Drones against refineries: will UAV attacks lead to a new fuel crisis

Sergey Kondratiev, Principal Director on Economic Studies at the Institute for Energy and Finance, commented to the Novye Izvestia newspaper on the consequences of UAV attacks on Russian refineries for gasoline production.

The first attack by a Ukrainian drone on the Tuapse refinery was in February 2023. A year later, the direction of the UAV strike is extremely clear: refineries, oil depots and pipelines. Drones are hitting factories supplying the Central District with all types of fuel — diesel, gasoline, aviation kerosene. What are the threats of these attacks?

— With gasoline, the balance may be more tense, because traditionally domestic production exceeds demand by 8% -15%, depending on the time of year. In summer, demand is high, the difference that is exported is less, in winter it is more. Now we understand that due to the fact that the installation at the Nizhny Novgorod refinery was eliminated, there may be problems in Ryazan, there were certain difficulties in Volgograd too due to drone attacks, yes, potentially this could mean that the supply will be somewhat lower than the demand, - Sergey Kondratiev says.

Another problem in the petroleum products logistics is transportation by rail.

— Last year, the railway was overloaded. It is overloaded even now, due to the fact that we are redirecting export flows to the east, and it is clear that everything is not easy. We had situations when wholesale consumers could wait for fuel instead of 10 days — 20 or more, —Kontdratiev recalls.

If fuel reserves are small, and traffic flows along the railway are not adjusted, then difficulties are possible at the local level, the expert warns. This is understandable: if gasoline or diesel has not reached its destination, then it will not be at the gas station.