The Bouches-du-Rhône, the Alpes-de-Haute-Provence, the Var or even the Vaucluse and the Gard. Many prefectures, mainly in the Provence-Alpes-Côte-d’Azur region, have implemented restriction measures at the pump to limit the risk of shortages.
And for good reason: a strike is underway in refineries on Tuesday and many gas stations are already dry. This Tuesday, more than 30% of the stations in the Bouches-du-Rhône had no more diesel at the pump, while nearly a quarter of them ran out of diesel in the Gard and the Vaucluse.
Avoid running out of fuel
Each time, the instructions from the prefectures are similar: limit sales to avoid overconsumption, a situation where customers store fuel that they would not normally need.
“The shortage is a problem of discrepancy between demand planning and actual demand”, explained to the Parisian Salomée Ruel, teacher-researcher in management sciences at Kedge Business School. Asked about the prospects for a fuel shortage, she pointed out that “the stock that was in the service station then ends up in the tanks of cars and in jerry cans”.
This Tuesday, the Bouches-du-Rhône police chief issued an order to requisition the Fos-sur-Mer depot which was on strike in order to ensure supplies and stations and prohibited the sale and purchase of jerrycan fuel.
Same story on the side of the prefecture of Gard and Alpes-de-Haute-Provence, with a limitation of 30 liters for light vehicles and 200 liters for goods transport vehicles over 12 tonnes.
Priority audiences
The decree specifies that certain service stations “are required to make fuel available for the supply of the services and personnel of the priority professions” mentioned, namely the police, firefighters, doctors and nurses or still emergency breakdown services and funeral transport.
“Whether it’s for kerosene or toilet paper, we find ourselves in a situation where the consumer will have the individualistic reflex of going to help himself before his neighbour”, analyzed Salomée Ruel to explain this type of restriction.
Some departments such as Var are currently limiting the purchase and sale of canisters or jerrycans of fuels ranging from gasoline and diesel to ethanol and LPG. “Stockpiling is creating a shortage”, even reports the prefecture of Vaucluse, which has taken similar measures and also limits the purchase of fuel to 3 liters for light vehicles and 120 liters for vehicles over 3.5 tons.
The duration of these prefectural measures depends on the day of their implementation. They will last until Friday evening in the Alpes-de-Haute-Provence, Thursday midnight in the Gard, the Vaucluse and the Var.