The peninsular electricity system will be allocated a total active demand response service (SRAD) capacity of 1,775 MW for the second half of 2026, a figure slightly higher than the 1,725 MW allocated for the first six months. These are the results of the auction held today by Red Eléctrica, which are already available on the ESIOS website.

The 1,775 MW allocated represents 76% of the capacity required in the specifications for this call (2,339 MW). The majority of service providers (with a capacity of 1 MW or more) that applied to participate, either individually or aggregated, submitted their bids through an energy supplier operating in the electricity market.

The successful bidders will be remunerated at a marginal price of €42.62 per allocated MW per hour for their availability to reduce their consumption capacity during the assigned hours. Furthermore, each service activation will be remunerated at the tertiary regulation price corresponding to the time of its provision.

Following a proposal by the CNMC, a modification to Operating Procedure 7.5 was published in the Official State Gazette (BOE) on 15 May to optimise the allocated capacity volume and the marginal price. This modification has already been incorporated into the algorithm and was taken into account for the allocation of the service in this auction.

Service conditions 

Implemented in 2022, the SRAD is a balancing mechanism aligned with European regulations that provides greater flexibility to system operation from the demand side. This service is only deployed in specific cases where the system operator identifies insufficient resources to maintain an adequate level of upward reserve in the peninsular electricity system. 

The maximum duration of each deployment is 2 hours, and providers are limited to a single daily activation during the established time bands: Monday to Friday from 08:00 to midnight, and weekends and public holidays from 22:00 to 23:59. The provider will receive advance notice of at least 12.5 minutes prior to activation.

2026 is the first year that the SRAD features two provision periods: one from January to June (for which the allocation auction was held in November 2025), and another from July to December. This structure is part of the proposals approved by the CNMC in line with EU regulations, aiming to bring the service closer to European balancing service standards. The required capacity volume for service provision has remained the same across both periods. 

So far this year, the SRAD has been deployed on 28 January, a day when all service providers participated in two consecutive, staggered activations.