Executive summary
This year has seen a step change in the intensity of attacks on Ukraine’s
energy sector, creating risks that extend far beyond energy as Ukraine
approaches the winter months. While Russia has regularly targeted energy
infrastructure in Ukraine since its full-scale invasion of the country in February
2022, its most recent bombardments have been unprecedented in scale; a
concerted attack in late August 2024, for example, involved more than 200
missiles and drones. Air defence measures have been unable to prevent major
damage. The primary targets have been in the electricity sector – including
generation, transmission and distribution – but district heating networks and some
gas infrastructure have also been hit.

Introduction
On the morning of 26 August 2024, Russia fired more than 200 missiles and
drones in one of its largest aerial attacks on Ukraine; the main targets were
the country’s energy infrastructure. Around 8 million households lost power
without warning; the capital, Kyiv, experienced its first unscheduled blackout since
November 2022. Ukraine’s air defences provided some protection, but the scale
of the attack and the resulting disruption highlighted once again the vital strategic
importance of Ukraine’s energy sector, as well as the ever-present risks to the
country’s energy supply.
Ukraine’s energy system1 has been regularly targeted by Russia since its
full-scale invasion in 2022, with attacks intensifying since the spring of 2024.
The targeting of energy infrastructure has had wide-ranging consequences for the
provision of energy to Ukrainian households and other consumers. Over the
course of 2022-23, about half of Ukraine’s power generation capacity was either
occupied by Russian forces, destroyed or damaged, and approximately half of the
large network substations were damaged by missiles and drones. The occupation
of the Zaporizhzhia nuclear power plant, on its own, reduced available Ukrainian
power generation capacity by 6 gigawatts (GW). In the wave of attacks between
March and May 2024, Ukraine lost another 9 GW of generation capacity; this was
mainly thermal and hydro assets, although some smaller solar PV units also came
under attack, as well as numerous substations. This left Ukraine with only around
one-third of its pre-war capacity, even before the most recent round of summer
attacks. Ukraine’s district heating and natural gas infrastructure has also been
targeted. Since 2022, 18 large combined heat and power (CHP) plants have been
damaged or completely destroyed, along with more than 800 boiler houses. Some
above-ground natural gas storage infrastructure has been damaged, although
underground inventories remain unaffected.

Industrial power consumption has halved since the 2022 invasion, and even
though household electricity use is down 20%, it now constitutes the largest share
of overall demand. The composition and level of Ukrainian electricity consumption
has shifted significantly. Industrial demand has plummeted. The 20% fall in
residential demand is largely due to the effect of 6.5 million Ukrainian refugees
leaving the country, although some policies and initiatives have helped save
electricity. For example, an EU-funded program that replaced incandescent bulbs
with LED bulbs reduced demand by as much as 1 GW. Many utilities are now
facing extreme financial difficulties due to lost assets, lower revenues due to
reduced economic activity and additional expenses such as clearing debris or the
cost of repairing or demolishing damaged facilities. While donors have been
providing much-needed equipment and assistance to restore damaged
infrastructure, including standalone generators for critical infrastructure such as
hospitals, water systems and district heating companies, the scale of the challenge
remains huge.

Source:https://www.iea.org/reports/ukraines-energy-security-and-the-coming-winter