Provence: Extreme heat causes repeated power cuts

The intense heat waves recorded this summer in Provence have “put under stress” the electricity network “particularly in dense urban areas”, according to Enedis, causing repeated outages in cities like Marseille, Arles and Avignon.

In Arles, four outages were recorded between August 6 and 7, “penalizing many residents, but also our traders, restaurateurs, craftsmen and professionals, in the middle of the summer season,” lamented Mayor Patrick de Carolis in a press release, who demanded “clear answers” ​​from Enedis.

Between August 13 and 19, several thousand customers also suffered repeated outages in Marseille, Avignon, Vitrolles, Sausset-les-Pins and Martigues. In Aubagne (50,000 inhabitants), mayor Jean-Pierre Squillari denounced “frequent outages, sometimes lasting several hours in a row” and blamed “an obsolete electricity network, overwhelmed by the explosion of new uses (air conditioning, heat pumps, electric vehicles)”.

Incidents in several departments

Questioned by AFP, Enedis confirmed incidents "in several departments of the region, mainly in Bouches-du-Rhône and Vaucluse", while emphasizing that they "remain very localized in view of the 3.8 million customers supplied with electricity by Enedis in Provence-Alpes-Côte d'Azur". “Very high heat can put certain equipment in the underground network under stress, particularly in dense urban areas,” explains Enedis regional director François Gonczi.

Indeed, if “the structures of the public electricity distribution network are designed to withstand significant levels of stress, particularly during heatwave episodes, (...) the very high heat accumulated over several days, with a temperature which does not drop below 25°C at night, causes the temperature in the tarmac floors to rise by several tens of degrees (up to 80°C)”.

“These conditions can affect impregnated paper cables (CPI), installed in France until the 1970s, as well as the junction boxes which connect the cables together,” he explains. “Enedis did not wait for recent heat episodes to act,” defends the company, which recalls having initiated the “gradual replacement of old impregnated paper cables (CPI) with synthetic insulation cables, much more resistant to episodes of high heat.” “In Provence-Alpes-Côte d'Azur, 410 million euros were invested by Enedis in 2025 for the modernization and adaptation of the network to climate change,” also underlines François Gonczi.