Spain approves legislation to encourage energy storage and flexibility

Approved on 24 June by the Spanish government, the Royal Decree-Law 7/2025 contains measures that aim to strengthen the resilience of the country’s electrical system, including boosting electrification, storage and flexibility.

“New innovative measures are being introduced to streamline processing and reduce bottlenecks in flexibility and storage,” Spanish minister for the ecological transition, Sara Aagesen, said citing priority delivery for storage projects and solar thermal technology.

To promote the development of energy storage, the package proposes to speed up permits for projects, exempting them from the environmental assessment procedure if the facility is within the perimeter of a renewable plant that already has a positive environmental assessment. This is something the industry has been requesting for some time.

The declaration of public utility (DUP) of storage and related infrastructures used for transporting energy to and from the transmission and distribution networks is expressly established – as has been the case so far with the generation facilities.

The legislation also improves the conditions for self-consumption through the creation of the manager of collective self-consumption and the extension of the radio in which surpluses up to 5 km can be shared (compared to the current 2 km).

Additionally, the development of the aggregator role will help align energy demand with solar photovoltaic generation hours. The renewal and repowering of existing generation facilities is also encouraged, with administrative processing times cut in half—provided the resulting capacity does not exceed 125% of the original.

Electrification

To further deepen the process of electrifying the economy and speed up the adaptation of electricity infrastructure, the planning of the current electriicty network will be reviewed every three years, initiating a new six-year planning cycle. Modifications to specific aspects will be approved every two years.

The capacity for oscillation damping and voltage control is also strengthened: renewable technologies will be able to participate in voltage control and system backup, and be compensated for doing so.

According to Aagesen, €500 million will be allocated as aid for synchronous compensators.

The Spanish Photovoltaic Union (UNEF) believes that the measures approved on Tuesday allow for more dynamic grid planning than the previous five-year static organization. “It will provide greater stability, robustness, and flexibility to the electrical system and allow renewable energies to play an important role in it. This will offer us greater security of electricity supply and energy independence and will help Spain move forward in the fight against climate change,” UNEF’s CEO, José Donoso, said. He also warned that it would be essential to complete the entire regulatory framework and adapt it to the current development of photovoltaic energy.

These measures are in addition to the CNMC’s approval of the updated PO 7.4, which will allow photovoltaic technology to contribute to grid voltage control, a proposal that the sector has long requested. “As voltage control has a strong geographic component, photovoltaics, as a widely distributed energy source, is particularly well-suited to providing this service to the grid,” UNEF says.

To facilitate the connection to electricity networks of new economic, industrial activities mainly, the regulations on access and connection of demand are revised, setting at five years the expiry period of access rights, which will make it possible to make greater use of existing and currently disused networks.

The electrification of air conditioning in neighboring communities is encouraged and municipalities are enabled to apply 50% deductions in the Real Estate Tax and 95% in the Construction, Facilities and Works Tax (ICIO), as is already the case with self-consumption.

Monitoring and enforcement

In addition to the storage and flexibility measures, the package aims to strengthen the supervision of network operators.

Spanish independent competition regulator, the National Markets and Competition Commission (CNMC), will enforce the regulations. The watchdog will have to compile a monitoring report on compliance with the voltage control obligations of all operators who are obliged to do so. The report must be presented within six months. The CNMC will also complete an extraordinary inspection plan for replacement capacities, with greater attention to facilities with autonomous start-up and distribution networks, which will be repeated every three years.

The regulator will develop an update every three months. “In 12 months, it will carry out an inspection plan for all the replacement capacities of the system, and every three years an inspection of all these elements will be carried out,” Aagesen said.

Red Eléctrica (REE), Spain’s national grid operator, is tasked with preparing proposals for policy changes on responses to to power fluctuations, the rate of voltage variation, the scheduling of technical restrictions, and other technical elements that contribute to strengthening system security.

The REE is entrusted with the development of a new operation procedure to coordinate the development plans for the transport network and distribution network and a proposal for minimum monitoring requirements for incident analysis. These technical proposals should be ready within three to 15 months. Subsequent policy reforms must be approved in less than six months.

Under the new legislation, REE will serve as a single access point to the data of the final customers. So far, this information, from 30 million smart meters, is distributed by more than 300 distribution companies.

From pv magazine Spain