Energy storage is gaining strategic importance in Spain as Galicia, Andalusia, and the Valencian Community move to modernise their regulatory frameworks. The new rules are designed to speed up permitting processes for storage infrastructure, especially projects linked to renewable energy plants, creating more favourable conditions for both public and private investment in standalone and hybrid energy storage systems.
In north-western Spain, Galicia has amended its legal framework through Law 5/2025 on fiscal and administrative measures, formally recognising electricity storage as energy infrastructure of public interest. This classification places storage projects on a par with transmission and distribution networks, granting them full planning compatibility, including on rural land.
The reform also enables priority permitting procedures, allowing storage—particularly hybrid projects—to undergo simplified environmental impact assessments. In addition, the law strengthens the “strategic project” designation, enabling the regional government to assume sole authority over complex or territorially significant developments.
Meanwhile, the Valencian Community has approved Decree-Law 14/2025, introducing urgent measures to boost generation and energy storage facilities. The regulation explicitly prioritises self-consumption schemes and renewable-hybrid storage projects.
A key innovation is an extraordinary fast-track technical assessment via the designation of “priority projects for the energy transition”, which consolidates multiple sectoral permits into a single procedure. The decree also relaxes land-use compatibility requirements on non-developable land and shortens municipal reporting deadlines to ease common permitting bottlenecks. Energy storage is now formally embedded within the region’s energy planning instruments.
As previously reported by Energía Estratégica, Andalusia has adopted Law 4/2025 on strategic productive areas, explicitly recognising energy storage as a project of strategic regional interest. This status grants priority processing and allows existing urban planning rules to be modified or overridden, ensuring that energy uses can prevail over others.
The law also introduces simplified environmental permitting for smaller-scale storage facilities, a move expected to significantly reduce development timelines.
Regulatory reform is being matched by tangible project deployment. In the Valencian Community, X-ELIO Energy has secured environmental approval for its El Tello project, with 63 megawatts of capacity in the province of Valencia. In parallel, Endurance Motive will develop the region’s first large-scale storage system for renewable hybridisation, with a capacity of 50 megawatt-hours.
According to official data, the Valencian Community already has more than 500 megawatts of energy storage projects under permitting. In the latest call funded by the FEDER, 15 projects were awarded a total of 44.5 million euros.
In Andalusia, momentum is also building. The ST Cerrillo project, promoted by Rolwind, is currently under public consultation as part of its administrative and construction permitting process. Located in Málaga, the project envisages 77.6 megawatts of installed capacity.
European funding has also backed several flagship initiatives, including BESS La Vega, with 10.5 megawatts of power and more than 24 megawatt-hours of storage capacity, and Solacor TES1, which combines 60 megawatts of power with 310 megawatt-hours of storage.
Galicia is also seeing growing interest. The regional Ministry of Economy and Industry reports 30 storage projects currently under review, with two already authorised—in Vigo and Malpica—and one facility fully operational in Sanxenxo. The latter, developed by Sungrow Renewables, is Spain’s first standalone energy storage plant, with 5 megawatts of power and 20 megawatt-hours of capacity.
The facility absorbs electricity from the grid during periods of low demand and releases it when needed. “Under complex operating conditions, this plant supplies electricity to around 2,000 households per year,” the company stated.
Across the three regions, a common regulatory approach is emerging: prioritising hybrid energy storage as a key enabler of the energy transition, shortening permitting timelines and creating attractive conditions for private investment. Instruments such as regional public-interest declarations, fast-track procedures and explicit land-use compatibility for storage on rural land are central to this strategy.
These regional advances align with Spain’s national outlook, which targets more than 20 gigawatts of installed energy storage capacity by 2030, positioning storage as a cornerstone of grid integration, renewable energy deployment and long-term system flexibility.
