Spain pairs battery storage with 26% of new rooftop PV systems in 2024

Around one-quarter of all new rooftop PV systems installed in Spain in 2024 included battery storage, underscoring continual growth in distributed energy, despite a decline in total installed storage capacity.

From pv magazine Spain

The deployment of batteries for rooftop PV systems under Spain’s self-consumption regime declined 34% year on year in 2024, with 327 MWh installed, according to data from the Spanish Photovoltaic Union (UNEF), which warned of a “slowdown in the pace of installation.”

Despite the decrease, 26% of new grid-connected installations last year included batteries, representing a capacity of 110 MWh.

The cumulative volume since 2022 stands at 2,205 MWh, with growth in the commercial, industrial, and off-grid segments, where there is “growing interest from companies seeking to optimize their energy consumption and reduce their exposure to market prices,” said José Donoso, director general of UNEF.

UNEF welcomed the regulatory changes introduced in Royal Decree-Law 7/2025, including the creation of a collective self-consumption manager and the extension of the surplus energy sharing radius to 5 km.

Spain’s Ministry for the Ecological Transition (MITECO) is currently reviewing more than 650 comments submitted during the public consultation to amend Royal Decree 244/2019 on self-consumption, which began in October 2024.

UNEF has called for several additional measures. These include revising the fixed component of the electricity tariff to emphasize the variable term, which would encourage energy savings and reward efficiency among self-consumers. They also seek recognition of self-consumption without a license and simplified permitting for systems up to 15 kW, with streamlined approval for projects up to 500 kW.

Meanwhile, PV systems operating under the self-consumption regime without battery storage continued to decline. According to UNEF, installations fell 17% in the first quarter of 2025, following a 31% drop in 2024. Compared with the quarterly average for 2024, residential installations fell 14%, commercial systems declined 17%, and industrial installations dropped 20% in 2025.