By Ukraine Rebuild News Staff
The Ukrainian government has allocated 350 million hryvnii ($9.6 million) from the State Budget Reserve Fund to help energy companies in the country pay interest on loans taken out to repair or rebuild energy infrastructure damaged in fighting.
“State financial support will be provided to business entities, regardless of ownership, that produce electricity at thermal power plants and/or combined heat and power plants by reducing the cost of loans,” the government said in a press release on Aug 21. It didn't say whether the aid was in the form of grants or loans.
Ukrainian Prime Minister Denys Smyhal said on his Telegram channel that the money is meant specifically to prepare the country’s energy infrastructure for heating demands in the upcoming autumn and winter. He didn’t name the companies to receive funding nor did he say where the loans came from.
The World Bank, which estimates more than half of Ukraine’s energy infrastructure was damaged in fighting last winter, said in its latest Ukraine Rapid Damage and Needs Assessment that artillery barrages, cyerbattacks and other hostilities had inflicted more than $10 billion in damage to Ukraine’s infrastructure by February of this year.
In April, the World Bank announced $200 million in grant financing to help state-owned energy firm Ukrenergo pay for emergency repair equipment. An Aug 4 update said about $50 million of the financing was expected to be disbursed by the current quarter and the full amount by Q2 of 2025.
The World Bank said an additional $300 million will come from unnamed bank “partners” in the form of grants and other contributions to pay for emergency repairs to the heating infrastructure under the Restoration Project of Winterization and Energy Resources.
