In front of the crisis to come of the energy resources, of the climatic change due to the human activity, the actors of the housing in France try to make the housing sustainable, that is energy-efficient and environment-friendly. If recently the public policies have for objectives to develop the construction of a new sustainable housing, with the development of new quality standards and a new thermal regulations in buildings, for several decades, the policies of rehabilitation towards the existing housing strengthen their actions in terms of energy saving and reduction of gas emissions, and imagine new tools to make the existing housing more sustainable. In this communication, we will try to answer the following questions: how can we define the public policies of sustainable rehabilitation in France? How the actors imagine new tools to be effective? How these tools are implemented? And what are their effects on the housing and the territories? So, to answer these questions, we will present, at first, the energy and environmental problems which exist in the housing in France; then, secondly, the public policies of thermal and energy rehabilitation of the existing housing, which are contracting and incentive policies, and finally in the last time, the example of a recent tool of rehabilitation, the "opération programmée d'amélioration thermique et énergétique des bâtiments" in Grenoble, from 2005 to 2009, with its implementation and its assessment.
