The energy transition is also decided by administrative timelines.
Europe has mature technologies, capital ready to invest, and projects capable of cutting emissions, improving energy security, and generating economic activity across the territory. However, a significant share of these investments still runs into permitting procedures that are excessively long, fragmented, and hard to predict.
The European Commission itself already acknowledges that slow and complex permitting is one of the main obstacles to the development of renewable energy and the infrastructure needed to integrate it into the energy system.
On the table is the Proposal for a DIRECTIVE OF THE EUROPEAN PARLIAMENT AND OF THE COUNCIL RED II on the internal markets for electricity and gas amending Directives (EU) 2018/2001, (EU) 2019/944 and (EU) 2024/1788 as regards speeding up permitting procedures. The data included in the European proposal are telling enough: electricity transmission networks take around ten years to complete, and permitting accounts for more than half of that period. Renewable energy projects can take up to nine years to obtain their permits, and storage facilities between one and seven years. In addition, 78% of participants in the European public consultation classified permitting as the main obstacle to ensuring that grid infrastructure is developed at the pace required by the energy transition.
We are not, therefore, dealing with an isolated issue or one unique to a single country. It is a structural weakness in Europe’s energy deployment model.
Europe identifies the causes of the delay
The Commission clearly points to the factors behind these timelines:
- incoherence in administrative systems, the involvement of multiple authorities
- lack of staff and resources in the responsible bodies
- the length of environmental assessments,
- limited digitalisation and data availability
- lack of public acceptance and the accumulation of administrative and judicial appeals.
Environmental assessments are precisely one of the phases most exposed to delays. The average duration of an environmental impact assessment for projects in general terms stands, according to the proposal documentation, at around 20.6 months. Added to this are uncertainties arising from the lack of clear rules when different public interests come into conflict, which can prolong procedures and increase litigation.
The Commission also acknowledges that many projects need to obtain permits from different administrations, in parallel or sequentially, without effective coordination mechanisms between them. This fragmentation creates confusion, duplication, and inefficiencies, and ultimately makes it difficult even to meet legal deadlines.
The problem is not, therefore, only the formal duration of each procedure. It is the absence of an overall timetable, of an authority to coordinate the entire file, and of an integrated view of all the infrastructure the project needs to operate.
The measures adopted so far have not been sufficient
The revised Renewable Energy Directive introduced important advances:
- the presumption that the development of renewable energy is of overriding public interest,
- the designation of acceleration areas,
- the simplification of certain procedures and the possibility of applying some environmental flexibilities where the necessary protection and mitigation measures have been adopted.
These measures have delivered positive results where they have been applied decisively. The Commission itself highlights the case of Germany, which has made extensive use of the European acceleration measures. In 2024, the country permitted approximately 14 to 15 GW of additional onshore wind power—85% more than the previous year and a figure close to the total new wind capacity installed in Europe during that year.
However, bottlenecks persist. The previous European framework did not fully address slow permitting for networks, storage facilities, or charging stations. Nor did it sufficiently resolve limited digitalisation of procedures, lack of administrative resources, coordination between authorities, or issues related to public participation and social acceptance.
For this reason, in December 2025 the Commission presented a new proposal for a Directive to speed up permitting procedures, by amending the Renewable Energy Directive, the Electricity Market Directive, and the Directive on the internal markets for renewable gas, natural gas, and hydrogen. The proposal is part of the European Grids Package and, as of July 2026, remains within the ordinary legislative procedure.
Speeding up the plant is not enough: the entire chain must be permitted
One of the most relevant aspects of the proposal is that it recognises that the permitting problem cannot be addressed solely from the perspective of production facilities. The energy transition needs procedures capable of covering the project as a whole: the plant, its connection, the pipelines, the injection points, storage infrastructure, and transmission and distribution networks.
The European proposal aims to tackle bottlenecks affecting renewable energy projects as well as electricity and gas networks, storage facilities, and charging stations. Its objectives include shorter timelines, preventing delays, greater targeted flexibility in applying certain environmental rules, and the creation of a European permitting regime for electricity networks inspired by the approach already established for gas and hydrogen assets.
Article 8 of Directive (EU) 2024/1788 already requires Member States to establish objective, non-discriminatory criteria and transparent procedures for permitting installations, infrastructure, pipelines, and associated gas and hydrogen equipment.
The new proposal seeks to strengthen that model by incorporating measures such as the availability of adequate resources in national authorities, processing via digital platforms, deadlines for administrations to request additional information, and, at certain intermediate stages of the procedure, tacit approval mechanisms.
