New Renewables Regime: What Changes for Developers?
The new Renewable Acceleration Zones (ZAR) cut environmental licensing from 12-24 months to 6-9 months, though local bureaucracy still holds back projects.
The Government introduced initiatives to accelerate solar, wind and storage projects. The most significant is the creation of Renewable Acceleration Zones (ZAR): low environmental impact regions that benefit from exemption or simplification of the Environmental Impact Assessment (AIA) and mandatory licensing deadlines, lowering the risk profile for investors.
Grid management and remaining bottlenecks
The new model facilitates hybridizing batteries or wind into existing solar plants without a new capacity reservation process, and introduces stricter rules against capacity "hoarding" by stalled projects. Even so, compliance with municipal master plans (PDM) and the EMER 2030 Municipal Guide, the physical grid capacity of E-Redes and REN, and the technical complexity of hybridization remain critical stagnation points.
- Environmental licensing: from 12-24 months of uncertainty to 6-9 months within ZAR.
- Hybridization: a simplified process instead of a full new grid connection request.
- Self-consumption: manual steps replaced by digitalization and automatic approval.