European governments are running short on cash to help rebuild Ukraine’s battered energy system, the head of the EU-backed Ukraine Energy Support Fund (UESF) told Semafor.
Mutual attacks by Ukraine and Russia on each other’s electricity and fossil fuel networks have increased over the past week, as Kyiv seeks to drain Moscow’s oil revenue and Moscow aims to set Ukrainians up for another winter without reliable heat and power. Tens of thousands of people in both countries have already faced blackouts this week, and Ukraine’s state-owned Naftogaz said it was struggling to recover from the biggest-ever attack on its gas production facilities.
Prior to the latest round of attacks, European donors were steadily closing the gap between available funding and equipment, and what Ukraine’s energy ministry has requested. Now that gap, currently about €400 million, is widening again, Ádám Balogh, head of the Ukraine Support Task Force Unit, which oversees the fund, said. Given the weeks, months, or even years of lead time required to procure most kinds of energy hardware, many requests for replacement parts that haven’t already been made will be difficult to fulfill this winter, making each new strike more difficult to recover from than the last. “This is quite serious compared to the previous situations,” he said.