Electricity prices in France temporarily dropped to zero — consumers got power for free On December 8, electricity prices on France’s day-ahead market fell to zero, meaning that for several hours power was effectively free. Bloomberg reported the development. The reason was a rare energy surplus: an unusually warm winter sharply reduced demand for heating, while strong winds boosted output from wind farms. At the same time, nuclear plants were running at about 85% capacity, adding even more excess supply to the grid. The agency notes that Europe is seeing such situations more and more often: growing renewable generation during periods of low demand increasingly pushes electricity prices down to zero — and sometimes even into negative territory.