Could Turkey's floating generators help power Ukraine through the winter?
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Play - 04:47
As Russian forces continue to target Ukraine's energy infrastructure, a company in Turkey claims its power ships can thwart Moscow's efforts to leave Ukrainians without electricity this winter.
Russia's latest onslaught against Ukraine once again targeted civilians, with an apartment block in Dnipro destroyed in a missile strike on 14 January.
But Russian attacks do not only take out homes. The streets of Ukraine are regularly plunged into darkness as missiles relentlessly hit the country's power stations.
"What they are seeing is that they are doing this in order to kill as many Ukrainians as possible – but in a kind of indirect way, by creating the unbearable conditions for life without electricity, heating and water," said Petro Burkovskiy, a senior fellow at the Democratic Initiatives Foundation in Kyiv.
"Right now, we have subzero temperatures and the winter has started. It's a real challenge for the people ... I would say hundreds of thousands of Ukrainians will be in danger."
But the Turkey-based company Karpowerships says it can help alleviate Ukraine's energy crisis.
The company's promotional video boasts it has the world's largest fleet of power ships – floating power plants with massive generators that can operate independently.
Up to 300 megawatts
Karpowership operates worldwide, including in hotspots like Beirut, supplying millions of homes with electricity.
According to Zeynep Harezi Yilmaz, the chief commercial officer of Karpowership: "We have been in contact with Ukrenergo [Ukraine's national power company] since August last year and with the Odesa governorate as well."
The company could potentially place three 100-megawatt ships, Yilmaz said, adding that one such ship could power the port of Odesa and its facilities while the others could supply nearby residential areas.
"The technical side is where to position the power ship and whether there is enough water depth at the port," she explained. "And since we have a substation on board the power ship, it requires only a couple of overhead transmission lines to connect to the nearest substation."
With Ukraine's power stations targeted by Russian forces, Kyiv says generators have become of strategic importance.
"That is why generators and uninterruptible power sources have now become as necessary in Ukraine as armored vehicles and bulletproof vests," declared Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky, remotely addressing an international aid conference in Paris last month.
Safety concerns
Protecting power ships from Russian airstrikes would be a significant challenge. Ankara has maintained good relations with Moscow, but it is unclear whether the goodwill would extend that far.
"Physical security means that we need to be in a zone where our personnel is not threatened and we can continue supply logistics without any interruptions," warned Karpowership's Yilmaz.
"Now we are in communication with Moldova authorities and Romanian authorities to also evaluate the possibility of placing the ships in Romania or Moldova and then transmitting the electricity to Ukraine," she said.
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Karpowerships says that with some of its ships already close by, they could be supplying Ukraine with electricity within 30 days.
But payment could be the biggest obstacle.
"The question is who will pay for these services, whether it's the Ukrainian government or a kind of international agency, so these details are not clear," cautioned Burkovskiy.
But time is not on Kyiv's side, as Russian forces are predicted to step up their assault on Ukraine's infrastructure just as the worst of winter sets in.
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