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Dear
Friends!
Today, Russia has
renewed its energy terrorism attacks in Ukraine.
Increasingly, thermal power plants,
hydroelectric power plants (HPPs), and other
energy centers are under attack. These attacks
are made with the intent to sow panic among
Ukrainians and to bring about the collapse of
the country’s energy supply system. A number of
large cities, including Kharkiv, have been left
without power due to this shelling. Kyiv’s Trypilska, the
city’s largest thermal power plant was
destroyed. Ukraine’s response has been to
conduct targeted strikes on Russian oil
refineries. This results not only in disruptions
to energy infrastructure and temporary
blackouts, but also has a serious impact on the
environment, such as petroleum product spills
and atmospheric emissions at thermal power
plants and gas and oil storage facilities.
Restoring energy systems also requires
additional resources.
Dniprovska HPP was
damaged by shelling on 22 March. Its destruction
has the potential to result in a localized
environmental catastrophe, as occurred at
Kakhovka HPP in June 2023. Although the dam was
not breached at this time, the shelling did
cause a fuel leak that
is polluting the Dnipro River
watershed:
Environmental problems
caused by the war are aggravating the
consequences of climate change. The first month
of spring not only broke temperature records,
but was also marked by severe flooding. Although
the situation in Ukraine was not as catastrophic
as in Russia and Kazakhstan, where the Orenburg
and Aktobe regions were inundated, spring floods
are nevertheless significantly changing the
landscape, especially in war-affected areas. In
particular, the basin of the former Kakhovka
reservoir was flooded again. Read about spring
floods around Kakhovka and the war’s other
environmental consequences in our monthly
review:
The war is also changing
supply chains, directly affecting environmental
conservation in different countries. We have written
previously about the
environmental impacts of navigational changes on
the Danube River brought about by Russia’s
full-scale invasion. Over the past year, the
situation has not improved and today the Danube
Biosphere Reserve in the Danube River delta is
also threatened. Dredging and other canal
expansion work not only reduce the success of
biodiversity restoration programs, but also
interfere with the operations of protected
areas.
The war’s effects can be
felt even in the Arctic. Programs studying this
region – an area experiencing catastrophic
damage from climate change – are on the verge of
failure after the start of the full-scale
invasion. Without scientific collaboration, it
is almost impossible to conduct international
research in the Arctic. Meanwhile, the outbreak
of Russia’s full-scale war in Ukraine has
resulted in the growing isolation of Russia’s
scientific community. Both the West and Russia
itself are refusing to engage in cooperation,
increasingly resulting in closing scientific
spaces behind a new “Iron Curtain”. Margaret
Williams, senior fellow at the Arctic Initiative
at the Belfer Center for Science and
International Affairs at the Harvard Kennedy
School of Government, examines ways to avoid the
loss of collaborative research efforts focused
on the Arctic:
The consequences of the
war in Ukraine will affect life and ecology in
the region, perhaps for decades. It is important
not only to collect data today, but also to seek
solutions to these environmental problems. In
2023 and 2024 we collaborated with Reporters Without
Borders and the Svea Green
Foundation on a webinar series
sharing data collection methods and ways of
covering the war’s environmental consequences.
UWEC experts and members of our editorial team
are also regularly invited to present at other
events. You can read a summary of these events,
as well watch them in this special
summary:
You can read all of our
analysis and news of the environmental
consequences of Russia’s invasion of Ukraine on
our website,
on Twitter (X),
and on
Facebook and Telegram.
We wish you strength and
peace!
Alexej
Ovchinnikov
Editor, UWEC Work
Group
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