Ukraine's Strikes Drive Russian Refinery Runs 30% Below Seasonal Norms as Moscow Turns to Asian Gasoline Imports
Russian July refinery runs hit 3.6 million bpd, 30% below seasonal norms, and seaborne fuel exports collapsed 55% year-on-year as Kyiv intensifies strikes on processing infrastructure.
Ukraine struck an oil refinery and a gas-processing plant in Russia overnight into Tuesday (2026-08-25), deepening a summer campaign that has driven Russian refinery throughput to more than 30% below seasonal levels and compelled Moscow to import gasoline it normally exports.7
Two facilities were targeted. The Afipsky refinery, owned by privately held ForteInvest, has a processing capacity of about 180,000 barrels per day. The Novoshakhtinsk plant, designed for roughly 110,000 barrels a day and owned by Russian engineering holding Peton, was also struck; it had last been hit in late May.7
By July, Russian refinery runs had averaged about 3.6 million barrels per day, more than 30% below seasonal levels, according to EA Analytics estimates cited by Bloomberg. Seaborne petroleum-product exports fell 33% in July from June and were down nearly 55% from a year earlier, as accumulated damage reduced the volumes available to ship.6
Russia has been forced to import gasoline from Asia to prevent domestic shortfalls, Yahoo News reported. Typically a major net exporter of refined products, Moscow has resorted to shipping product from Asian suppliers to cover a gap that Ukrainian strikes have opened in domestic supply.2
Gazprom's Neftekhim Salavat complex in the Urals, with a capacity of about 200,000 barrels per day, was struck on Thursday (2026-08-13), one of the heavier single hits of the campaign. Ukraine also hit two refineries in overnight strikes on July 14 (2026-07-14), causing fires at both. The Moscow oil refinery halted operations after a drone strike on June 16 (2026-06-16).6,4,5
The targeting has grown more precise. Nikhil Dubey, a senior research analyst at Kpler, said some drones appeared to have been aimed at hydrocracker units inside the refineries. Hydrocrackers convert heavy oil fractions into lighter, higher-value fuels; damage to them takes longer to address and has a sharper impact on usable product output than equivalent strikes on crude distillation capacity.2
NORSI, Russia's second-largest gasoline producer at around 320,000 barrels per day of capacity, has also been struck during the campaign. At the complex, CDU-6 — a primary refining unit accounting for 53% of overall capacity and able to handle 25,700 metric tons per day — was among the targets.5
The campaign has reached beyond refineries. The Caspian Pipeline Consortium stopped receiving crude from July 20 (2026-07-20) after attacks on tankers at its Black Sea terminal disrupted loadings. The CPC route serves Caspian producers, so the halt reduced export capacity beyond Russia's own output. Two Russian fuel tankers were struck in Taganrog Bay in the northeastern Sea of Azov as Kyiv extended the effort to tighten fuel distribution within Russia's south.5,3
Russian forces have responded in kind. Moscow launched drone and missile attacks on Ukrainian gas production facilities in the Poltava and Kharkiv regions overnight into Tuesday (2026-05-19), causing what state-owned Naftogaz described as "significant" damage, Montel reported.1
ICE Brent crude front-month stood at $88.29 a barrel as of 2026-08-29, with Urals crude at $76.55, a discount of around $12 to Brent. The spread reflects the sanctions and routing costs that buyers continue to apply to Russian barrels.
Hydrocracker repairs take months. If Kyiv sustains the current strike pace through September, Russia's domestic fuel supply faces the autumn heating season already dependent on Asian imports for volumes its own refineries can no longer produce. Satellite imagery and tanker-flow data at facilities like Salavat and Afipsky offer the clearest early read on whether Moscow's processing capacity begins to recover before winter demand arrives.6,2