Brace for a harsh winter? Can Ukraine's grid survive Russian attacks, and what is next for electricity and heating

Russians are striking electricity infrastructure differently, but no less painfully

Since the beginning of October, Russian drones and missiles have been hitting Ukraine's electricity system almost every day. Frontline regions are suffering especially badly.

"I think the Russians are looking at this from a psychological perspective. That is, there are problems somewhere in Sumy Oblast, Chernihiv Oblast, but no problems, for example, somewhere in western Ukraine. And the Russians want to use this backdrop to somehow inflame, probably, enmity, that someone in Ukraine is sitting with light, and someone is sitting without light," argues Daria Orlova, an analyst at ExPro Electricity consulting.

On October 10, Russia launched 450 drones and more than 30 missiles at Ukraine's critical infrastructure. The left bank of Kyiv was left without power for several hours, as well as some districts on the right bank. Judging by everything, TETs-5 and TETs-6 thermal power plants were damaged — important for supplying electricity to Kyiv residents, as well as heat.

That is when the president criticized the capital's authorities for not doing enough to engineer protections for both TETs. Zelenskyy insists that it is not about air defense, but specifically about protecting power plants. He says the effectiveness of drone interceptors is 68%, and Commander-in-Chief Oleksandr Syrskyi notes that the effectiveness of Ukrainian air defense is about 74%. However, not everyone agrees that the issue is precisely with the engineering protection of energy facilities.

"Those drones that hit the relevant objects on the premises of these plants should not have reached TETs-5 and TETs-6. They simply should not have reached, but they did, they managed to fly more than 300 kilometers and hit the relevant objects. Now the president says that he has complaints about the protection of TES-5 and TES-6. I understand that he meant precisely insufficient engineering-technical protection. But, in my opinion, the energy workers are doing a good job. What can the energy workers do if they are constantly being hit on the head? First of all, active protection is needed, that is, air defense," comments Gennadii Riabtsev, an energy expert and professor at the Kyiv-Mohyla School of Governance.

hromadske reached out to Ukrenergo, the state operator of trunk power grids, with questions about the installed engineering protection at energy facilities.

"Today — more than half of Ukrenergo's facilities have second-level anti-drone protection. Construction work is ongoing constantly," the company's press service said.

They explain that when building protection at a substation, equipment must be turned off. This means that people who receive electricity from this station will be left without electricity for a certain time. Therefore, the process of building shelters was divided into two stages. The first stage is key substations for transmitting electricity from west to east and from south to north. They are already protected. Protection of the second stage will be completed in the first half of 2026.

The first level of protection involves installing so-called gabions — structures made of metal mesh filled with stones. The second level of protection is concrete structures that are supposed to protect against drones. The third level of protection is supposed to protect against missiles.

"By decision of the Cabinet of Ministers, 90,000 gabions are being transferred to the ownership of the Ministry of Energy, so that it can then distribute these gabions among critical infrastructure facilities. If something is transferred with a bureaucratic procedure, then various orders, various plans are needed there. All this will, of course, be developed for months — and these gabions may not reach the facilities they are supposed to protect," says energy expert Gennadii Riabtsev.

According to the Ministry of Energy, Ukraine's energy system entered the cold period of the year quite prepared, with 17.6 GW of generating capacity, considering that last winter's peak demand was 16 GW per hour. Then Ukraine had its own generation of 15 GW; another 1 GW was covered by imports. Now, technical conditions allow importing up to 2.1 GW from the European Union.

The Ministry of Energy also claims that this year 194 MW of distributed generation has already been introduced (solar power plants, wind turbines, gas installations). This should be enough, for example, to provide electricity to a city of about 400,000 residents. And by the end of the year, more than 380 MW is planned.

However, if the Russians keep hitting large electricity production facilities, blackout risks remain.

"Therefore, the government needs to take care of simplifying the connection to networks of small energy installations, cheapening this process, stimulating private business to install such installations.

