EDF - Anticipating the new energy landscape

This is a complex and eminently multidisciplinary exercise, and the Group works with a network of partners. R&D thus focuses the messages delivered to top management on the following areas:

• Critical overview of international thinking on the energy future, quantifying the risks associated with lasting energy shortages and examining alternative solutions.
• Drafting of macro-energy scenarios that take on board the forecasts mentioned above as well as anticipated shifts in demand resulting from climate change and economic development in the major geographic areas.
• Interpretation of the rules already in effect or to be implemented, with an eye to assessing their impact on the regulations and institutional frameworks that govern energy markets.
• Evaluation of technical, economic and environmental performance of centralised and decentralised electricity generation technologies and management, notably fourth-generation reactors, renewable energies, fossil-fired facilities with CO₂ capture, thermal and electrical storage, etc.