Ukraine is planning to replace missing volumes of natural gas with fuel oil and other alternative types of fuel during the upcoming heating season, Ukrainian Deputy Prime Minister Volodymyr Hroisman has said.
“It was decided to increase the replacement of a certain part of missing volumes of gas with fuel oil as an alternative type of fuel. Complete calculations are currently being made on how much [financial] resources we need to buy it,” he said at a briefing in Kyiv on Sept. 22 after a meeting of the anti-crisis energy headquarters.
He said that it was planned to replace about three billion cubic meters of natural gas with fuel oil. The issue concerns the purchase of fuel on the domestic market and abroad, he added.
Hroisman also said that the Cabinet of Ministers could make decisions to limit exports of fuel oil produced at Ukrainian refineries.
“We are considering all possibilities to get the amount of fuel oil that will help us ensure full-scale gas savings,” he said.
He also said that Ukraine had already contracted one million tonnes of coal from South Africa, which will be delivered to the country from October 2014 to January 2015, or 250,000 tonnes each month for the needs of PJSC Centrenergo. In addition, the remaining market participants are contracting coal in other countries, he said.
Hroisman expressed hope that consumers would consciously save energy resources in the upcoming heating season.
