Spain: Self-consumption slips again—611 MW added in H1 2025 as home batteries surge

Spain’s solar self-consumption market contracted for a third straight year, with 611 MW added in the first half of 2025, a 14.6% drop versus H1 2024, according to APPA Renovables. The decline was concentrated in industry, where additions fell 22.9%, even though factories still account for ~70% of self-consumption capacity.

APPA cites sharp day-ahead price spreads and grid saturation as key headwinds for industrial economics. Exporting surplus power remained difficult, and 19% of self-consumption output in 2024 was curtailed, further squeezing returns. “In a time of geopolitical uncertainty, we cannot let under-investment in networks and storage undermine competitiveness,” said Jon Macías, president of APPA Autoconsumo.

By contrast, households accelerated installs after April’s Iberian blackout. Residential self-consumption rose 11.6% year-on-year in H1 2025, and battery uptake jumped: 146 MWh of storage was deployed in H1—nearly the total for all of 2024—mostly as retrofits to rooftop PV. Segment split: 58 MWh residential and 88 MWh industrial, with higher attachment in homes (30%) than in industry (21%).

APPA argues storage is now essential to overcome saturated grids and long connection queues, enable further electrification, and open new flexibility revenues (e.g., ancillary services). The association calls for a specific framework to incentivise distributed storage, plus tax relief (corporate, property, and personal income), and a 10% reserved capacity at both transmission and distribution nodes for self-consumption. Newly published CNMC capacity maps show >83% of firm-demand access nodes are already saturated, limiting new connections.

Given consecutive annual declines, APPA warns today’s trajectory risks missing the 2030 self-consumption target in Spain’s NECP.