Volodymyr Demchyshyn: 15% voluntary reduction of electricity consumption to prevent power blackouts

Minister of Energy and Coal Industry of Ukraine Volodymyr Demchyshyn urged the industry to self-limit power consumption by 15% during peak hours. This will help balance the electricity market and avoid outages of electricity for enterprises as well as for the public. The Minister said this during a conference call with representatives of regional administrations and energy enterprises on a decrease of their consumption of electricity during peak periods of the day.

According to him, we currently have an approximately 3 thousand megawatt lack of electric power. This has been caused by different reasons: in particular, this is a lack of coal, and due to the fact that unit №3 at the Zaporizhia NPP, which is almost operational, has not been yet switched on. "Thus, we are facing a problem with insufficient power generation", Volodymyr Demchyshyn noted.

The Minister has stated that the Ministry recommends reducing electricity consumption by 15% during peak hours. If we successfully pass this day in the hours of highest electricity consumption, we will make a decision to cease outages of electricity for consumers: "Please take this seriously. We are waiting restrictions of electricity consumption today from 17:00 to 21:00. We will report tomorrow. If we see that consumption will decrease and won’t exceed the limits of available power output, then tomorrow I promise to appeal to the NPC Ukrenergo to halt power blackouts."