Why Russia continues to bombard an oil refinery of Ukraine that is already destroyed

Black smoke columns rise over the city center of Kremento. — Photo foot, A long column of smoke was seen Kremenchuk after attacks on August 19.

- Author, Diana Kuryshko
- Author's title, BBC Ukraine
14 minutes

In his most recent offensive on Ukraine, the Russian army attacked the city of Kremenchuk, located in the center of the country, in one of the most intense bombings recorded this month.

The attack comes just a few days after the summit on Ukraine between US President Donald Trump and European leaders.

The governor of the Poltava region, where Kremento is located, said there were no victims, but that almost 1,500 homes were left without electricity.

Kremenchuk is an important industrial and logistics center in the center of Ukraine. It is located on the eastern shore of the Dnieper River and has long been a vital transport and manufacturing center.

There is the headquarters of Kredmash, an important machinery plant, and other industrial facilities that support the infrastructure and defense of Ukraine.

It is also an important railway knot that connects the east and west of the country.

Smoke coming out of an industrial fireplace. — Photo foot, Kremenchuk's oil refinery was one of the greatest of the former USSR.

A strategic point

It is also the headquarters of the largest oil refinery in Ukraine, the Kremenchuk oil refinery, which only continued to process products derived from oil at the beginning of the Russian invasion in 2023.

“At the beginning, the Russians did not attacked the Kremenchuk refinery. They thought they would control it, which was its oil refinery,” explains Mykhailo Honchacha, president of the Strategy XXI Global Studies Center, to BBC News Ukraine.

“But when the 'Kyiv in three days' campaign failed, they began to attack the refinery, because it is a source of oil products.”

The first missile attacks against the Kremenchuk refinery occurred twice in April 2022, and in May there was a new attack against the refinery.

In June 2022, a Russian missile hit a busy shopping center in Kremenchuk; According to Ukrainian authorities, more than 20 people died.

Russia has repeatedly assured that it does not attack civil infrastructure, claiming that it attacked nearby stores in which military supplies in the United States and European countries were supposedly kept.

Missile attacks against the refinery continued in 2023 and 2024.

On June 15, 2025, the Russian forces carried out one of the greatest attacks against the Kremenchuk refinery, according to the Russian Defense Ministry, which indicated that the refinery supplies fuel to the Ukrainian forces in the Donbás region and that the attack had been a success.

However, in August the attacks with missiles and drones against the plant resumed.

Smoke and fire rise from a shopping center reached by a Russian missile. — Photo foot, Russia's attacks, like this June 2022, have hit Kremento strongly.

“The plant was no longer operational. They simply want to sweep what was there and make the restoration of the plant impossible or very expensive. They are ending it,” he explains to the BBC Serhiy Kuyun, director of the A-95 Consulting Group and analyst on energy issues.

According to the expert, these attacks should probably be considered as a revenge for attacks against Russian oil infrastructure and as a psychological blow, since the plant has not worked for a long time.

According to Kuyun's calculations, the refinery has probably been attacked by dozens of missiles and hundreds of drones since the beginning of the invasion.

Buildings on fire after an attack — Photo foot, Russia's attacks have been constant during the war.

Will you create a fuel crisis?

The current state of the plant does not affect the distribution of fuels in Ukraine, since these have been imported from Europe in tank trucks.

The Kremenchuk refinery was large, with a processing capacity of 19 million tons of oil per year, although experts claim that before the war began only processed approximately three million (almost 50% of the country's gasoline needs, according to Kuyun).

At the beginning of the war, Ukraine suffered interruptions in the fuel supply for some time, but these were quickly resolved.

“The fuel supply was then transferred to trucks and trains. It was brought from Europe in tank trucks. It is practically impossible to destroy thousands of tank trucks that go to Ukraine,” says Mykhailo Hoganchar.

Once maritime routes were unlocked, gasoline also began to be imported by sea.