The Portuguese Government formally opened two competitive procedures on 22 October 2026 for a maximum of 1,050 MVA of grid injection capacity reservation titles for energy storage. The procedures were approved through provisions 12924-B/2026 and 12924-C/2026, published in the Diário da República, and are managed by DGEG, the Directorate-General for Energy and Geology.
How the 1,050 MVA is split
Of the total, 750 MVA is reserved for standalone storage installations and 300 MVA for renewable generation plants co-located with batteries, so-called hybridised projects. The structure signals that Lisbon wants both pure merchant storage and storage attached to solar or wind assets competing for scarce injection capacity, rather than treating them as a single category.
Injection rights are not charging rights
The most consequential detail for developers is that awarding injection capacity in Portugal's auction does not guarantee equivalent power to charge from the grid. Demand-side access limits are a decisive variable, with restrictions especially relevant at certain nodes such as Sines, where grid capacity and demand concentration interact.
The shared technical terms contemplate that the network operator may limit storage operation during certain periods: up to 500 annual hours of combined charging and discharging restrictions for standalone batteries, and up to 750 hours of grid charging restrictions for hybridised projects. A revenue model built on unrestricted two-cycle-per-day arbitrage would therefore overstate achievable throughput.
Why the auction matters beyond Portugal
Portugal's procedure is part of a wider acceleration of European storage auctions in October 2026, driven by the need for flexibility, firmness and renewable energy integration in European power systems. The instruments differ by member state: Portugal awards grid access rights for storage projects, while Italy remunerates available capacity to guarantee security of supply.
For bidders, the Portuguese design rewards projects that can absorb curtailment-style restrictions without breaking financing covenants — favouring hybridised configurations that can charge from co-located renewables, and standalone systems with grid-charging flexibility at less constrained nodes. Developers will also be watching how DGEG scores projects and whether the restriction hours are treated as firm limits in connection agreements or as indicative operating envelopes.
Key dates to watch
With the procedures now open, the next milestones are the submission windows for each of the two categories, the publication of results, and the conversion of reservation titles into binding connection agreements with the network operator. The treatment of Sines and other constrained nodes will be the clearest test of how much of the awarded 1,050 MVA is genuinely bankable storage capacity.
Source: Energía Estratégica
This article was assisted by AI analysis. Please refer to the original source for official information.