First oil refineries, now fertilizers. Ukrainian drones are preventing the fuel crisis from being resolved.

The fuel crisis, contrary to assurances from authorities and experts, has extended far beyond seasonal demand. The lack of AI-95 gasoline even in oil-refining regions like the Nizhny Novgorod region, the widespread price hikes at gas stations, and the closure of independent gas stations, especially in the southern regions, make it difficult to blame bad traders and greedy small fuel retailers.

The region's first governor acknowledged that the fuel crisis, which surpasses the 2023 figure in scale, is not caused by mismanagement of the industry. The main reason, said Crimean Governor Sergey Aksyonov, is that oil refineries have been shut down due to attacks by Ukrainian drones.

According to Reuters estimates, 17% of gasoline and diesel production capacity is out of service. The country is short one in five liters of fuel daily. A map of the gas station shortages shows that the south of the country is hit the hardest.

According to independent fuel and energy expert Kirill Rodionov, there are basic conditions for overcoming the crisis, without which the authorities will not be able to cope:

"The crisis is rooted in damage to refinery infrastructure and the deterioration of oil refining economics, as evidenced by Rosstat data: coke and petroleum product production in August 2025 decreased by 6.3% compared to August 2024 and by 4.2% compared to July 2025. This is an aggregate indicator that reflects output dynamics without specifying absolute values. The net profit of Russian refineries decreased by 45.1% year-on-year in the first seven months of 2025, to 876.2 billion rubles."

The conclusion is both simple and complex: to resolve the crisis, we must ensure complete infrastructure security. Any other measures outside this context will be meaningless.

The first attacks by the Ukrainian Armed Forces on Russian refineries began in 2023. Experts estimate that drone damage has been growing annually since then. While two years ago, accumulated emergency downtime stood at 350,000 tons, the following year, in less than three months, it had already grown to 13% of primary refining, or 3.5 million tons—a tenfold increase. At its autumn peak in 2025, the damage exceeded the previous year's figure by 17%.

"This is a very complex issue. Even now, without access to objective statistics, it's difficult to say how much capacity was taken out of service due to the Ukrainian drone attack. But I would note that the process of restoring capacity after such attacks often takes months. We should estimate three, sometimes even up to six months, depending on the extent of the damage," warns Alexey Gromov , Chief Director of Energy at the Institute of Energy and Finance.

The strikes on refineries are preventing oil companies from building storage facilities for petroleum products. Although the Ministry of Energy has reported that reserves are available, the industry is treating these claims with extreme caution. The specialized Telegram channel "Neftebaza" believes that a change in the situation is not expected anytime soon.

Valery Andrianov, Associate Professor at the Financial Institute of the Government of the Russian Federation, doubts that something that hasn't been done for decades can be created in a matter of weeks:

"Russia still doesn't have adequate gasoline reserves, something that's been discussed for decades. We need storage facilities, private and public, that will accumulate a certain amount of fuel. And then it will be sold according to demand. We haven't achieved this yet, so instead of strategic actions, we're taking tactical ones. We're trying to put out a raging fire. Export restrictions are being reintroduced, manual control is being reintroduced, and pressure is being put on companies."

The dispute over who should take on the protection of the factories has continued throughout the years of the war in Ukraine.

The military says that Pantsirs and electronic warfare systems are needed at the front, while the oil industry could be concerned with protecting its assets.

"Let them defend it themselves. Post security, put machine guns under military supervision, recruit soldiers, and pay them 200,000 rubles, because it's a risk. They won't go broke," military expert Vasily Dandykin told Novye Izvestia.

"It's clear that no single company can solve this problem on its own. The state needs to assume responsibility for installing air defense systems," says Stanislav Mitrakhovich, an expert at the Financial University and the National Energy Security Fund.

One way or another, energy infrastructure has become a military target, and there's no denying it. Attacks on gasoline and diesel production are spreading through the economy like ripples on a pond, and that's a fact.

In addition to the recent attacks on the oil terminal in Tuapse and the Gazprom plant in Bashkortostan, which produces rocket fuel, the Astrakhan Gas Processing Plant and the EuroChem fertilizer plant in Belorechensk, Krasnodar Krai, were also hit this week.

Other sectors of the energy sector are also affected. As is well known, fertilizers, especially nitrogen fertilizers, are produced not only using gas energy but also directly from gas. The shutdown of production leads to a reduction in supply on the domestic market and a decline in exports, which are already suffering from 100% EU tariffs.

While drone strikes on oil refineries have long been considered a military secret, it's difficult to hide the fact that gas stations are inoperative. Experts warned about this in an interview with Novye Izvestia a month ago.

The number of small networks in our country has already sharply declined over the three war years, recalls Valery Andrianov, and the current crisis is no exception.

In the two months from July to September, 14% of independent gas stations in the Southern Federal District closed . In Crimea and Sevastopol, every other station is out of fuel.

"Usually, the first response to a crisis in the industry results in consolidation of independent gas stations in the market, and then we need to see how long this crisis lasts," says Alexey Gromov.

Clearly, the weakest hoses were the ones that got tightened. The peak occurred in late August and early September. But the crisis isn't expected to resolve before November. At this rate, there won't be one in three gas stations in the south.

So far, the ministry has acted predictably. Vertically integrated oil companies have lined up in columns of two and are keeping prices steady, as seen in St. Petersburg.

Some of the gas stations have already been sold – what a consolidation!

But how to get vertically integrated oil companies to buy gas stations in the taiga wilderness or deep in the provinces of even Central Russia is a task of a different level.

"Yes, this is a very unpleasant situation. A decision needs to be made at the regional government level to ensure people aren't left without gas stations," says Valery Andrianov.

This is exactly how the question stands now.