{"id":"france-water-abstraction","slug":"france-water-abstraction","name":"France Water Abstraction Dataset","description":"Annual volumes of water actually abstracted in France by purpose — public supply, irrigation, industry, electricity generation and canals — for every department and for France as a whole, from the national abstraction database.","methodology":"Aggregated by Hydrionis from per-abstraction-point annual declarations in the Banque Nationale des Prélèvements en Eau. Only declarations the water agency recorded as an abstraction actually carried out are counted; points instructed but not abstracted from are excluded, so a licence is never counted as a withdrawal. Volumes are summed in cubic metres and stored in millions of cubic metres. The five purposes form a composition group and the total is the sum across all purposes including any not mapped to a named category.","domains":["abstraction","withdrawal","sector-use"],"metricIds":["abstraction-volume-total","abstraction-volume-public-supply","abstraction-volume-irrigation","abstraction-volume-industry","abstraction-volume-energy","abstraction-volume-canals"],"subjectScope":"French departments and France","cadence":"annual","version":"1.0.0","released":"2026-08-25","changelog":[{"version":"1.0.0","date":"2026-08-25","summary":"First release. Hydrionis holds abstraction observations for the first time.","additions":["Annual abstraction by purpose for French departments and France."]}],"limitations":["These are withdrawals, not consumption. Most abstracted water returns to the environment — cooling water almost entirely, irrigation water hardly at all — so the sector shares here describe pressure on a water body, not water used up.","These are declared volumes, not licensed entitlement. Licensed volumes are substantially larger and are a different quantity.","Only abstractors above a national declaration threshold report. A total is a total of declared abstraction, not of all abstraction.","Volumes the water agency flagged as estimated rather than metered are included and are not separated out."],"observationCount":10854,"seriesCount":670,"subjectCount":141,"from":1970,"to":2024,"sourceIds":["eurostat-water","fr-hubeau-prelevements"],"units":["Mm³"],"redistributable":true,"commerciallyReusable":true,"citation":"Hydrionis (2026), France Water Abstraction Dataset, version 1.0.0. Retrieved from https://hydrionis.com/data/datasets/france-water-abstraction/","downloads":[{"file":"/downloads/observations-abstraction-eurostat-water.csv","format":"CSV","label":"abstraction observations from Eurostat (8,369 rows)"},{"file":"/downloads/observations-abstraction-fr-hubeau-prelevements.csv","format":"CSV","label":"abstraction observations from Hub'Eau / BNPE (7,010 rows)"}],"apiPath":"/api/v1/datasets/france-water-abstraction.json","lastFetched":"2026-10-01","fields":[{"id":"abstraction-volume-total","name":"Water abstracted, all purposes","definition":"Total volume of water reported as actually abstracted from surface water and groundwater in a year, across all declared purposes.","unit":"Mm³","nativeGeography":["county","country","river-basin"],"comparabilityNotes":"Reported abstraction, not licensed entitlement and not consumption. Water abstracted is largely returned to the environment after use; the share consumed is a different and much smaller quantity. Coverage depends on which abstractors are required to declare, so a national total is a total of what is declared rather than of what is taken."},{"id":"abstraction-volume-public-supply","name":"Water abstracted for public water supply","definition":"Abstraction for treatment and distribution as drinking water through a public supply network.","unit":"Mm³","nativeGeography":["county","country","river-basin"],"comparabilityNotes":"Reported abstraction for a declared purpose, not consumption. Purpose categories are defined by the reporting jurisdiction and do not map exactly onto categories used elsewhere, so a single purpose should not be compared across countries without checking both definitions."},{"id":"abstraction-volume-irrigation","name":"Water abstracted for irrigation and agriculture","definition":"Abstraction for crop irrigation and other agricultural use.","unit":"Mm³","nativeGeography":["county","country","river-basin"],"comparabilityNotes":"Reported abstraction for a declared purpose, not consumption. Purpose categories are defined by the reporting jurisdiction and do not map exactly onto categories used elsewhere, so a single purpose should not be compared across countries without checking both definitions."},{"id":"abstraction-volume-industry","name":"Water abstracted for industry","definition":"Abstraction for industrial and economic activity other than irrigation and electricity generation.","unit":"Mm³","nativeGeography":["county","country","river-basin"],"comparabilityNotes":"Reported abstraction for a declared purpose, not consumption. Purpose categories are defined by the reporting jurisdiction and do not map exactly onto categories used elsewhere, so a single purpose should not be compared across countries without checking both definitions."},{"id":"abstraction-volume-energy","name":"Water abstracted for electricity generation","definition":"Abstraction for cooling and operation of electricity generating plant.","unit":"Mm³","nativeGeography":["county","country","river-basin"],"comparabilityNotes":"Reported abstraction for a declared purpose, not consumption. Purpose categories are defined by the reporting jurisdiction and do not map exactly onto categories used elsewhere, so a single purpose should not be compared across countries without checking both definitions."},{"id":"abstraction-volume-canals","name":"Water abstracted for canals and navigation","definition":"Abstraction to maintain water levels in canals and navigations.","unit":"Mm³","nativeGeography":["county","country","river-basin"],"comparabilityNotes":"Reported abstraction for a declared purpose, not consumption. Purpose categories are defined by the reporting jurisdiction and do not map exactly onto categories used elsewhere, so a single purpose should not be compared across countries without checking both definitions."}]}