October 10 will mark a year since Russia launched its first massive attack on Ukraine’s energy sector. On this day, the Russians launched 100 missiles at critical infrastructure. Millions of people were left without electricity.
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Thus began a series of attacks aimed at depriving Ukrainians of heat and light.
Lack of electricity from several hours to several days, interruptions in water supply, cold apartments and weak mobile communications have become part of winter life. But that winter Ukraine managed to survive. Will that happen this time?
Energy workers in Ukraine do not plan outages and blackouts, but have developed outage schedules in case of serious damage to the energy system.
The enemy’s goal is to achieve a blackout in Ukraine, estimates Energy Minister German Galushchenko.
Since mid-September, the Russians began their first attacks on the energy sector: they knock out thermal power plants, power grids and electricity transmission points. More often they use Iranian Shahed drones. For example, near the Dnieper they were hit: cables, transformers, equipment and materials that power engineers had purchased for restoration work in the winter were destroyed.
Into the new winter without a reserve of strength
Authorities and businesses report that 70% of damaged facilities were restored in the summer. Lana Zerkal, former adviser to the Minister of Energy, assessed the state of Ukraine’s preparations for winter as three points out of five. Before the war, the repair season in the energy sector lasted from May to September. Now experts are joking among themselves that the repair campaign in 2022 can be completed by 2029.
Officially, what part of the capacity is lost irretrievably or permanently is not disclosed for security reasons. This area is not very public right now, so as not to provide the Russians with unnecessary information to plan new attacks. The real state of energy consumption and production is now a mystery, so it is difficult for experts to make a realistic forecast regarding the viability of the energy sector under fire.
Director of the Association “Energy Efficient Cities of Ukraine” Svyatoslav Pavlyuk convinces that this winter the stability of the energy system will depend primarily on the ability to close the sky. The military promised that the effectiveness of missile defense in the winter would be higher than in the past, as Ukraine received more air defense systems. In addition, this winter Ukraine will be the first in the world to use engineering fortifications to protect against fragments of missiles and drones. It is difficult to completely cover objects with them, so power engineers advise preparing for possible destruction.
Meanwhile, Energoatom has launched seven units of nuclear power plants at full capacity, and two more are being repaired. The largest producer of thermal energy in Ukraine, DTEK, will enter the winter with the same generating capacity as it had in 2022.
The key issue is the safety margin, that is, in Ukraine there is a sufficient number of additional transformers that can replace what the Russians could potentially destroy.
Former people’s deputy Victoria Voitsitskaya said that in 2022, it was possible to quickly restore energy supplies thanks to the stock of equipment. But in March 2022, all reserves dried up. The government has ordered dozens of transformers, but is still receiving only a few. The media wrote that Ukraine is keeping them in neighboring countries to protect them from missile hits.
The Economist wrote that in preparation for attacks on energy infrastructure, Ukraine ordered 100 new high-voltage transformers.
Half of them will be produced domestically, the other half will be purchased abroad. Foreign cargo will be stored in Poland and Romania until needed.
The Energy Ministry says that if there are no new attacks, Ukraine will be able to survive the winter without blackouts. At the same time, the Center for Energy Research said: if it is minus 10-15 degrees for several days in a row, planned shutdowns will begin.
The mayor of Lvov, Andrey Sadovy, is working on scenarios when Lvov will not have electricity for a month or two.
The safest thing to do is prepare for the worst
But most experts in Ukraine are convinced that the collapse of the energy system will not happen.
The winter will be difficult, but we will get through it,” said Igor Polishchuk, mayor of Lutsk.
He advises people to prepare at the household level: exchange lamps for energy-efficient ones, check generators, buy charging stations if possible.
In Lutsk in the summer, 90% of the city’s boiler houses were equipped with diesel generators. Hospitals, pumping stations, and kindergartens also received them. Warming points with stoves and heat guns were built in schools. The city hospital is able to operate with a solid fuel boiler room in case of a power outage.
The authorities also rely on the fact that Ukrainians learned last winter to save electricity and survive in conditions of large-scale blackouts. People are again rushing to buy candles, batteries and power banks. Many people make their own electrical appliances – combining car batteries and inverters that increase the current. Thanks to these devices, key appliances, even a refrigerator, can work.
Meanwhile, the authorities left unchanged tariffs for gas, heat and hot water for the population. Prime Minister Denis Smigal said that the government has extended the preferential gas price for heat producers. In Ukraine, half of households use the services of boiler houses, so the price of gas is of strategic importance for them. Heat producers receive gas from Naftogaz at 7.4 UAH per cubic meter. This is a preferential and non-market price, but a forced one, the government says.
Klitschko is worried about debts
The mayor of Kyiv, Vitaliy Klitschko, said that the heating season in the capital could be in jeopardy if the debt is not paid.
According to him, the debt, which “the state has promised to repay for the second year in a row,” currently amounts to UAH 6.8 billion to Kiev.
The point is that there was no increase in tariffs for the population, while the cost of all components of the tariff increased. That is why such a large debt arose. Klitschko reports that the government promised to compensate for this difference, but there were no funds yet.
The mayor of Kiev also appealed to the deputies of the Verkhovna Rada so that the people’s representatives would support amendments to the budget bills that should be considered by parliament – in terms of resolving the issue of compensating for the difference in tariffs and ensuring the credit capacity of communities.
Source: Racurs
I am David Wyatt, a professional writer and journalist for Buna Times. I specialize in the world section of news coverage, where I bring to light stories and issues that affect us globally. As a graduate of Journalism, I have always had the passion to spread knowledge through writing.