UPDATE CRIMEA: Electricity supply has been partially restored in Sevastopol as the city has transferred to the use of its own power supply sources – gas-turbine plants and diesel generators. The schedule of hourly rotating connection of residential areas in each of the four districts of the city to power supply has been introduced, the Russian Emergencies Ministry reported on Sunday.
The electricity supply limit is at the moment 65 MW. The city’s life support systems and socially important facilities have been connected to the backup electric power supply sources.
The state of emergency introduced in Sevastopol will be maintained until the electric power supply to the peninsula is fully restored.
The forces and means of the Russian Emergencies Ministry’s main department for Sevastopol are working in an emergency mode and are ready to promptly respond to every possible incident.
This night Crimea has been cut off from electricity supply from Ukraine. According to reports from Kiev, explosions of towers of the powerlines supplying electric power to the peninsula caused this. Crimean authorities have withheld comment on these reports, but introduced a state of emergency. No panic is not observed in the streets of the cities Simferopol and Sevastopol: their social facilities have been connected to the backup power supply, and the mobile phone communication is working without disruption.
All settlements of Crimea were disconnected from electricity supply at 00:22, am, Moscow time, Sunday. Electric power supply stopped on all four powerlines running from Ukraine. Two of them went out of order on Friday due to damage done to the powerline towers as a result of explosions. “Crimea is completely cut off, I cannot give the details yet,” director of the local power utility company Krymenergo Viktor Plakida. The regional emergencies department also could not clarify the details and causes of the incident. However, journalist Osman Pashayev, a Crimean Tatar activist, reported that unknown perpetrators in the Chaplinka village of Ukraine’s Kherson region blew up the Crimean powerline towers that withstood previous blasts. Similar information has been circulated by the head of the Ukrainian Interior Ministry’s antidrug department, Ilya Kiva.
Crimea will become independent of electricity supply from Ukraine after power supply from Russia’s Krasnodar territory is organised. According to Russian Energy Minister Alexander Novak, the project will be completed before the end of the year. “We are working on schedule, and by the year end we will commission the first stage of the line,” the minister told reporters on November 20. The ‘energy bridge’ to Crimea is built within the framework of the Federal Target Programme for the development of Crimea until 2020. The project that envisages the laying of a cable under the Kerch Strait with the power transfer capacity of some 850 MW, is implemented to ensure independence of the Crimean Federal District from electric power supplies from Ukraine. It is expected that by 2016 the energy bridge from the Krasnodar region will be supplying to Crimea about 800 MW of electricity per day. These volumes will make it possible to lessen the burden during the winter peak load periods, when power consumption increases to 1,000-1,200 MW per day.
According to the April executive order of the Russian government, the first stage of the energy bridge with the capacity of up to 400 MW should be launched before December 25, 2015.
*** Crimea’s own electric power generation covers less than a half of the peninsula’s needs for electricity, Crimean Fuel and Energy Minister Sergei Yegorov said after a meeting of the emergency headquarters on Sunday.
“The morning maximum consumption in the Crimean federal district is about 800 MW at such air temperatures. We have 350 MW of our own electricity generation and are short of another 450 MW. That is why, schedules of temporary electricity disconnections for these 450 MW will be introduced,” he said.
The schedules of electricity blackouts will be brought to the notice of local residents every two hours, he said.
Fuel for electric power generators in Crimea to suffice for at least 30 days
Fuel stocks for backup electric power supply sources in Crimea will suffice for at least 30 days, Crimea’s Frist Vice-Premier and head of the emergency headquarters Mikhail Sheremet said on Sunday.
“We have fuel reserves. No doubt, we understand that we depend on weather and the ferry to some extent. But nonetheless we can work calmly during 30 days,” he said.
Crimea has activated all backup electricity supply sources after Ukraine completely cut off electric power supply to the Black Sea peninsula.
All Crimean cities supplied with electricity
All large cities on the Crimean peninsula are supplied with electric power after electricity supplies from Ukraine were completely cut off, Crimea’s First Vice-Premier Mikhail Sheremet said.
“We actually have all the cities connected [to power supply],” said Sheremet who heads the headquarters for eliminating the consequences of an emergency situation on the Black Sea peninsula.
Powerful electricity supply generators will be sent to the regions experiencing difficulties with electric power supply, he added.
The Crimean first vice-premier earlier said that schedules of disconnecting households from electricity and water supply would be introduced in Crimea due to the shortage of local power generating capacities.
