In his evening address on Wednesday, President Volodymyr Zelensky stressed that Ukraine is looking for new sources of power to heat the capital and cities and villages around the country.
That same day, Kyiv installed five new miniature power plants (66-megawatt generators), with two of them up and running, and the other three set to come on line soon.
Petro Panteleiev, acting First Deputy Head of the Kyiv City State Administration, noted that the total capacity of the new mobile power plants will not close the gap of the city’s overall winter-consumption energy deficit.
These new “cogeneration” units are designed to produce both heat and electricity at the same time. They will not provide electricity to residences, but rather to critical-infrastructure facilities.
However, another 20-megawatt diesel power plant has been ordered, Panteleiv said, which is set to launch in March.
After that, more than 500-megawatts in cogeneration units will be commissioned in 2026, Minister for Development of Communities and Territories Oleksii Kuleba announced.
“Together with our international partners, we have secured almost 600 cogeneration units, about 400 block-modular boiler houses and 28 gas turbine units. Most of this equipment has already been installed or is at the final stage of commissioning.”
More than 570 megawatts of new decentralized capacity in the municipal sector has already been commissioned.
“Cogeneration units, block-modular boiler houses and gas turbine units operate close to the consumer and can be started autonomously. This means a boiler house can operate even if a large combined heat and power plant is damaged and pumping stations ensure water supply without electricity from the grid,” Kuleba said.
In 2024, Zelensky unveiled plans to build up to a gigawatt of such mobile generation capacity for that year, and another four gigawatts in years after that.
“As a result of Russian missile and drone strikes, nine gigawatts of power have already been destroyed, despite the fact that the peak energy consumption in Ukraine last winter was 18 gigawatts. So, half of it doesn’t exist anymore,” he told the Ukraine Recovery Conference in Berlin at the time.
Also in Wednesday’s address, Zelensky said that curfews related to Ukraine energy emergency may be lifted for some cities and villages during the current energy emergency, pending a government review.
“I have tasked a review of curfew regulations: during this state of emergency, curfews can be lifted for some cities and communities where the security situation allows it,” Zelensky said.
His administration has also set up a headquarters to coordinate the situation in the capital, with Denys Shmyhal, narrowly approved as energy minister and first deputy prime minister on Wednesday after the Verkohvna Rada rejected his first appointment a day earlier, will oversee the project.
Shmyhal’s predecessor resigned after being implicated in a far-reaching energy corruption scandal which shook the foundations of Zelensky’s government late last year.
Secondly, officials will cut red tape and explore new avenues to find a long-term solution to the energy crisis, Zelensky said.
“I have instructed them to increase electricity import capacities – using all business opportunities. In Kyiv and other cities, there must be more, much more, assistance points for people.”
He refers to those facilities as “Points of Invincibility”, or heated shelters stocked with food and power sources.