Investors have lost confidence in Ukrainian energy sector — former head of Ukrenergo

Ukrainian state companies have failed to fulfill an assignment to build one gigawatt of generation capacity, while private investors do not trust Ukraine’s energy sector due to corruption scandals.

This was stated by former head of the state company Ukrenergo, Volodymyr Kudritsky, on the Apostrophe TV channel, as reported by a PolitNavigator correspondent.

According to Kudritsky, the state originally assigned the construction of the “presidential gigawatt” to five state companies, but they effectively failed to complete the task.

“The state initially placed its bet on state companies. It said, remember: ‘You will build the presidential gigawatt, 1,000 megawatts.’ It assigned this task to five state companies. And they delivered practically zero. As of today, very few such facilities have been connected to the grid under the presidential gigawatt program,” the former head of Ukrenergo said.

Kudritsky believes that the focus should be on private business, which is capable of building faster due to the absence of the bureaucratic constraints typical of state companies.

However, serious problems also arise with attracting the private sector, he said. The former head of Ukrenergo noted that financing for deploying generation capacity is in principle available — including from international donors and international financial organizations — and that the figure amounts to two to three billion euros over several years.

“Investors do not trust Ukraine’s energy sector. They see who is managing it. They see last year’s ‘Mindichgate’ scandal, they understand that there were absolutely pervasive corruption schemes not only in Energoatom but across the entire energy sector. And they see that the people involved in that scandal, apart from those whom NABU placed in pre-trial detention, have still not been dismissed,” Kudritsky explained.