Ukraine should create a network of at least 500 small energy installations, with a capacity of 1 MW and more, so that after each next hit, the light does not go out in the whole city or in the whole territorial community. Now, out of the planned 908 installations, delivery of 551 is confirmed, and 189 are already operating in the network, providing 145 MW of capacity.

Well, what is 145 MW? And those pending cogeneration installations (those that can produce electricity and provide heat), that were delivered — there are 551 of them, but only 189 connected. The others are standing in yards somewhere in the regions. But they are needed now in Chernihiv, in Odesa," says energy expert Gennadii Riabtsev.

Such installations are not as vulnerable to Russian strikes, since they are smaller, and their location may be unknown to the enemy.

The Russians are now targeting primarily Ukraine's electricity distribution systems, but this is no less painful than strikes on electricity production. To repair distribution systems, energy workers have to turn off the electricity at the level of a city or region.

"Even without a completely destructive effect on a power plant or substation as a whole — damage to switching, protection, transformers or autotransformers — such strikes can temporarily take large sections of the network out of operation," explains Olena Lapenko, general manager for energy security and resilience at DiXi Group consulting.

At the same time, if we are talking about Kyiv, repairs usually happen faster, but in the regions everything is much more complicated.

"In regions close to the front or with dispersed infrastructure, including in Chernihiv Oblast, logistics is more complicated — damaged roads, increased risks for repair crews, and smaller reserves of backup equipment. That is, repairs happen more effectively where resources are concentrated and safe access for crews is ensured," says Olena Lapenko.

Even if after the next hit power supply is restored, this does not mean at all that the repair is fully completed. It only means that the energy workers were able to set up alternative supply. And repairing damages, especially if it is about key equipment of power plants and substations, can take months and even years.

At the same time, Ukrenergo assures that there is enough equipment to replace damaged elements of the energy system.

"Taking into account the experience of previous autumn-winter periods, the transmission system operator has created reserves of high-voltage equipment that are two to three times higher than the established standards. Thanks to own resources and assistance from international partners — accumulation of equipment and materials reserves continues," the company's press service said.

Gas is another problem — money is needed

In parallel with the electricity system, the gas infrastructure is also suffering. The Russians are hitting gas extraction and transportation regularly, and sometimes the strikes are quite devastating.

On October 3, according to Naftogaz, Russia attacked gas industry facilities in the Kharkiv and Poltava oblasts with 35 missiles and 60 drones. Bloomberg then reported that Ukraine lost about 60% of its own gas production.

However, analysts point out that this figure needs to be understood correctly.

"Minus 60% — that was at the moment after the strike. To guarantee safety for gas transportation facilities, transportation was simply stopped, extraction was stopped. Everything was put on pause so that there would not be an explosion. But that does not mean that everyone will just sit still. No, they will restore — and they are restoring all this now, extraction is being restored," explains energy expert Gennadii Riabtsev.

"As a result of the strikes, a significant part of the Naftogaz group's facilities is damaged, and some destruction is critical. Work on a number of facilities of the private DTEK Naftogaz in Poltava Oblast was stopped. Some facilities can be repaired faster and quickly return part of the equipment to operation. Some need to be rebuilt from scratch, which will require significantly more time," explains Artem Petrenko, executive director of the Association of Gas Producers of Ukraine.

"From the published information, one can conclude that gas lifting towers, compressor stations, pressure lines, and power supply substations are damaged the most. The most sensitive are precisely compressors and electrical facilities. If only pipelines or surface equipment are damaged, repairs are usually possible in a few weeks," adds Olena Lapenko from DiXi Group.

Thus, risks arise for passing the cold season in terms of sufficient natural gas reserves.

On the one hand, it is not so bad. As of now, 12.9 billion cubic meters of gas have been accumulated in underground storage facilities, while, for the needs of the heating season, according to government estimates, reserves should be at the level of 13.2 billion cubic meters. That is, formally, only 300 million cubic meters are needed, considering that 500 million are already contracted.

