Analysts outline three scenarios as drone strikes crush Russian oil output
Fire is raging at Moscow oil refinery after Ukrainian drone strike (Photo: Reuters)
Ukrainian drone strikes became another act in a months-long campaign of attacks on gasoline and diesel producers in Russia, which has brought the gas station country to a genuine crisis in recent weeks.
Deep Strike units of Special Operations Forces struck two oil refineries in Nizhnekamsk in Tatarstan and a refinery in Saratov overnight on July 8.
A few days before the strike, The New York Times spoke with residents of Irkutsk in Russia, located almost 5,000 km from the Ukrainian border. One of them, 26-year-old Alyona Sadovnikova, said she got in line for gas at 11 p.m. and only filled up the next day at 5 p.m. That is, for eighteen consecutive hours, the woman, along with her husband and an 18-month-old baby, waited for the opportunity to pour gas into their car.
Sadovnikova first faced fuel shortages in mid-June, when it was issued only by coupons at the gas station. "I was horrified: are we really back in the Soviet Union, where you need coupons for sausage?" The New York Times quoted her as saying.
By the summer of 2026, these queues had become commonplace in Russia: from the Far East to Moscow. At the same time, the aggressor country has no major refinery left that Defense Forces drones could not reach: "good" UAVs even visited the plant in Omsk, 2,500 km from the Ukrainian border.
In the first half of the year, experts estimate that drones struck Russian refineries at least 194 times (11 times more often than last year) and disabled between 20-25%, according to the most conservative experts, to the 42.7% of Russia's oil refining capacity claimed by Armed Forces of Ukraine. As a result, fuel sales are already being rationed in most regions of the gas station country.
However, as experts explained, the 42.7% claimed by Armed Forces of Ukraine is the share of capacity of the struck plants, not the drop in output; the real reduction in refining is about 25%.
Armed Forces of Ukraine estimate the aggregate losses of Russia's oil refining industry over the past year — from the summer of 2025 to the summer of 2026 — at $13.5 billion. For example, insurance broker Mains estimated losses at over 1 trillion rubles ($13.12 billion) just last year.
About a third of Russian oil refining capacity has been disabled, Chris Weafer, CEO of international consulting firm Macro-Advisory, who worked in Russia for many years, said in an interview.
Alexander Kolyandr, a senior fellow at the U.S. Center for European Policy Analysis (CEPA), quoted by exiled Russian publication Meduza, called the fuel crisis in Russia a strategic achievement for Ukraine, not a side effect of the war.
The drone race against repair crews
Even last year, air strikes on refineries in Russia were isolated: one drone per plant, damage was repaired in weeks, and the market remained calm. Everything changed in the summer of 2025 when Ukraine shifted to attacks using massive UAV swarms and repeat strikes that disrupt repairs.
According to Bloomberg calculations, Ukraine carried out 120 attacks on Russian energy facilities last year, 81 of which were specifically on refineries. By October, according to the BBC, 21 of the 38 large Russian processing plants had been hit. And in the first half of 2026, according to an analysis by the Financial Times jointly with Rochan Consulting, the number of strikes on Russian oil refining reached at least 194, with a record 16 successful attacks in May alone.
The culmination was Omsk — on July 6, FP-1 drones struck the local refinery. This enterprise, as Armed Forces of Ukraine explained, was the last of the 11 largest gasoline producers in Russia to be hit by Ukrainian forces.
Omsk plant accounts for the production of approximately 11-12% of all Russian gasoline (every eighth liter).
The list of targeted plants looks like a complete map of Russian oil refining.
"The size, coordination, and repeated waves of drones make Russia unable to repair plants before the next attack," independent analyst Boris Aronshtein noted.
Modern plants in Russia were built on Western technologies and catalysts (UOP/Honeywell, Axens, Shell, Haldor Topsoe), and after 2022, sanctions made rapid repairs of complex units impossible: cracking, reforming, hydrocracking, and isomerization.
"The resilience of the Russian oil industry is stretched to a dangerous limit," Sergey Vakulenko from Russian Carnegie noted. He is one of the most cautious analysts in his estimates; after strikes on the Moscow refinery in Kapotnya and Tatarstan's TANECO, he said, the capacity loss "could be 28% compared to previous years."
In June, Russia refined about 3.95 million barrels of oil per day, a quarter less than a year earlier — and this became the lowest level in over two decades, as expert Gary Peach from Energy Intelligence calculated. Gasoline production fell by 17% (from 1.03 million to 850,000 barrels per day), which is significantly less than the domestic market's needs.
Russia is plugging the hole by all means. Its government has introduced a complete ban on gasoline exports for producers, plans to ban foreign sales of diesel, and for the first time in years has cut aviation fuel exports to zero.
Fuel began to be imported into Russia. According to specialized publications, Belarus supplied a record 141,000 tons in the first 25 days of June (141 times more than a year earlier); Kazakhstan can transfer 50,000 tons at once; batches of 60,000-80,000 tons are coming by sea from India, and plans reach 400,000 tons per month.
