Russia has carried out one of its largest attacks on Ukraine's state-owned energy sector in recent months, striking seven oil and gas production facilities operated by Ukrnafta, part of the Naftogaz Group, in the latest effort to disrupt domestic energy supplies ahead of winter, the company said in a press release emailed to IntelliNews on August 7.

The overnight assault hit production assets in eastern Ukraine, destroying critical equipment and forcing several facilities offline, according to Naftogaz. The company said the damage had resulted in the loss of "significant oil and gas production volumes", although it did not disclose the scale of the disruption.

"Russia is systematically attacking Ukraine's oil and gas production sector in an attempt to inflict maximum damage on our infrastructure ahead of winter. Last night's strike was one of the largest attacks on Ukrnafta's production facilities in recent months. Fortunately, there were no casualties," said Sergii Fedorenko, acting chief executive of Naftogaz.

As IntelliNews reported, Ukraine has run out of air defence ammo and its skies are open to Russia’s ballistic missiles. Fears are widespread that the Kremlin intends to repeat last winter’s attempt to freeze Ukraine into submission when temperatures fall with a massive bombardment of the country. A brutal tit-for-tat missile war is already rapidly escalating.

The latest attack underscores Moscow's renewed campaign of targeting Ukraine's energy infrastructure. Ukraine’s power generation capacity has already fallen from just under 60GW pre-war to around 12GW now, according to comments from Ukraine’s Energy Minister Denys Shmyhal this week.

Naftogaz warned that Russia was now increasingly shifting from electricity generation and transmission facilities towards upstream oil and gas production as it aims to know Ukraine’s energy production capacity completely.

Kyiv has warned that Russia is attempting to reduce domestic gas output ahead of the winter heating season, increasing Ukraine's dependence on costly but limited imports, as Europe is also facing a mounting energy crisis this year, due to the dearth of supplies thanks to the Iran conflict.

Naftogaz said the strikes destroyed equipment essential to extraction operations and forced a number of production sites to suspend operations. The strikes are also in retaliation for Ukraine’s persistent attacks on Russia’s oil refineries that has reduced throughput of refined products by 45%, according to recent estimates.

In a separate wave of attacks over the previous 24 hours, Russia also struck four Ukrnafta petrol stations in the Zaporizhzhia and Dnipropetrovsk regions, the company reported. "Neither customers nor employees were injured," the company said.

The latest strikes continue an escalating campaign against Naftogaz infrastructure. As part of Russia’s “punishment strategy” it has specifically answered the attacks on its refineries, that have sparked a fuel crisis, by systematically destroying Ukrainian petrol stations. According to company figures, Russia has destroyed 32 Ukrnafta filling stations and five production facilities operated by Ukrgasvydobuvannya, Ukraine's largest natural gas producer, during the first seven months of 2026.

As Ukraine’s state-owned gas national champion, Naftogaz has found itself in the Russian crosshairs. The group has reported repeated attacks on gas production assets throughout the summer, including strikes on facilities in the Kharkiv and Poltava regions that temporarily halted production.

The assault also follows a deadly strike earlier this week in which three people were killed at a Ukrnafta filling station in Ukraine's Dnipropetrovsk region.

Ukraine has been scrambling to secure sufficient gas supplies before the start of the heating season after repeated Russian missile and drone attacks significantly reduced domestic production capacity earlier this year. The government has accelerated gas imports from the European Union while Naftogaz has sought additional financing from international partners to purchase fuel for winter storage.

Despite the continuing attacks, Ukrainian officials have repeatedly said emergency repair teams are working to restore damaged facilities wherever security conditions permit, although replacement of specialised production equipment is expected to take considerably longer.

The latest strike highlights the increasingly strategic nature of Russia's campaign against Ukraine's hydrocarbon sector. Rather than targeting only electricity generation, Moscow has intensified attacks on production, processing and fuel distribution infrastructure in an effort to undermine Ukraine's energy security and increase pressure on the government as winter approaches.

Naftogaz logged a total of 229 attacks on its facilities in 2025. But those numbers have been rising this year to 107 large-scale attacks by early May, 170 by mid-June, and overtook last year’s total by July 17 to reach 250.

Winter carry-over. Ukraine came into 2026 already reeling: gas imports surged nearly 800% in 2025 to 6.47bn cubic metres as Russian missile and drone strikes — concentrated in February and October — cut domestic production by 40-60%. By early March, with 229 strikes tallied for 2025, Naftogaz's production base entered the new year already battered.

May. A large-scale Russian ballistic missile assault on May 5 caused what CEO Serhiy Koretskyi called "severe damage" to gas production facilities, forcing another round of import increases to cover the shortfall.

June. A Russian mass missile-and-drone assault on June 3 killed 22 people nationwide; in Kharkiv, one of Naftogaz's key facilities was hit with a "double-tap" strike — a second strike timed to hit emergency crews responding to the first. Production assets in the Poltava and Kharkiv regions were hit again over June 25-27 by at least four ballistic missiles, including cluster-warhead variants, plus attack drones, damaging equipment and hitting a bus carrying employees (reported in the July 19 roundup). By Constitution Day (June 29), Russia's barrage was again hitting production facilities operated by Naftogaz alongside a wider campaign that had destroyed over 150 petrol stations in two months.

July. The pace, if anything, quickened. A Poltava region production asset was hit by drones on July 4, causing a fire and halting output; a Kharkiv facility was struck twice in succession on July 6, causing a fire and injuring an employee; and a large-scale drone attack on July 17 forced another Kharkiv gas production site offline entirely, with staff sheltering through a strike that ran from early morning — Naftogaz's 250th attack of 2026. Naftogaz pushed through a €1.2bn Eurobond restructuring in the same period explicitly to free up cash for "infrastructure restoration" ahead of the next heating season. By month's end, with domestic output still impaired, Kyiv was drafting a controlled gas-export quota mechanism even as Naftogaz continued reporting "repeated attacks on gas assets" forcing higher imports.

August. Heading into the next winter, Kyiv appealed for a further €650mn funding gap to be closed, including €400mn earmarked specifically to help Naftogaz recover from Russian strikes — with Energy Minister Denys Shmyhal warning Putin's aim is to "finish off our energy system" before winter sets in.

Naftogaz used a €1.2bn Eurobond restructuring in July partly to fund rebuilding, and Kyiv is now appealing for €400mn more to help the company recover before winter.