Summary
- RTE had reserved almost 18GW for roughly 80 data centre projects by May 2026.
- Around 7GW sits in Île-de-France and 6GW in Hauts-de-France.
- Large projects are increasingly drawing local scrutiny over land, power, water, and decision-making.
France had almost 18GW of grid capacity reserved for around 80 data centre projects by May 2026, while several large developments were also meeting resistance over land use, infrastructure demand, and local control.
RTE says the volume has risen sharply from roughly 5GW across around 40 projects at the end of 2024.
Most current connection requests are for 100MW to 200MW, while around ten projects are seeking more than 400MW.
The pipeline is heavily concentrated in two regions. Around 7GW of reserved capacity sits in Île-de-France and another 6GW in Hauts-de-France.
Reserved capacity is not the same as operating load. RTE expects only part of the project queue to be built, and facilities that do enter service can take years to approach the electrical demand stated in their original connection requests.
The scale of individual developments is also increasing their visibility in local planning.
At Fouju in Seine-et-Marne, the Campus IA development envisages ten to twelve data centre buildings with eventual electrical demand of up to 1.4GW.
French parliamentary records identify a joint venture involving MGX, Bpifrance, Nvidia, and Mistral AI. Around 700MW of capacity has already been contracted with RTE, with discussions covering a larger connection.
The project completed a public inquiry during April and May and received approvals for its first phase during the summer.
Opposition has continued over land use, environmental effects, electricity demand, and the consultation process. Reports published in late September said opponents were preparing legal challenges, although publicly accessible records do not yet establish that those cases have been formally registered.
A separate proposed Google development near Châteauroux has also produced local political conflict.
The mayor of Etrechet and several deputy mayors resigned in September amid disagreement over a campus expected to reach roughly 880MW to 1.1GW at full scale.
The dispute included concerns over the municipality’s influence on a project with regional and national significance, alongside water demand, land use, visual impact, and electricity infrastructure.
RTE is trying to shorten the electrical side of the development programme.
The transmission operator intends to move towards a first ready, first served connection model that gives greater weight to project maturity rather than application date alone.
It is also working on accelerated connections for five very large data centre projects seeking between 700MW and 2GW each and identifying locations where the transmission network can accept substantial new demand more quickly.
Faster grid connections do not remove land, environmental, planning, or local governance requirements.
The 18GW pipeline will consequently narrow before it becomes operating capacity. Some projects will change scale, some will ramp slowly, and others may fail to secure the approvals or infrastructure needed to proceed.
France has a large low carbon electricity system and an active programme for connecting major loads. The development rate will depend on whether projects can secure grid capacity and still obtain land, consent, finance, and local acceptance on compatible timetables.
