Ukrainian drones frequently strike the facilities again
shortly after repairs are completed, while the costs of continually restoring
them have been privately described within the company as prohibitive.
The shortage of spare parts is also complicating repairs.
The most difficult units to restore are complex secondary processing facilities
whose parts were previously purchased from Western suppliers. Because of
sanctions, Rosneft now relies on Russian-made copies and Chinese imports, which
can take months to arrive and are not always compatible with existing
equipment.
Attempts to protect the refineries from drone swarms with
shipping containers, nets and steel cables have failed, according to Bloomberg.
Rosneft owns 12 refineries, accounting for about one-third
of Russia’s refining capacity. Some have been out of service for extended
periods. The Tuapse refinery has been offline since April. The Ryazan refinery,
one of the largest facilities supplying fuel to Moscow and the surrounding
region, was not operating for more than half the time after it was first
attacked in May.
The Syzran refinery has mostly either been idle or operating
at less than one-third of capacity over the past six months.
The attacks are already affecting the company’s finances.
Rosneft’s net profit fell by nearly one-fifth to RUB200 billion ($2.5 billion)
in the first half of the year, while its debt burden rose to its highest level
in more than five years.
Company executives fear that several more months of attacks
could cause long-term damage to the business, according to sources cited by
Bloomberg.
Ukrainian drones have attacked Russian refineries at least
114 times since the start of the year, according to a Bloomberg tally, twice as
many as during the same period last year. In September, the International
Energy Agency lowered its forecast for Russia’s oil processing over the next 18
months to about 4 million barrels per day, nearly 30% below pre-2022 levels.