A protestor holds a flare next to a spread out banner reading "100% public" during a demonstration at the call of several workers' unions of the electricity and gas sector against a government plan to remove the "tarif agent", a preferential energy rate on electricity and gas consumption for employees and retirees of the electricity and gas industries, near France's Economy ministry Bercy in Paris on September 15, 2026. Electricity and gas workers staged a massive strike on September 15, 2026, to protest plans to roll back their preferential energy rates, a benefit that is part of their compensation package, with some 59% of EDF SA employees (excluding subsidiaries) participating by midday, according to management. This level of participation, calculated on the company's total workforce, is "historic," according to the CFE-CGC, the company's leading union, which notes that it already exceeds the participation rate recorded at the end of the day during the previous action to defend the employee tariff in 2011. (Photo by LOU BENOIST / AFP via Getty Images)