At Crucero, in northern Chile, the arbitrage margin of a hypothetical 4-hour battery, with perfect foresight, fell in 12 months. It went from 137 to 105 USD/kW per year. In that period, system storage power rose from about 1.2 to 3.2 GW during 2025. These data cannot isolate how much of the decline is attributable to batteries. The average price across all hours also fell, from 51 to 43 USD/MWh. The transitional regime that recognizes capacity for batteries lasts 10 years fro

Storage investors must evaluate how technological configurations compete, what benefit they create for the electricity system, and how much they can earn. Their profitability also depends on how those conditions will change during the asset’s life. This Perspective is for storage investors: developers, generators evaluating hybridization, funds, and financiers. Before investing, they should establish with evidence whether capital is going to the configuration that will produc

In the PEG-5, more than half of the capacity awarded was solar; for new plants, the PEG-6 admits only geothermal and natural gas. In the PEG-5, the solar component added up to 701 of the 1,258 MW of maximum guaranteed capacity awarded for 15 years. Of 960 MW of maximum natural gas offers, 15 were awarded. For the PEG-6, the Comisión Nacional de Energía Eléctrica (CNEE) required firm energy with a capacity factor of at least 90% and energy offered in all hours. For new plants

In Colombia, the firm energy auction awarded 99% of new capacity to solar in 2024, and 55.9% to thermal in 2026. The February 2024 auction, for 2027–2028, awarded 4.44 GW of solar. The May 2026 auction, for 2029–2030, awarded 4.07 GW of new capacity: 55.9% thermal and 38% solar. Measured over all firm energy awarded, rather than over new capacity, solar contributes 7.7%. Between the 2 auctions, the rules, prices, and hydrological context also changed. Attributing the change i

Chile's Coordinador Eléctrico Nacional operates the national power system. On Tuesday, November 3 it opened the price bids of the new-works transmission tender under Decreto Exento N°354 de 2025 (Exempt Decree No. 354 of 2025) of the Ministry of Energy. The operator reports 17 of the 19 tendered works in a position to be awarded, 89.5% of the total, with referential investments on the order of USD 500 million. The 2 remaining works, La Invernada and Montemar, were declared vo

Evidence markers: [V] verified in a primary source · [D] derived by calculation · [E] estimate with explicit assumptions · [H] hypothesis pending testing Contracting energy and covering demand in critical hours are decisions that must be evaluated together. The 7 countries examined have mechanisms for recognizing, contracting, or remunerating firmness (§1). For this note, firmness means a resource’s accredited contribution under critical conditions; each country uses its own