But on the other hand, there are also significant risks. Usually, 12-13 billion cubic meters of gas in storage is enough for Ukraine to get through the cold season, but during the winter period, a significant share of consumption is covered by its own production. It is its own production that may not be enough.

"It is obvious that the strikes on gas production have led to a significant reduction in own production, so it will be necessary to significantly increase imports and import gas all winter. The existing import capacities allow this. It is just a matter of money. We need to find somewhere $1.5-2 billion additionally for financing imports. The gas that is in storage will not be enough to get through the autumn-winter period," notes Serhii Makohon, former head of Ukraine's Gas Transmission System Operator.

Previously, Naftogaz planned to import 4.6 billion cubic meters of gas, of which 4.1 billion are already there, but later the Ministry of Energy increased this need by 30% — to almost 6 billion cubic meters. That is, according to official estimates, about 2 billion cubic meters more need to be imported.

"In an optimistic scenario, an additional 1 billion cubic meters may be needed. In a pessimistic scenario, which takes into account new large-scale Russian attacks, we may need about 4 billion cubic meters of additional gas. This figure varies greatly and will depend on what the weather will be, whether there will be Russian attacks, how quickly we can restore already damaged facilities. If we talk about the negative scenario, it could cost about $2 billion," predicts Mykhailo Svyshcho, gas market analyst at ExPro Consulting.

Hungary, Poland, and Slovakia provide 97% of Ukraine's gas imports. There is also the possibility of transporting blue fuel from Moldova and Romania.

"Hungary, Poland — the cheapest routes, they are used now almost to the maximum. To increase imports, it needs to be done through Slovakia, and that is a more expensive route," adds Svyshcho.

So, Naftogaz now has to actively seek funds to pay for importing additional volumes of gas. The state company has already attracted several large loans. First, it turned to Ukrainian state banks. Ukrekssimbank provided $59.3 million for gas production. Ukrgasbank and PrivatBank provided 96 million euros each. Another 3 billion hryvnias ($72 million) was provided by Oschadbank. From its own pocket, Naftogaz pulled out $1 billion for additional gas purchases.

International partners have also joined. The European Bank for Reconstruction and Development loaned Naftogaz 770 million euros this year and plans to give another 500 million euros for emergency gas imports. The European Investment Bank loaned 300 million euros, and the government of Norway provided a grant of 85 million euros.

Of course, this increases Naftogaz's debt — and this may affect gas tariffs. So, the government, although it extended the validity of preferential gas prices for heating for household needs until March 31, 2026, raised prices for thermal power plants, combined heat and power plants, gas piston and gas turbine installations.

"In fact, it is quite difficult with funding. Therefore, now the search for new loans is ongoing, and negotiations with foreign partners are being conducted. I think that by the end of the year, we may see more similar loan agreements with foreign partners. Europe and European partners understand that we now have a difficult situation, ahead of winter, Russia is attacking, and we need help.

Therefore, I think that we will be able to get certain funds to increase imports. This is a huge amount of funds, but theoretically, if there is a very difficult situation and a negative scenario, I think the government will have to help Naftogaz with funds. Perhaps, they will somehow resolve the issue of debts of heat supply enterprises to Naftogaz and partially allocate funds to Naftogaz," says gas market analyst Mykhailo Svyshcho.

The Russians, meanwhile, are only thinking about the most negative scenario for Ukraine coming true.

"We are dealing with a treacherous enemy who wants to destroy both Ukrainian gas production and our entire energy system. All previous attacks are direct confirmation of this. Winter will indeed be difficult, and we all need to prepare for it," predicts Artem Petrenko from the Association of Gas Producers of Ukraine.

The Lviv authorities are already preparing that due to limited gas reserves, the heating season will have to start later. The mayor of Dnipro, Borys Filatov, directly called for doing just that — starting the season as late as possible. And Kyiv mayor Vitali Klitschko, in turn, advised Kyiv residents to prepare for difficulties.