Who decides what on Mexico's power grid

Bajío Ventures · May 2026 · Grid First, 1 of 4

An energy project in Mexico doesn’t connect to “CFE”. It connects to a system with four actors, and each one decides something different. Mixing them up costs months.

Four actors, four roles

• SENER plans. Under the Electricity Sector Law (DOF, March 18, 2025), planning is binding and the State must keep at least 54% of the annual average energy injected into the grid.
• The CNE grants permits. The National Energy Commission replaced the CRE and grants generation permits and, where applicable, storage permits.
• CENACE decides operation. It holds operational control of the National Electric System, runs the wholesale market, guarantees open access to the grid and proposes its expansion. It also determines the infrastructure each interconnection requires.
• CFE Transmission and CFE Distribution execute. They hold physical control: they operate the equipment in the field and take over the interconnection works.

In practice, a developer runs the studies with CENACE and coordinates switching, outages and protections with CFE. Two different counterparts, on two different calendars.

The Bajío has its own control region

CENACE operates through regional control offices. Guanajuato and Querétaro fall under the Western Regional Control Office (Gerencia de Control Regional Occidental), based in Zapopan. It covers all of Aguascalientes, Colima, Guanajuato, Jalisco, Nayarit and Querétaro, almost all of Michoacán and Zacatecas, and municipalities in Hidalgo and San Luis Potosí. It is the technical counterpart for any project in the region.

What still applies

The Electricity Industry Law was repealed, but the rules issued under it —the 2018 Interconnection and Connection Manual, the Market Rules and the Grid Code— still apply insofar as they do not conflict with the new law, until new instruments are issued. Existing permits and contracts keep their terms until they expire, with no extension.

Recommendation

Before applying for anything, every project should have a stakeholder map: what SENER decides, what the CNE permits, what CENACE studies and what CFE takes over. In the next installment we look at how long each step takes.

In this series: 1. Who decides what on Mexico’s power grid · 2. 24 months: the real interconnection timeline · 3. The Bajío’s grid is decided in June · 4. What Baja California teaches the Bajío

Sources: Electricity Sector Law (Chamber of Deputies) · Boundaries of the regional control offices (DOF, May 15, 2018) · Norton Rose Fulbright, new electricity sector laws (Mar 2025)

This content is for information only and does not constitute legal, regulatory or investment advice.

Bajío Ventures — a Mexican energy-infrastructure investment group based in Guanajuato: capital, a data platform on the region’s industrial base, and a German industrial channel, with its own advisory presence in Berlin.