What Russia cannot gain on the battlefield, it is trying to gain by plunging Ukraine’s cities into darkness and cold as a long winter looms.
The result is a bitter battle of attrition: Russian missiles fly across Ukraine, and Ukrainian power engineers work for days in freezing temperatures to restore power.
Last Monday (5th) saw the biggest wave of missile attacks since November 23rd. Ukraine’s state power generator, Ukrenergo, says around 40% of normal electrical supply was cut off at one point in October.
This situation became known as an electricity deficit and oscillates from one side to the other depending on the impacts of the missiles.
Kyrylo Tymoshenko, deputy chief of staff of Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky, told CNN that “what the Ukrainian power system has been experiencing since October, no power system in the world has ever experienced”.
The CEO of state-owned power generator Ukrenergo, Volodymyr Kudrytskyi, says the point is not to generate power, but to bring it to the people.
“The enemy is hitting the most important installations and key elements of the substations that guarantee the production and transmission of electricity.” Kudrytskyi told CNN.
Russians go after the most vulnerable parts of the system. “By the nature of the attacks, we see that Russian missiles are directed by Russian energy engineers,” says Tymoshenko.
This is in part because until this year Ukraine was on the same power grid as Russia and Belarus. Russian engineers knew the Ukrainian network inside out.
The main targets are high voltage lines, substations and distribution networks.
Joseph Majkut, director of the Energy Security and Climate Change Program at the Center for Strategic and International Studies, says “Russia’s attacks focused on key elements of Ukraine’s transmission grid, preventing generated electricity from passing through the grid and reaching consumers and forcing blackouts to balance the grid”.
“Attacks on high voltage substations have been particularly damaging as they are critical to grid operation and difficult to repair,” he added.
Ukraine is now scouring the world to find compatible parts and carry out repairs – while ordinary people are subjected to power cuts that often last more than 12 hours a day. Prolonged blackouts threaten to send another wave of Ukrainian civilians fleeing west to Poland and other neighboring countries.
There is a glimmer of hope: Ukraine’s air defenses are getting better at taking out Russian cruise missiles, often with newly arrived Western equipment.
Ukraine said it had destroyed about 60 of the 70 missiles fired on Monday; video surfaced of one being intercepted by a German-made Gepard anti-aircraft missile.
But just a dozen Russian missiles hitting critical targets wreak havoc. 15 gigawatts of Ukraine’s power capacity has been drawn, compared to a pre-war capacity of 56 gigawatts (GW) of power, according to Ukrenergo.
Gradually, power engineers are fixing the system – this week, the electricity deficit has been reduced to 19%. But recovery is tenuous.
Sergey Kovalenko, CEO of energy provider YASNO, says “Ukrainians will probably have to live with blackouts until at least the end of March.”
Some people in Kiev told the CNN who are ready to retire to rural dachas, where at least wood stoves provide warmth.
Specialized equipment
Aware of the impact on Ukrainian morale, Western governments stepped up aid in the form of transformers, thousands of generators and other equipment.
The US has mobilized allies in the G7 group to focus on a multipronged approach to keeping the lights, heat and water on. Washington has already provided more than $100 million for everything from circuit breakers to lightning rods and generators that are now arriving in Ukraine.
The European Union is sending emergency equipment, including welding electrodes and circuit breakers. Ukraine’s Energy Support Fund sent 37 shipments from 20 countries; Another 47 deliveries are scheduled.
Kudrytskyi, the CEO of Ukrenergo, reveals the list of countries that sent equipment, including Poland, Germany, Italy, Finland and Lithuania.
But Ukraine’s network also requires specialized, made-to-order equipment, according to CSIS’s Joseph Majkut. An example is the high voltage system (750kV) that transports electricity from nuclear power plants to other parts of the grid.
“There is not enough equipment available to allow full and lasting repairs to the power grid. For example, high voltage autotransformers are hard to find and have long manufacturing lead times from companies like Hitachi or Siemens,” Majkut told CNN. They also weigh up to 250 tons.
Most of Europe runs on lower voltages, and many critical items would need to be manufactured specifically for Ukraine’s needs.
Tymoshenko told CNN that some would take six to nine months to produce, although he hoped that South Korea could be a promising source of compatible equipment.
Meanwhile, Ukrainian engineers are carrying out patchwork repairs, according to Kudrytskyi, installing “used equipment that often does not meet the full technical specifications of the network, but can be temporarily implemented by network engineers.”
But he warned that the company is running out of equipment.
“While Ukrenergo has a significant stockpile of other equipment for emergency restoration work, it is running low due to the scale of the damage.”
There are some short term options. In early December, USAID provided 2,200 generators to communities across the country. Hundreds more have been imported from Europe – and mobile boilers could provide heat for 7 million civilians this winter, says the US State Department.
Generators help keep critical services running: hospitals, sewage treatment plants, housing for the most vulnerable. But Kudrytskyi says they are “a temporary alternative. They cannot replace power generation in any type of power plant.”
They also require a lot of fuel, which was lacking at times during the conflict.
In the long term, Ukraine seeks its integration into the European network. Tymoshenko told CNN that Ukraine’s power system has been part of the mainland grid since March, after synchronization of the systems. This allows for easier trading of electricity.
“And that, of course, will encourage us to continue the technological development of the power system after the victory,” he says.
This synchronization is already paying dividends. To stabilize the grid in Ukraine, part of the electricity destined for Kiev or Odesa passes through Europe and back to Ukraine.
defending the skies
The other half of the equation is better missile defenses. With its S-300 long-range surface-to-air missile systems and, more recently, Germany’s highly capable IRIS-T and US NASAMS, Ukraine’s air defenses have intercepted a growing proportion of Russian cruise missiles and Iranian attack.
By October, Ukrainian air defenses were taking out just over half of the cruise missiles fired, according to Ukrainian military data. That proportion is now over two-thirds – and Ukrainians believe the Russians are running out of their most accurate systems.
Last month, the Pentagon also authorized the deployment of HAWK missiles (the launchers come from Spain) and four Avenger air defense systems.
Ukrainians want more – and they ask Germany and the US for Patriot missile batteries almost every day. US officials have been mum about the prospect, saying it is not currently up for discussion.
As engineers work around the clock, Kudrytskyi said, “the percentage of the electricity deficit is gradually decreasing. But then Russian missiles and drones fly again to Ukrainian power facilities and destroy everything that has been restored.”
Some Ukrenergo facilities were attacked eight times, he said, and eight times they were patched up.
Tymoshenko told CNN: “The enemy intends to plunge Ukraine into cold and darkness. And we know it takes courage and endurance from each of us this winter. We know it will be the hardest in Ukraine’s history.’
But he said he was confident Ukraine would prevail and the ultimate goal was to “build back better” – and faster.
Source: CNN Brasil
Bruce Belcher is a seasoned author with over 5 years of experience in world news. He writes for online news websites and provides in-depth analysis on the world stock market. Bruce is known for his insightful perspectives and commitment to keeping the public informed.
