Fuel Overview

Before the full-scale Russian invasion in Ukraine in February 2022, most of Ukrainian fuel of all types came from Belarus and Russia. The highest dependence was in diesel fuel and LPG. After the beginning of the full-scale war, there was no fuel export from Russia and Belarus. Ukraine, as well as the European Union, have switched the origins of fuel from Russia and Belarus towards the EU (Romania, Slovakia, Poland, Bulgaria, and Greece in particular), USA, and Gulf Countries (Kuwait and Saudi Arabia). Only 2 out of the 10-11 million tonnes of oil products consumed were sourced from a few domestic refineries before the invasion (mostly Kremenchuk and Lysychansk plants), which processed domestically extracted oil from the western and north-eastern regions of the country.

During the war the fuel production and storage infrastructure has been the primary target of attacks and sustained very serious damage. This caused the fuel crunch in April-July 2022. Fuel rations for all users were established, taxes on fuel were lifted and the informal fuel market sprung up to circumvent the rations as well. By the time new fuel supply chains from partner nations with minimal storage use and different modes of transportation were established from the ground up, the shortage dissipated, the rations and tax exemptions were lifted (the latter - in July 2023).

Since then, despite the October 2022 - February 2023 rolling and emergency blackouts, no fuel shortages have occurred. Fuel nowadays is used both in transportation and emergency/independent power supply through generators, both by civilians and the military.

At the moment, till the end of martial law, the Ukrainian airspace is closed, hence no civilian jet fuel market exists as such. Beforehand, Turkey and Azerbaijan have been the primary suppliers of TC-1 and Jet A1 fuels. As well, local Ukrtatnafta company claims to have domestic production of the latter kind. Bulgaria and Romania  are proximate contenders for jet fuel exports as well.

Fuel Production

There were 7 large and 20-25 small refinery plants in Ukraine that could produce fuel before the war. Some of them are still operating during the war, but their output is not revealed.

Refinery plant name	Processing capacity, Mt	Region	Status
Full-scale oil refineries
Kremenchuk Oil Refinery	18.6	Poltava	Destroyed
Lysychansk Oil Refinery	16	Luhansk	Partially Destroyed, Occupied
Kherson Oil Refinery	7.1	Kherson	Not operating
Odesa Oil Refinery	2.8	Odesa	Not operating
PAT “Naftokhimik Prykarpattia”	2.6	Ivano-Frankivsk	Not operating
OPK “Halychyna”	2.3	Lviv	Not operating
Shebelynka Gas Processing Plant	NA	Kharkiv	Destroyed
Mini-oil-refineries
“Alternative Energy Sources Company” LLC	NA	Kharkiv	Destroyed
“Firma Garant” LLC	NA	Poltava	Not operating
“Standard Oil-2000” LLC	NA	Poltava	Operating
“Pasipol” LLC	NA	Poltava	Operating
“TD Eco-Oil” LLC	NA	Poltava	Not operating
PrC “MTN-Poltava”	NA	Poltava	Not operating
“Poltavavtorma” LLC	NA	Poltava	Operating
“NVP Istok” LLC	NA	Poltava	Operating
	NA	Kharkiv	Operating
[Reshetylivka Mini-Oil-Refinery]	NA	Poltava	Not Operating
“Agroholding-C” LLC	NA	Kharkiv	Operating
“Khim-Consulting Trade” LLC	NA	Kharkiv	Operating
“Petrochemical Company “Matarpak-Ukraine” LLC	NA	Kharkiv	Operating
“Transcompect-V” LLC	NA	Dnipro	Operating
“Dnepro-Black-Oil” LLC	NA	Dnipro	Operating
“Ferst Group LLC”	NA	Dnipro	Not operating
“Kryvbasnaftoproduct” LLC	NA	Dnipro	Not operating
“Aleksprom” LLC	NA	Dnipro	Operating
PrC “Metal Union”	NA	Kropyvnytskyi	Not operating
“Spetz-Energomash” LLC	NA	Kropyvnytskyi	Criminally charged
“Kirovohradksa Oil Company” LLC	NA	Kropyvnytskyi	Operating
“Agrovelii” Production Company” LLC	NA	Sumy	Not operating
“Raffineria” LLC	NA	Cherkasy	Not operating
“Niom” LLC	NA	Chernihiv	Operating

 

The Kremenchuk, Lysychansk and Shebelynka plants were capable of producing Euro-4 or Euro-5 grade fuel. The rest of the plants required deconservation and modernization from Euro-2 or Euro-3 standards. Only two plants (OPK “Halychyna” and PAT “Naftokhimik Prykarpattia”) are in relative safety from Russian cruise missile attacks and proximity to the EU nations’ borders.

