Ukrenergo: 368 communities in 9 regions of Ukraine still cut off from power supply because of storm

MOSCOW. Nov 29 (Interfax) - As of Wednesday morning, 368 populated areas in the Dnepropetrovsk, Zakarpattia, Kirovograd, Nikolayev, Odessa, Poltava, Cherkassy, and Chernigov regions and in the Kiev-controlled part of the Kherson region remained cut off from power supply, Ukrainian media have reported with reference to the power grid operator Ukrenergo's social media post.

The most complicated situation is currently observed in the Odessa region, where over 54,000 customers in 228 communities remain without electricity, and in the Kiev-controlled part of the Kherson region (nearly 15,000 customers in 30 communities).

"Ukrenergo repair teams along with regional energy offices are continuing to restore power supply to customers in the southern part of the country. The work is complicated by adverse weather conditions, including snowdrifts and glazed frost. Wind has strengthened again, and it's raining heavily somewhere," Ukrenergo said.

Adverse weather prompted new power cuts in the Kirovograd, Nikolayev, Poltava, and Cherkassy regions early on Wednesday, it said.

Power consumption in the country is rising rapidly, and the Ukrenergo dispatch center expects it to remain high throughout the day. It urged customers to use electricity economically.

"Consumption is growing because of bad and dull weather, which affects green generation, and what counts most, the resumption of consumption in the areas hit by bad weather," it said.

No power consumption limits have been set, and no outage schedules have been applied or are planned, Ukrenergo said.

The Energy Ministry circulated an identical report on its social account.

"However, if this high consumption continues throughout the day, this could cause a supply shortage in the power grid because of the decline in the operation of solar power plants," Ukrenergo said.

As in the previous few days, Ukraine is not exporting electricity on Wednesday, and imports from Slovakia, Romania, and Moldova are taking place mainly at night and evening hours. The overall amount of electricity to be imported on Wednesday is roughly the same as it was on Tuesday, 1,277 MW/h, with its maximum capacity reaching 474 MW during certain hours.

As reported earlier, the storm disrupted power supply to over 2,000 communities across Ukraine as of Monday morning, and 357 of them still remained without electricity by Tuesday evening.

Since November 28, the electricity import capacity from Europe to Ukraine and Moldova grew to 1,700 MW from 1,200 MW.