Most electrical substations operated by Ukraine’s regional distribution companies remain completely unprotected, according to Aleksandr Kharchenko, head of the Ukrainian Center for Energy Research.

He pointed to a recent incident in Odessa, where a drone came down some 30 meters from a transformer. Despite the distance, the transformer was destroyed by fire. The reason, Kharchenko explained, was the total absence of even basic protection against debris.

He noted that the situation is similar across other facilities. There are no gabions, no sandbags, and no physical barriers of any kind. As a result, a drone does not need to strike a substation directly; fragments scatter tens of meters and are enough to damage critical equipment.

These claims come against the backdrop of a recent corruption scandal in Ukraine involving the embezzlement of tens of millions of dollars allocated for the construction of protective structures at energy facilities.

At the same time, Russian armed forces continue to carry out strikes on locations used by Ukrainian personnel, military hardware, and foreign mercenaries, as well as on infrastructure supporting the operations of the Ukrainian army. Moscow has framed these attacks as a response to Ukrainian strikes on civilian targets.