. “Many animals will have fled their habitat or will have died during the construction work,” he says.
Boralex insists that the project, officially launched in 2009, is the result of “more than five years of environmental and landscape studies, in partnership with the French government”, and that “everything possible has been done” to protect biodiversity.
“Initially, the park was designed to cover several dozen hectares, but its size was reduced to take account of this issue,” explains Paupe.
“And we have put in place a whole series of measures to preserve species: we have adapted our work periods, set up biodiversity corridors, restored habitats,” he says.
But opponents of the solar farm decry these measures as inadequate and say they are just “smoke and mirrors”.
In an area known for its biodiversity, a few "ecological corridors" won’t compensate for the damage caused by building the site, they say.
'An example of what needs to be done in the EU'
Paupe says that the farm "aligns perfectly with French and European ambitions for energy transition” and is “essential in the fight against global warming”.
“What's more dangerous for biodiversity: climate disruption or photovoltaic panels?” he quips.
Indeed, the European Green Deal's overarching aim is to make the EU the world's first "climate neutral bloc" by 2050.
The EU is therefore aiming to massively accelerate the development of renewable energy in a bid to reduce its dependence on fossil fuels, which are the main cause of climate change.
Under the terms of the deal, renewable energies will account for 42.5% of the energy mix by 2030, up from 23% in 2022. France shares this aspiration and passed a law to accelerate the production of renewable energy in March 2023.
But Paupe argues that "this ambition is only achievable if we agree to develop large-scale projects, like the one at Cruis", drawing on studies carried out by RTE, France's electricity transmission company.
“Today, we can't be satisfied with solar panels on the roofs of houses and in areas that are already industrialised. Of course we need solar panels in these places too. But that won't be enough.”
Boralex says there were good reasons for selecting the Lure mountain area for the solar park.
“The PACA region has a lot of sunshine and strong photovoltaic potential. However, it currently imports a large proportion of its electricity. The Cruis power plant therefore helps to resolve this paradoxical situation,” he continues. “In short, it's an example of what needs to be developed across the European Union to move away from fossil fuels. But it will take multiple projects like this one to get there.”
Apart from the arguments put forward by Boralex, projects like this one also provide significant funds for the municipalities concerned.
In Cruis, revenues generated by the solar plant make up 20% of the municipal budget, according to mayor Félix Moroso.
“Over the past two years, it has enabled us to renovate a parking lot, start work on the school and reintroduce aid for disadvantaged groups,” says Moroso, who has been the mayor of the village of 700 inhabitants for 35 years.
“All this at the cost of photovoltaic panels on 1% of our commune”, he adds, expressing annoyance at the actions of the park’s opponents.
But Bitterlin says the project is “not the solution. We're razing forests to put up photovoltaic panels. We're caught in a paradox."
“The first thing to do is to reduce our consumption. If we really adopted more sober lifestyles, would we still need these huge power plants in natural environments?”
“The problem with these parks is their giant size. We wouldn't be against reasonable photovoltaic projects, in line with the needs of the population,” she says. “Unfortunately, we've adopted the financial logic of companies and communes that seem to simply want to make money.”
Months of mobilisation
The situation in Cruis became particularly tense in September 2023 when construction began. “We'd spent years trying to alert and educate the population, to no avail. So when we saw the construction equipment arriving on the mountain to destroy everything, we decided to take action," Bitterlin noted.
For weeks, and in all weathers, Bitterlin and the other activists tried almost daily to block the construction site.
“Never in my life did I think I'd ever chain myself to construction machinery, get under its wheels or climb trees to block work,” said Bitterlin, who says she’s never been the rebellious type. “But the cause was too important,” she says.
On October 4, 2023, Bitterlin and fellow activist Claudine Clovis, 72, were arrested by gendarmes as they lay under the wheels of earth-moving machinery.
They were taken into custody and detained overnight. They were eventually found guilty of obstructing traffic in February 2024 by the criminal court in Digne-les-Bains and sentenced to a suspended fine of €1,200 and a three-month suspension of their driving licenses. The two defendants will also jointly pay €5,000 towards Boralex's legal costs.
Although they have decided to appeal the decision, their arrest put a stop to their campaigning. “We had to keep a low profile and, above all, Boralex stepped up its surveillance,” Bitterlin says. “And, frankly, we were exhausted both physically and morally by those weeks of fighting.”
But the Elzéard group has not given up entirely. Although no one is currently physically blockading the Cruis solar plant, the activists have taken their fight to the courts, with legal assistance from Pantel and ANB.