The Council of the European Union endorsed on 26 June 2026 the need for faster and more transparent procedures, digital portals to simplify applications, priority consideration for renewable projects, and the possibility for Member States to introduce tacit approval at certain intermediate stages when the competent authority does not respond.
Biomethane highlights the need for an integrated approach
This approach is particularly relevant for biomethane. Permitting a plant is only one part of the process. For the project to actually come into operation, the following must also be processed:
- connection to the gas grid,
- construction of the pipelines, the injection point, compression and metering facilities
- land occupation, infrastructure crossings and, where applicable, modifications or expansions of the network.
Each of these elements may depend on different bodies, be subject to different procedures, and progress according to timelines that are not always coordinated.
That is why speeding up only the permitting of the production facility does not solve the problem. A permitted plant that cannot access the grid within timelines compatible with the investment remains a blocked project.
This European vision contrasts with the reality of many biomethane projects in Spain, where environmental, planning, energy, and gas processing is still distributed among different administrations, units, and managers, without an effective one-stop shop or a binding overall timetable for the project as a whole.
The result is a loss of time, competitiveness, and investment capacity. It also creates uncertainty for developers, financial institutions, suppliers, livestock farmers, farmers, and the municipalities involved in the projects.
Spain should not wait for the Directive’s final approval
At IAM Carbonzero, we believe Spain should not wait for the entire European legislative procedure to conclude before starting to apply the logic that underpins this proposal.
Europe has already identified the problem and the main solutions. Many of them can be driven from now on through national organisational, administrative, and regulatory changes, while fully respecting environmental safeguards and public participation.
Speeding up does not mean reducing the rigour of assessments or lowering protection levels. It means eliminating duplication, coordinating bodies, providing administrations with sufficient resources, establishing clear rules, and preventing a file from remaining stalled due to lack of response or an inefficient distribution of competences. Spain should move forward with at least five measures:
- An effective one-stop shop for renewable gases
Projects should have an authority or unit responsible for coordinating all the necessary permits, from the production facility through to connection and injection into the network. The one-stop shop cannot be limited to receiving documentation. It must actively follow up on the file, coordinate the different administrations, and ensure that procedures move forward in parallel whenever possible.
- A comprehensive, binding, and transparent overall timetable
In addition to the deadlines for each permit, there must be a complete project timetable, accessible to the developer and to all the authorities involved. Requests for additional documentation should be made within defined time limits, with justification, and avoiding successive requests that restart or indefinitely prolong processing.
- Integrated processing of the plant and its connection
The production facility and the infrastructure needed to transport and inject biomethane should be assessed as parts of the same energy project. It makes no sense for the plant and its connection to progress through completely independent procedures when one cannot operate without the other.
- Full digitalisation and administrative interoperability
The European proposal backs digital portals capable of managing permitting procedures. Spain must move towards a single electronic file that allows documentation to be shared between administrations and prevents the developer from having to repeatedly submit the same information.
Digitalisation must also serve to show the real status of the procedure, identify the responsible bodies, and monitor compliance with deadlines.
- More resources and specialisation in administrations
The Commission itself identifies the lack of staff and technical capacity as one of the main causes of delays. Regulatory simplification will not be enough if the units responsible for assessing projects do not have the necessary resources and expertise. It is essential to strengthen teams, improve their specialisation, and establish collaboration mechanisms between the General State Administration, the autonomous communities, and local entities.
Speeding up with safeguards
Europe is changing its regulation because it has understood that the energy transition cannot move forward with procedures designed for a different context and a different pace of investment.
Spain has agricultural and livestock resources, gas infrastructure, technological capacity, an industrial base, and investors interested in developing biomethane. But this opportunity will not materialise if projects need several years to complete a succession of fragmented and poorly coordinated permits.
Regulation must guarantee environmental protection, legal certainty, and the participation of territories. But it must also be able to provide responses within timelines compatible with the energy, climate, and economic urgency.
The conclusion is simple: it is not enough to set production targets for renewable gases. It is necessary to create the administrative conditions that make it possible to achieve them. Europe has already shown the way. Spain must start down that path without waiting.
Each month of administrative delay not only postpones renewable energy production; it also delays investment, jobs, competitiveness, and opportunities for rural areas. Administrative simplification is no longer only a matter of efficiency: it has become an energy and competitiveness policy.
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