On the territory of Ukraine there are interruptions in electricity due to the shelling of several thermal power plants at once

Sergey Kondratiev, Deputy Head of the Economic Department of the Institute for Energy and Finance, commented to Business FM on the operation of the Ukrainian energy system:

“Ukraine faced a serious reduction in demand, primarily from industry: in January-early February, demand was 21-22 gigawatts, now it fluctuates in the range of 9.5-10.5 gigawatts, in fact, demand has halved. Demand is now satisfied in these 10 gigawatts due to the fact that about 6 gigawatts of nuclear power are in operation - the South Ukrainian NPP, there is the Rivne NPP and the Khmelnytsky NPP, about 3 gigawatts are coal-fired capacities. Yes, they are mostly in Western Ukraine now, so I think that if we see, for example, in the next two or three weeks a coordinated attack on Ukrainian energy facilities, this could lead to a destabilization of the system and could force Ukraine to move to restricting supplies to individual consumers or rolling blackouts. If this attack was a one-time attack, then, with a high probability, Ukraine will be able to maintain a relatively stable operation of the energy system until the first cold weather. What will happen this winter, it is rather difficult to say now, because there are problems with the occupancy of warehouses at coal-fired power plants.”