Ukraine’s power grid faces its hardest test since 2022 blackout – Shmyhal
In Ukraine, January 22, 2026 became the most difficult day for the power system since the blackout in November 2022.
According to Ukrinform, this was reported on Telegram by First Deputy Prime Minister and Minister of Energy of Ukraine Denys Shmyhal.
According to him, Ukraine is facing an extremely difficult situation due to a combination of factors caused by constant shelling – namely damage to generation facilities, destroyed distribution networks and transformers, and ongoing enemy attacks across the entire power grid.
Energy workers have been forced to continue emergency power outages. To preserve the integrity of the power system, Ukraine’s transmission system operator Ukrenergo had to introduce special emergency outage schedules.
The Minister of Energy said the most difficult situation is in Kyiv, the Kyiv region, and the Dnipropetrovsk region.
During the daytime, 165 repair crews were working to restore heating to homes in Kyiv, while 83 crews are taking over for the night shift. The work is significantly complicated by security conditions – this evening Kyiv experienced its 2,000th air raid alert since the introduction of martial law.
“We understand that people are having an extremely hard time, with fatigue and stress taking their toll due to constant terrorist attacks. However, cases of physical aggression against repair crews are unacceptable: these people work in the cold around the clock, at the limits of their capabilities. They are real heroes. They are doing everything possible to restore electricity and heat as quickly as possible,” the Deputy Prime Minister emphasized.
He reminded that the enemy is not only shelling Ukraine’s infrastructure but is also trying to stir up Ukrainian society. Many fakes and manipulations are appearing in the information space.
“I urge you to trust only official information,” Shmyhal appealed to citizens.
As reported by Ukrinform, in the Vinnytsia region police are investigating the beating of the head of a district electricity network in Mohyliv-Podilskyi, which occurred on January 22.
Earlier, social media published a video of a protest over power outages in Mohyliv-Podilskyi that ended with the beating of the head of a regional electricity supply company.
Photo: Denys Shmyhal / Telegram