MEXICO Law and Practice Contributed by: Bernardo Cortés and Fernando Quesada, Cortés Quesada Abogados, S.C.
strategic industries and areas, and the organisation- al simplification reform. The Congress also recently passed a new Law for the Promotion of Investment in Strategic Infrastructure for Development of Wellbe- ing (Mixed Participation Schemes Law), which con- templates additional schemes in which the State and private entities may partner in order to construct and operate electricity facilities. The approval of the constitutional reforms by Con- gress gave rise to the enactment of the LSE, LCFE, LPTE and LCNE (among others) in March 2025, fol- lowed by the publication of the Regulations to the LSE (RLSE), the Regulations to the LPTE (RLPTE), and other secondary regulations during late 2025 and 2026. As a result, the reform is no longer transitional in nature, but an operative legal framework currently governing the sector. More recently, SENER and the CNE supplemented this framework through the issu- ance of the Migration Guidelines for Self-Supply and Cogeneration Projects and the Transmission Method- ology applicable to legacy projects developed under the former Power Utility Law (LSPEE). The main foundational changes of the 2024–2025 energy reform on electricity matters are as follows. • Transformation of the legal nature of CFE (formerly a State-productive company) into a vertically integrated State-public company – this change consolidated CFE’s role across the generation, transmission, distribution and basic supply seg- ments of the electricity value chain, and prioritised reliability, continuity and social function over profit- ability criteria. • Clear preference of CFE and other State-owned generation companies over private participants – this includes a mandate to ensure that the State controls at least 54% of the electricity injected into the NES, thereby limiting private sector participa- tion to a maximum of 46%, measured annually under the State prevalence mechanism incorpo- rated into PLADESE. • New regulatory rules for generation activities, including the formal recognition of self-consump- tion, cogeneration, storage and mixed participation schemes (long-term production and mixed invest- ment), as well as simplified permitting procedures
for certain self-consumption projects and new migration rules for legacy projects. • Binding planning obligations applicable to new generation projects, requiring compliance with official planning criteria relating to reliability, energy transition, energy justice, system efficiency and State prevalence as a condition for permit issu- ance. However, legacy self-supply and cogenera- tion projects migrating under the Migration Guide- lines are expressly exempt from these binding planning criteria. • Creation of the CNE and broader authority of SEN- ER, expanding the federal government’s purview over sector planning, market oversight and regula- tory enforcement actions. • New specific regulations governing electricity storage systems, cogeneration and the voluntary migration of legacy independent power producer permits, self-supply and cogeneration projects, and a new transmission tariff methodology applica- ble to legacy self-supply and cogeneration projects electing to remain under the LSPEE regime, all of which materially affect the development, operation and economic conditions of generation assets. In short, these reforms signal a decisive shift toward greater State control, planning centralisation and direct public participation in the Mexican power indus- try, with significant implications for public and private sector stakeholders alike. 1.7 Announcements Regarding New Policies Many of the principal regulations to the LSE and ancil- lary laws have been issued, including: • the administrative regulations to each federal stat- ute; • the new General Administrative Provisions for gen- eration and storage permits, and self-consumption projects; and • specific regulations governing electricity storage, cogeneration, the voluntary migration of legacy supply and cogeneration projects, the migration of independent power producer (IPP) legacy permits, and the methodology for determining transmission charges applicable to legacy projects remaining under the former LSPEE regime.
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