Iberia's flexibility imperative

BESS and the next phase of renewable integration in Spain and Portugal

Spain and Portugal are entering a new phase in their energy transition. Rapid solar deployment, recurring curtailment, growing interconnection, and evolving market rules are reshaping how value is created in the Iberian power system.

This white paper explores how these structural changes are impacting price behaviour, flexibility needs, and revenue opportunities for BESS, and why Iberia is emerging as one of Europe’s most closely watched flexibility markets.

Key insights:

• Volatility is no longer an exception. High solar penetration is driving sharper intraday price swings and more frequent negative pricing events.
• Curtailment is becoming a system signal. Lost renewable output is accelerating the case for flexible assets that can respond in real time.
• Storage revenue stacks are expanding. Merchant arbitrage, balancing exposure, and emerging flexibility mechanisms are increasingly intertwined.
• Policy and market design matter. National frameworks in Spain and Portugal are shaping how quickly storage projects can move from concept to operation.

As these dynamics intensify, storage is shifting from a reactive solution to a planned system requirement, a change that is increasingly visible in deployment forecasts.

SolarPower Europe’s medium-scenario projections for battery energy storage deployment in Spain between 2025 and 2029 show a rapid scale-up of installed BESS capacity. Driven primarily by utility-scale projects, with commercial and industrial applications also gaining momentum over time, this projected growth reflects the increasing role of storage in managing high solar penetration and supporting system flexibility. 

Portugal’s needs are smaller in scale but equally urgent. While the country’s PNEC 2030 sets a target of 2 GW of installed storage, analyses by Aurora Energy Research indicate that total system needs could approach 5 GW when combining battery and pumped hydro technologies. 

Download the full white paper below to dive deeper into the direct implications for system sizing, key optimisation strategies, risk management, and revenue dynamics shaping Iberia’s storage landscape.

Continue the conversation

The themes explored in this white paper will be discussed further at the Solarplaza Summit Iberia PV & Storage, taking place on 3 March 2026 in Madrid. As the Iberian market shifts from renewable build-out toward system optimisation, the summit brings together key stakeholders to examine hybrid solar-plus-storage strategies, evolving revenue models, and regulatory developments across Spain and Portugal.