KYIV (Reuters) -Ukraine’s state energy firm Naftogaz signed a 300 million euro ($352 million) loan deal with the European Investment Bank for gas purchases ahead of the winter heating season, the company said on Wednesday.
Naftogaz has stepped up efforts to secure additional funding to purchase sufficient gas to get Ukraine through winter after Russian strikes on production facilities cut domestic output by 40%.
As part of the agreement, Naftogaz pledged to reinvest an amount equivalent to the EIB loan into renewable energy and decarbonisation projects.
“300 million euro from the EIB is substantial and practical support that will help us guarantee the country’s energy resilience ahead of the winter,” said Naftogaz CEO Sergii Koretskyi.
He said that the company was pumping gas into underground storage for winter as planned, and that its storage targets are now about 95-98% met.
The government has said Ukraine needs at least 13.2 billion cubic metres of gas for the 2025/26 heating season which starts in mid-October.
The loan will allow the purchase of around 0.6 billion cubic metres of gas, Naftogaz said.
Ukraine was forced to start importing gas back in the spring of 2025, due to attacks by hundreds of drones and missiles targeting the country’s production facilities.
Koretskyi says that gas purchased with the loan can be of any origin except Russian.
He said that this year Naftogaz significantly increased imports of U.S. liquefied natural gas (LNG), which accounted for 8% of total imports.
Koretskyi said the company had purchased 0.5 billion cubic metres of U.S. LNG, most of which has already been delivered to the country.
($1 = 0.8516 euros)
(Reporting by Pavel Polityuk, writing by Yuliia Dysa and Pavel PolityukEditing by Tomasz Janowski and Elaine Hardcastle)
