Ukraine imports record amount of electricity due to new power consumption high

Ukraine requested emergency assistance from Poland and Romania and bought 2,000 MW of electricity from these countries on August 21, which is a record for such assistance in a day, reported the press service of Ukrenergo.

Emergency assistance is the last and most expensive emergency response measure to balance the power system, which does not require disconnecting consumers, the company explains.

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Ukrenergo had to buy such a large volume because of a new summer record of electricity consumption – the evening maximum exceeded the previous record figure recorded on August 16 by 1.3%.

This is very much due to the limited capacity of Ukrainian power plants, which have taken power units out of service to prepare for the coming cold season, Ukrenergo points out.

At the previous peak, Ukraine imported 400 MW every hour (from 7 to 10 PM) to meet consumption.

Today, small amounts of electricity are imported from Slovakia and Moldova in the morning and evening hours with a maximum capacity of up to 356 MW in some hours. There are no exports.

On August 18, 2023, Ukrenergo took extreme measures for the second day in a row to keep the power on.

On August 21, Ukrainians set a new record for electricity consumption over the weekend due to the heat wave.