15.000 brownfield sites representing an area of 60.000 hectares identified in France

Some 15.000 brownfield sites have been identified in France, equivalent to 60.000 hectares of land, according to data from the Centre for Studies and Expertise on Risks, the Environment, Mobility and Development published on Monday, September 22.

"Faced with the fear that land scarcity will limit new projects, brownfield sites represent a resource that remains underexploited and offers real development potential," the public institution emphasizes in its national inventory for 2025.

Of this total, 33% are brownfield sites linked to housing, 22% are industrial brownfield sites, the latter representing the largest share in terms of surface area (50%), while 10% are commercial brownfield sites, 5% are public facility brownfield sites and 5% are railway land.

Two-thirds of the brownfield sites identified are larger than 0,5 hectares, making them "potential for large-scale development projects or renaturation operations," the authors note.

A third of the brownfield sites are also located in areas with high demand for housing.

Cerema also identifies 13.000 additional plots of land which, however, have "not been subject to a check validating their status as brownfield sites", which brings the total estimated surface area of brownfield sites in France to between "80.000 and 140.000 hectares".

A figure to be compared to France's annual land consumption, estimated at around 20.000 hectares.

According to the authors, 4.500 brownfield sites out of 37.000 hectares can be used for industrial use, while 3.000 brownfield sites out of 2.000 hectares could be used for housing construction.

According to Cerema, the cost of rehabilitating a brownfield site to create housing, premises, public facilities or green spaces is around 540.000 euros per hectare.

Between 2021 and 2024, 5.800 hectares of brownfield land, the rehabilitation of which was financed by the "green fund" and the recovery plan, made it possible to produce 13,6 million m2 of housing and 10,3 million m2 of economic space.

Introduced into the urban planning code by the Climate and Resilience Law of 2021, a brownfield site is an "unused property, built or unbuilt, whose condition, configuration or total or partial occupation does not allow reuse without prior development or work".

Cerema's mapping of brownfield sites should make it easier to identify and redevelop them.