Kakhovka dam breach causes UAH 150-160 bln damages to Ukraine's irrigation system

MOSCOW. June 13 (Interfax) - The Kakhovka dam breach in Ukraine has inflicted damages of UAH 150-160 billion on the country's national irrigation and canals system but the exact amount will be known later, Ukrainian media reported, citing the Agrarian Policy and Food Ministry's website.

"It is impossible to talk about irrigated agriculture in the south of Ukraine in the near future unless the source of the water supply is restored," the ministry said.

It said Kakhovka reservoir supplied water to irrigate 584,000 hectares of land.

Ukrainian media quoted the Energy Ministry as saying the Dneprovskaya-1 and Dneprovskaya -2 hydroelectric plants were operating at reduced capacity due to lower water levels following the Kakhovka dam breach.

Agencies said on social media on Monday that all other hydropower plants in the Dnepr cascade were working as planned.

Ukrhydroenergo said the disaster had not affected the Kiev HPP and pumped storage tanks or Kanevskaya, Kremenchug and Srednedneprovskaya HPPs. It said that due to a sharp decrease in the water level downstream of the Dnepr HPPs, the plants were working at reduced capacity but that the station are working with a limitation, but no waste water had been discharged into the reservoir since May.

The Energy Ministry said more than 15,000 consumers still had no electricity due to the flooding.

"Power companies are ready to start restoration as soon as the water starts to recede. Preliminarily, it will be possible to carry out a full assessment of the damage two weeks after the water recedes," the ministry said.

Blackouts have been recorded in the Lvov, Kiev, Zhitomir, Dnepropetrovsk and Chernigov regions due to bad weather, but most consumers have electricity.

On the whole, the energy system is working steadily, the Energy Ministry said. Commercial imports of electricity over the past day amounted to 7,760 MWh. There were no exports. According to the ENTSO-E website, 4,604 MWh was received from Slovakia on Sunday, almost 10% more than Saturday's 4,246 MWh, but imports fell to 410 MWh on Monday. There have been no exports to Poland since June 8.