Spanish solar power is going through a shake out after a plunge in electricity prices left the owners of weak projects in one of Europe’s top renewables markets searching for exits.
The country has become a solar champion thanks to abundant sunshine and the government’s pro-renewables policies. But a surge in power production has outpaced demand, depressing electricity prices and profits for generators.
Some power producers are struggling to offload plants whose valuations have plunged as executives talk of solar “saturation”, creating a contrast between Spain and other places — China, India, Gulf states and European neighbours — where solar arrays are being built apace.
“It’s discount season,” said Carmen Izquierdo, co-founder of nTeaser, a deals marketplace. “Spain remains a dynamic market, but there is greater scrutiny of assets.”
Other producers are pivoting to installing batteries, which can complement and potentially save unprofitable solar projects.
Operational solar plants were valued at an average of €916,000 per megawatt in early 2024, but have now dropped to €648,000 per megawatt, according to nTeaser.
From 2022-24 there was a vibrant M&A market for Spanish solar portfolios, including those of mixed quality, but sellers are now having to strip out the weakest parks to close deals.
“They are willing to sacrifice part of the portfolio to move the rest forward,” Izquierdo said.
While cheap electricity is a boon for users, the gloom is even greater over so-called ready-to-build projects, where land, permits and grid access have all been secured, but construction has not begun.
A senior executive at an owner of Spanish solar plants said: “The market is flooded with ready-to-build projects that developers want to sell since they’re no longer good enough in the current market.”
Some projects were up for sale for just €1, the executive said, reflecting developers’ desperation to avoid further spending, and potential government penalties for not executing agreed construction plans.
The least attractive ready-to-build projects are often far from power grid nodes, requiring investment in expensive power lines.
As a solar downturn began in the past year, some Spanish companies sold existing plants to foreign investors. Utility group Endesa offloaded 50 per cent stakes in two solar power portfolios for a combined €1bn to Masdar, the United Arab Emirates’ state-owned clean energy company.
Prime Minister Pedro Sánchez’s Socialist-led government says cheap electricity is a good thing, and is already attracting new industrial investments that will bolster the economy.
But low prices are painful for producers. When they fall below zero, as they have for more than 500 hours in Spain this year, producers can end up having to choose between paying wholesale customers to take excess power off their hands or switching off.
Many producers insulate themselves by selling electricity through long-term power purchase agreements (PPAs), which they sign at fixed prices with corporate clients for 10-20 years.
Last month, Zelestra, an independent power producer, signed two PPAs with Microsoft in the Aragón region where the tech group plans to build data centres.
But negative prices are even clouding the market for PPAs, pulling down contract prices and prompting buyers to demand clauses that let them benefit from ultra-low rates in the spot market.
Andrés Acosta, innovation director at LevelTen Energy, a clean energy marketplace, said PPA prices that buyers are willing to pay are generally lower than what developers need — about €30 per megawatt hour — to make projects “bankable”.
“That has dramatically reduced the number of PPAs signed and means the majority of solar projects are not viable anymore unless they are hybridised with batteries,” Acosta said.
Adding battery storage to solar plants helps to limit price plunges by enabling generators to store electricity when prices drop during the day, then sell it in the evening when demand and prices are higher.
Killian Daly, executive director of Energy Tag, a non-profit group, said: “Storage should be the natural cure for the woes of the PPA market, but it’s not scaling as fast as it should do.”
The UK, Germany and Italy are far ahead of Spain in terms of existing and planned battery installations, according to data from the European Commission.
Following a nationwide blackout in Spain in April, the government took steps in November to remove some regulatory barriers to adding battery storage.
One key change eliminated a requirement for a new environmental impact assessment when installing batteries within an existing solar plant, said Pablo Martínez, Iberia lead at Modo Energy, a data provider.
That would reduce the time it takes to complete a battery project from three or four years to less than 18 months, he said.
Additional reporting by Carmen Muela in Madrid. Data visualisation by Nassos Stylianou
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