Ukrainian govt guarantees power supply to businesses importing electricity during blackouts

MOSCOW. Oct 30 (Interfax) - The Ukrainian government has endorsed a regulation on the specifics of electricity imports during martial law, under which industrial customers importing electricity cannot be subjected to power supply cutoffs during blackouts, government representative to the Verkhovna Rada Taras Melnichuk said.

"It stipulates that power supply restrictions cannot be applied to customers that receive electricity imported from abroad, provided that its consumption does not exceed certain volumes," Ukrainian media quoted Melnichuk as saying on his social account.

He did not specify the volumes to which this regulation would apply.

Customers importing electricity will not be subject to power supply schedules, hourly cutoffs, power supply limits, and emergency outages, he said.

Electricity imports from European Union countries help compensate for insufficient generating capacity to ensure the unified power grid's operational security, he said.

Energy Minister German Galushchenko said on October 12 that the ministry had forwarded a draft directive to the government proposing that, during power supply shortages, its supply to industrial consumers importing electricity be guaranteed, while reducing the share of imported electricity to 50% from 100%, as was the case last year.

"If a business buys 50% of imported electricity, then we will guarantee its operations without cutoffs," he said.

On January 3, 2023, the government endorsed a regulation on specifics of electricity imports during the 2022-2023 fall and winter season amid martial law in Ukraine, which stipulated that power supply restrictions would not be applied to customers receiving imported electricity.