"The world has never seen anything like this": expert describes Kyiv's energy situation

Oleksandr Kharchenko, Director of the Energy Research Centre, said that the world has never seen anything like these attacks on energy infrastructure at −15°C in a city with district heating that has effectively been destroyed.

Source: Oleksandr Kharchenko

Details: Kharchenko said that heating has technically already been restored across the whole of Kyiv.

"There are several hundred buildings where, due to the lack of electricity, it is not possible to start circulation pumps so that hot water from the pipes beneath the buildings can enter the heating system," he explained.

Nevertheless, as the expert noted, the situation with electricity remains "difficult".

"Electricity is currently available to only about one third of Kyiv," Kharchenko said.

He said that if Russian attacks were to be factored out, Kyiv would return to stable power outage schedules in about a week.

"They would not be four-hour outages, but eight to ten hours a day. However, they would be stable and predictable. Within two weeks, we would have schedules of four to six hours a day, and then things would gradually improve step by step. But unfortunately, we cannot predict the attacks at the moment, and they will certainly interfere with these schedules," the expert said.

Background:

• A state of emergency will be introduced in Ukraine's energy sector. A headquarters will also be established to coordinate the situation in Kyiv and will operate on a permanent basis.
• Earlier, Denys Shmyhal, First Deputy Prime Minister and Energy Minister, said that Kyiv had been far less prepared for Russia's large-scale strikes on energy facilities than Kharkiv.
• President Volodymyr Zelenskyy noted that "very little was done" in the capital, referring to preparations for an emergency situation in the energy system.

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