France Floods Europe’s Grid With Solar, Pushing Prices Negative

French solar power surged on Thursday as a stretch of sunny weather boosted generation allowing the country to export huge volumes of electricity to neighboring markets.

Solar generation climbed above 20 gigawatts at 12:15 pm Paris time, according to RTE data. Output is forecast to rise even further over the next two days, according to Bloomberg forecasts. The surge in solar combined with almost 40 gigawatts of output from France’s large fleet of nuclear power plants, means the grid is running a large power surplus, with exports to neighbors including Germany, Italy and the UK reaching over 15 gigawatts.