On 28 April 2025, Spain and Portugal went dark for several hours after a massive power failure, according to BBC Business. The blackout brought chaos across the Iberian Peninsula: people dug out lanterns and old radios, and companies scrambled to save whatever production they could. At the Spanish meat processing firm Fribin, in Binéfar in the north-eastern province of Aragon, the sudden shutdown halted production lines mid-shift. Technology and systems director Andrés Altabás said emergency systems lacked the capacity for continued operation: "Refrigeration was prioritised but all the lines had to be stopped." Many tonnes of meat in the processing stage were discarded. "There were losses of hundreds of thousands of euros," he added.
Blackout Catalyses Fribin's Battery Investment
Fribin's energy needs are "quite large", amounting to more than 25 gigawatt-hours a year, most of it for refrigeration, Altabás told the BBC. The business had considered investing in a battery back-up system for years, but it had been judged too expensive. "And then came the blackout, and all of that together catalysed the investment," he said.
The company made its first purchase of a five megawatt-hour module in June 2025, and ordered a second module with the same storage capacity in early June 2026. Both purchases amount to a total investment of around €1.5m (£1.3m; $1.7m), funded in part by the European Union's Next Generation funds.
Battery Capacity Jumps Almost Sevenfold in Spain
The Fribin project is part of a broader trend. Firms across Europe have been switching to electricity from fossil fuels for industrial needs, encouraged by subsidies from EU funds. While that helps bring down emissions of climate-warming gases, it has also made firms more vulnerable to power cuts, and in Spain and Portugal that threat was made painfully clear last year.
According to grid operator Red Eléctrica, Spanish battery storage capacity has risen almost sevenfold since last April, from about 28 MW before the blackout to 193 MW in April 2026. Much more is planned. In December, the IDAE (Spain's Institute for the Diversification and Saving of Energy) awarded €827m in EU funds to 133 energy storage projects totalling 2,400 MW. Around 80% of that capacity is battery storage, and the new capacity will be close to 10 times the amount Red Eléctrica currently registers on the Spanish grid.
| Indicator | Figure |
|---|---|
| Spanish battery storage capacity before April 2025 blackout | 28 MW |
| Spanish battery storage capacity in April 2026 | 193 MW |
| IDAE funds awarded in December | €827m |
| Number of storage projects awarded | 133 |
| Total capacity of awarded projects | 2,400 MW |
| Share of battery storage in awarded projects | ~80% |
| Fribin's first battery module | 5 MWh (June 2025) |
| Fribin's second battery module | 5 MWh (early June 2026) |
| Fribin's total investment | ~€1.5m |
Storm Kristin Adds a Second Warning
There have been more recent incidents to spur investment. At the end of January, Storm Kristin toppled thousands of electricity and telecom poles across central Portugal, cutting power and communications to hundreds of thousands of people – some for weeks, according to BBC Business.
Suppliers Report Rising Demand
Miguel Matias, founder of the Portuguese energy services company Self Energy, headquartered in the UK, said the industrial sector has been one of the first to look at storage systems "since it can't have its production drop off too abruptly". A backup for a few hours, or even minutes, "might guarantee that machines don't get damaged", he said.
Alberto Bodegas, from battery storage company Sungrow, told BBC Business:
We are seeing not only an increase in demand, but also a clear evolution in customer requirements.
With grid data showing the rapid build-out from 28 MW to 193 MW and the 2,400 MW pipeline of funded projects, battery suppliers and industrial energy buyers in Spain and Portugal are positioned at the centre of one of Europe's fastest-moving storage build-outs.
Sources:
