The Shift Toward Industrial Electricity Self-Consumption

The initial optimism surrounding the 2025 energy sector reactivation has been met with a complex reality: a significant disconnect between regulatory ambition and the actual capacity of the national power grid. While new laws suggest a renewed momentum for investment, industrial facilities face a structural challenge where the financial burden of grid modernization often falls directly on the user, frequently jeopardizing project economics. This environment has revealed a gap between the planning strategy to expand and modernize the distribution grid and the actual needs to support a rapidly electrifying economy.

In practice, translating this regulatory momentum into tangible and bankable energy solutions requires more specific solutions. In our work with clients, one issue consistently emerges: for industrial facilities seeking to increase electricity demand or integrate on-site generation, the cost of reinforcing the grid to enable this generally falls on them. These infrastructure costs can quickly become prohibitive, weakening project economics and, in some cases, rendering otherwise viable investments unattractive.

What the data ultimately reveals is not only an execution issue, but a recurring gap in planning credibility. Even in the most recent Distribution Grid Expansion and Modernization Program published in December 2025, the investment figures seem ambitious, but past planning exercises show that these investments are often reduced as projects move closer to implementation. On average, only around 45% of the originally projected investment is carried out, a pattern confirmed by the Federal Public Accounts.

It is worth noting that projected investment levels for 2025 are considerably lower than what was contemplated in 2018, declining from nearly US$800 million to just over US$200 million, despite the higher demand and accelerated electrification. This suggests a structural trend rather than a temporary setback: the grid continues to be planned with a cautious budget, at a time when its role is becoming increasingly critical for the economy and the decarbonization of the energy sector.

Equally important is how that investment is allocated. Roughly 4% of total planned distribution investment for 2025-2026 is assigned to smart grids, with a similarly limited share directed toward the integration of distributed generation. This allocation partly reflects Mexico’s starting point: over half of the total investment is used on basic modernizing such as aging metering and foundational infrastructure.

By contrast, systems such as California’s — operating from a more advanced baseline — allocate around 33% of grid investment to smart infrastructure and reinforcements, and approximately 17% to targeted renewable integration initiatives. Here, the contrast is about how investment priorities are defined and executed. While Mexico continues to close foundational gaps, the persistence of conventional planning approaches, combined with the limited emphasis on smart grids and distributed resources slows the system’s ability to evolve toward a more flexible and decentralized energy model, needed for 21st century challenges.

Against this backdrop, it appears that federal policy is implicitly encouraging greater energy self-sufficiency among companies — or groups of them, such as industrial parks — while reducing their day-to-day reliance on the public grid. On Dec.12, new regulations governing the self-consumption framework were published (Autoconsumo), with rules that suggest an effort to accelerate on-site energy projects in the 700kW to 20MW range.

This would not be the first time that federal strategy has relied on private investment to support the development of the power sector. In 1992, the legal figure of Self-Supply Companies (Sociedades de Autoabastecimiento) — the predecessor of today’s self-consumption schemes — was introduced precisely to accelerate private investment in the face of limited public resources. Today, while large-scale power plants are still being planned with public, private, and mixed investment, delays in grid expansion and modernization make self-consumption not just attractive, but increasingly indispensable.

The new self-consumption framework appears to be oriented toward what could be described as mid-scale generators. These projects serve demand levels larger than traditional distributed generation, yet remain different from utility-scale plants that rely heavily on the grid to deliver energy from generation to consumption points. Instead, these mid-scale projects generate energy on-site and are intended to serve medium and large users without requiring a fully modernized grid to be viable.

Mexico’s energy landscape is undergoing a significant transformation, driven by evolving regulatory frameworks and mounting pressure on the national grid. Industrial consumers face increasingly complex choices to increase their demand, shifting investment priorities, and new rules that encourage self-sufficiency. Understanding this transition — and the opportunities it presents — has become essential for companies seeking reliable, cost-effective power in a rapidly changing market.

This distinction is crucial. Regulatory and technical trends increasingly favor projects that can meet most of their energy needs on-site, minimizing dependence on the external grid. These projects achieve balance through a combination of on-site generation, energy storage, and demand management. As a result, energy strategies now require a holistic approach that integrates various assets, coordinates demand and strategically reduces grid reliance without going fully off-grid. This integrated solution is commonly known as a microgrid.

The outlook for the coming years is clear: waiting for grid capacity is no longer a viable business strategy. While current regulations support on-site generation, the reality of the grid means that success requires more than just installing solar panels; it requires a shift from passive consumption to active energy management. By leveraging existing tools to build sophisticated private energy systems, companies can stop waiting for infrastructure and start securing their own growth. In this new landscape, the competitive advantage belongs to those who learn to thrive despite the grid’s constraints.