Also, the Russian government legally permitted plants to sell Euro-3 class gasoline under the Euro-5 label, which can contain 15 times more sulfur than the norm.
Ukrainian military analyst Kostyantyn Mashovets, in a Facebook post, estimated the monthly gasoline deficit in Russia at 700,000 to 1.2 million tons even after imports.
Independent experts, taking into account Russia's reserve capacities, give more modest figures: about 300,000 to 700,000 tons per month, and an import need of 300,000 to 400,000 tons.
Diesel is a separate story. On paper, Russia has twice as much as its domestic market needs. But the main production is now concentrated in the Urals, Siberia, and the Far East, while the main consumers are in the west and south. The Russian publication IStories explained that the railway is supposed to transport the fuel, but it is loaded with military trains: Russian Railways (RZD) transfers about 87% of non-core cargo, transport volumes have dropped to a 16-year low, and even functioning railcars are in short supply. Therefore, the formal diesel surplus turns into a real deficit in the European part of Russia — somewhere around 300,000 to 600,000 tons per month. "By the time the train is formed and put on the RZD schedule, by the time you drive to Nizhny Novgorod, they've already hit Volgograd," is how IStories experts explain the mechanism of the "paper surplus."
The harvest is already falling behind schedule: as of early July, only about 3% of the area had been threshed in Russia (about a third of last year's figure), Neo consulting company calculated.
Fuel deliveries, which usually take one to three days, have stretched to five to ten, and diesel in agricultural regions has become 40-90% more expensive than in the spring. The crisis, as Chris Weafer emphasized, comes "at a very critical moment when the agricultural season, especially the harvest, is just gaining momentum."
Meanwhile, the authorities simulate control. Speaking at his party's congress on June 28, Russian dictator Vladimir Putin, as noted by ISW, "tried to create the appearance of stability"; he himself admitted a "certain deficit" but called the attacks "not critical." Deputy Prime Minister Alexander Novak described the situation as "not easy, but manageable," and Finance Minister Anton Siluanov entirely denied the jump in gasoline prices.
A sense of incomprehension
In early July, residents of occupied Crimea began salting meat in barrels: refrigerators do not work due to constant power outages. Gasoline rarely appears for civilians on the peninsula: sometimes by special codes, and more often fuel goes only to utility services, the military, and representatives of the occupation authorities. This is how the Crimean Tatar independent publication CEMAAT Media describes life on the peninsula. Fuel is "thrown" into free sale in one city per day: on Monday it's Feodosia, on Tuesday it's Dzhankoi. And at 220 rubles per liter against the official 70 rubles, and no more than 20 liters per person.
On July 7, Ukrainian drones knocked out thermal power plants around Simferopol, and the peninsula plunged into a blackout: according to CEMAAT Media, milk soured in shops, traffic lights were turned off in cities, the price of chicken soared from 260 to 380 rubles per kilogram in a few days, and farmers began slaughtering livestock en masse.
However, Russians are also feeling the crisis. In Irkutsk, according to local media reports, queues at gas stations are such that regional authorities promised to install portable toilets for those standing along the road; in Zabaikalye, due to a fuel shortage, garbage collection was suspended and bus routes were reduced.
According to the estimate of opposition Russian economist Vladislav Inozemtsev, more than 300 independent gas stations have closed in Russia since May.
Problems were felt even in the Russian capital.
"I am deeply frightened by the uncertainty and the lack of understanding of where everything is heading," a woman named Irina told the Al Jazeera TV channel while waiting for gas in Moscow.
Another Muscovite, Igor, said: "I think everything could get out of control if the crisis stops large production facilities."
According to a poll by the Gallup social group, at the end of June, 60% of Russians believed that economic conditions were worsening — a maximum for two decades of observations.
Three scenarios for the future
Strikes on refineries produce a powerful psychological and domestic political effect, but by themselves, they do not break the Russian economy.
"Russia earns not on petroleum products in the domestic market, but mainly on the export of crude oil," energy expert Volodymyr Omelchenko from the Razumkov Center explains.
A real breakdown, he emphasized, will begin when the strikes shift to export infrastructure — ports and oil pipelines, simultaneously with internal logistics.
Omelchenko advises "destroying" Russia's export potential "by November-December," hitting four vulnerable points: Crimea, Moscow, refineries, and the petroleum product export system.
According to experts interviewed by NV, three scenarios for the development of events are possible next. The first is a managed crisis, which Russia has now: chronic regional deficits, queues, rising prices and limits, but without an economic collapse, while the army, which consumes mostly diesel, hardly suffers. The second is a deepening of problems: Ukrainian strikes partially shift to export ports and railway junctions, the diesel deficit hits farmers at the height of the harvest, export revenues fall, and food inflation accelerates. The third, the hardest scenario for the Kremlin, is a systemic breakdown: fuel rationing with coupons, a black market, regional supply crises, and direct pressure on military logistics and the sowing campaign simultaneously.
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