V2G Participation in European Union: Legal and Regulatory Barriers in Spanish Electricity Markets

The European Union (EU) aims to realize the energy transition by increasing renewable energy production and enhancing the flexibility of the energy system. Vehicle-to-Grid (V2G) technology, which enables electric vehicles (EVs) to both draw power from and supply power back to the grid, presents a particularly important opportunity to contribute to this goal. However, this technology faces legal and regulatory barriers in some EU Member States, including Spain. This article investigates the contribution of V2G technology to sector coupling and examines its potential participation in balancing markets, with a specific focus on the Spanish context. Balancing markets are technically well-suited for V2G participation, but Spain's current legislation presents significant barriers. While EU level regulations supporting the integration of V2G technology were introduced under the Clean Energy for All Europeans Package, Spain’s delayed or incomplete transposition of these rules into national law continues to prevent V2G from entering the Spanish electricity balancing markets. The article analyzes the key legal and regulatory factors behind this limitation, particularly the market design favoring large-scale centralized production and the absence of a legal framework for independent aggregators. Nevertheless, it concludes that recent and ongoing legislative developments in Spain offer promising signs that these obstacles may be removed in the near future. This analysis is limited to legal and regulatory aspects and does not address technical, economic, or social dimensions of V2G deployment, which are also critical to achieving full integration.