The coal-fired power plant in eastern France, scheduled to close on March 31 after 71 years of operation, may restart this winter given the situation in Ukraine and tensions in the energy market, the French Energy Transition Ministry confirmed.

The ministry stated that it is leaving the possibility to activate the St.-Avold headquarters for a few hours if needed next winter, confirming the information on Radio RTL.

As stated, France will in any case remain below one percent of electricity produced from coal, and Russian coal will not be used.

In France, there is only one other coal-fired power plant at Cordeme in the west, where more than 67 percent of electricity is generated from nuclear sources, and fossil fuels accounted for 7,5 percent in 2020, of which 0.3 percent it was coal and 6.9 percent gas.

The ministry said the plant's resumption of work fits into the shutdown plans and that President Emmanuel Macron's plan to close all coal-fired power plants in France remains unchanged.

Germany, Austria and the Netherlands recently announced that they will increase their use of coal, the most climate-damaging fossil fuel, to compensate for declining Russian gas supplies to Europe.

This decision worried the European Commission and environmental organizations, which pointed to the risk of deviating from the EU's climate goals.