Over the past four years, the collective – with support from a dozen other environmental groups – has filed three complaints with the Digne public prosecutor for “destruction, alteration and degradation of the habitat of protected animal species” and “undermining the conservation of protected animal species”. According to Pantel, Boralex had in fact begun work on the plant before obtaining all the necessary permits.
A victory in court
In a big win for the activists, on Friday May 31, Boralex and the French government were found to be at fault by the Marseille Administrative Court of Appeal for failing to find an alternative site which would have had less impact on biodiversity.
The administrative judges found in favour of the collective, whose complaint had been dismissed by the court of first instance. The complaint challenged an order issued in 2020 by the Prefect of Alpes-de-Haute-Provence, granting Boralex an exemption from the prohibition on destruction, intentional disturbance or degradation of specimens and habitats of protected animal species.
“It's a great victory. The site is now considered illegal. Work will have to stop and the site cannot be exploited for the time being," says Pantel. “It also legitimises our actions and the disruption to the site – which is important for the Sylvie Bitterlin and Claudine Clovis trial. Finally, it's educational: this judgment shows that you can't destroy a natural habitat with impunity.”
Anticipating that Boralex will take this judgment to the Conseil d'État, the highest court of appeal, Pantel now hopes to reach a final ruling. “We will then go and demand restoration of the site, recognition of the ecological damage and we'll try to question the State's responsibility.”
For its part, however, Boralex believes that the cancellation of this protected species exemption “does not call into question Boralex's right to operate the Cruis solar power plant, nor does it call into question our presence on the site or the finishing work on the plant, which is not affected by this protected species exemption”, the company told AFP.
“This judgment also legitimises our future actions,” says Pantel. Aside from Cruis, some thirty photovoltaic projects are currently under way on the Lure mountain, eventually covering a thousand hectares, according to Pantel’s estimate.
“And we intend to prevent as many as we can,” adds Bitterlin.
A network of sentinels
One of the activists’ new battlegrounds lies a few kilometres from Cruis, in the commune of Montfort. Some 20 hectares have already been cleared.
In January, construction equipment levelled the pines and oaks and soon earth-moving machines will install a new photovoltaic park, operated by Engie Green. It will be the fourth park in this commune of 300 inhabitants.
“We weren't informed when the work started. We arrived too late to prevent the felling of the trees," says Bitterlin.
At the end of May, accompanied by her friend Véronique, also an activist, they came to see the progress of the site. “We were worried about seeing earth-moving equipment,” they say.
With a tape measure in hand, they walked around the site with one objective in mind: to check that Engie Green was complying with all regulations. Cut down a protected tree? Destroy the habitat of a protected species? An information panel removed? Everything is carefully examined. But today, everything seems to be in order.
“We won't be demonstrating here, and we won't be obstructing the work. In any case, it's already too late – once the clearing is done, there's not much left to defend,” they say.
“But we remain vigilant to strict compliance with the rules and are putting our energy into other projects.”
A few kilometres away, in the commune of Banon, Sophie and Nadine keep watch on the areas affected by other solar projects, including one led by a Korean company, QEnergy.
Aged 64 and 72 respectively, the two pensioners admit to being “constantly on the lookout”, “tracking down the slightest noise of construction work” to “check that building work isn’t starting”.
“I go walking in the area every day anyway,” explains Sophie. “Here, at certain times of the year, you can hear deer snorting. It's an incredible natural place. It can't disappear,” she says.
In her large garden with a totally unobstructed view of the surrounding countryside, she says she’s proud of having her own photovoltaic panels, but “only those necessary for her personal electricity consumption”.
“Do we really need to develop large-scale power plants? Isn't the solution first and foremost to take stock of our energy use?” she asks, echoing opponents of such projects in France.
“It's really the multiplication of these projects that's worrying. Are we really going to punch holes in the mountain from all sides?” asks Nadine.
“In addition to biodiversity, we're also touching on a whole literary heritage, the mountain so dear to Jean Giono!” she warns, referring to the writer who drew such inspiration from the Lure mountain.
The Green Deal was a central feature of outgoing EU president Ursula Von der Leyen's last term of office, and a new parliament will be formed after European elections on June 9.
Bitterlin said she hopes that the issue of solar parks in environmentally sensitive areas will be taken up by candidates for the new EU parliament.
“We've succeeded in making Cruis a symbol of our campaign,” she says, adding that what matters now is to prevent other environmentally disruptive projects from being built.
This article has been translated from the original in French.