The fuel industry of Ukraine (for illustrative purposes; coal visuals not useful and production figures are outdated)

The mini-oil-refineries are predominantly located closest to the Kremenchuk oil refinery, Prydniprovia industrial region and Kharkiv as its dedicated industrial center. They usually produce a few tonnes of fuel per day. Mini-refineries’ legality and product quality are claimed to be questionable.

Fuel Transportation

All large fuel refineries are connected through the oil pipelines (most notably - “Druzhba” and Odesa-Brody). Outside connection therethrough is available towards Hungary (Belarus and Russia are omitted). According to the International Energy Charter: “The total capacity of the oil transmission system at the "entry" points was 114 mln tons/year at the "exit" points - 56.3 mln tons/year in 2021.” The pipelines were left unscathed and even subject to sanction circumvention against Russia by Hungary. As of September 2023 the oil transit from Russia through the Druzhba pipeline still takes place.  Sea access to the pipelines is available from Odesa, but for now it’s endangered by the Russian seaport blockade.

Road and rail transport have become prevalent deliverers of fuel in Ukraine since the Summer-22 fuel shortages. Those connect up smaller and more distant fuel storage facilities and mini-refineries to the fuel supply network as well.

The State Transportation Safety Service of Ukraine regulates the fuel delivery market through licensing the carriers based on compliance with technical safety requirements. It also hosts a registry of licence owners (though the full extent of data is available only pre-war; actual data is only on rail transport).

Fuel Storage

International Energy Charter: “The total capacity of the tank park was 1,083 thousand

cubic meters.” That was even enough for the Ukrainian government to suggest providing storage services to the world in times of overproduction early during the pandemic. Over the course of the conflict much of the storage capacity has been destroyed, some new facilities may have been built. Information on intact sites is confidential for operational security purposes.

Natural gas storage can be purchased from UkrTransGas company.

Partner Trans

Director: Oleksandr Mykhailovych Bilyk — +38 (050) 308-25-33

There are oil product storage tanks on the territory of the base. The necessary stock of oil products for the needs of enterprises has been created. It is possible to store petroleum products in the volume of up to 600 tons over the agreed period. Only high-quality heaters with temperature sensors are used to heat dark oil products. They form a shipment schedule in the required quantities.

Contacts: +38 (050) 308-25-33, +38 (097) 999-20-33

bazis.bitum@gmail.com

Location — Poltava region

Storage Volume — 600 tons.

Garant Oil Group

Director: Holubok Svitlana Valentynivna

Contacts: 0442778557

Location: Poltava region

Storage Volume — not specified

UKRPETROLCENTR LLC

Director: Bogoslavets Oleksiy Volodymyrovych

Contacts: +380944401884

Location: Ukraine, Kyiv city

Storage Volume — not specified

Petroline

The Petroline company offers single-walled and double-walled tanks for storing petroleum products.

Director: Yury Sulym

Contacts: 067 407-75-75

Location: Office and warehouse in Kyiv, ave. Povitroflotskyi, 92-B

Production and warehouse in the city of Zhovkva, Lviv region, str. Lesya Ukrainka, 77

Storage Volume — in tsd litres: 3 / 5 / 6 / 10 / 15 / 20 / 25 / 30 / 35 / 40 / 50 / 60 / 75

Ukravtonomgas

Director: Dorofeev Andriy Serhiyovych

Contacts: +38 (067) 433 88 70; info@ukravtonomgaz.ua

Location: Kyiv City

Storage Volume: 120 tsd. tons.

GT Group

Liquified Petroleum Gas storage, sales and logistics

Contacts: +38 (096) 023-19-65; 20office@gaztron.com

Location: Western and Central Regions of Ukraine

Storage volume: 63,310 m³

Fuel Distribution

There are 37 mainstream fuel distributors and innumerous smaller sellers. Fuel distribution in Ukraine is done through vehicular delivery from storage facilities to the fuel pump discharging it directly into the vehicles. However, during the fuel shortage or great distance from the pump canister carrying and open-air fill-ups were common. Also, during the fuel shortage, 5-100L rations were applied to all civilian traffic to a varying extent at the pumps; law enforcement, military, and critical infrastructure vehicles were exempt from such limitations.

Below is the list of fuel station networks provided by the “A-95” Consulting Group with the first being the most spread-out ones:

• ОККО
• WOG
• Ukrnafta
• BRSM-Nafta
• Shell
• AMIC
• KLO
• SOCAR
• Avang 7
• Avias
• BVS
• Chipo
• Green Wave
• Luxwen
• Mango
• Marshal
• Motto
• Neftek
• Ovis
• Prime
• RLS
• Rodnik
• Route 20
• U.GO
• UPG
• VST
• VostokGaz
• ZOG
• Avtotrans
• Katral
• Kvorum
• Market
• Olas
• Paralel
• Rur group
• Ukr-Pertol
• Farktor