Ukrainian drone strike stunts restart plans at Russia's Ryazan refinery

Ukraine claimed another drone strike on Russia's third-largest oil refinery, Ryazan, as part of a Sept .5 offensive, dealing another blow to the major fuel hub a month after it was last targeted.

A telegram statement from Ukrainian military commander Robert "Madyar" Brovdi said that drones had struck the 342,000-b/d refinery and a Russian oil depot in occupied Luhansk, calling the attacks a major strain on the country's fuel sector.

"Gasoline is becoming a scarce liquid, while gas and oil are rapidly burning out," he said, without disclosing the extent of the damage linked to the attacks.

Russia's Astra news confirmed the attack on the refinery, circulating photos of a fire raging at the site and smoke billowing from the scene. Explosions were first heard at around 2 am local time, other Russian media outlets said.

Ryazan governor Pavel Malkov wrote that drone debris hit an industrial site in the region, without naming the Ryazan refinery. He wrote that the consequences were being dealt with, and urged locals to refrain from sharing details on drone damage.

Russia's defense ministry said nine drones were shot down over Ryazan and reported 80 other drone incidents across the country.

The attack is the second to hit the major Rosneft refinery in recent months, as Ukraine has notched up pressure on Russia's energy facilities and repeatedly dashed repair efforts across major facilities. A previous Aug. 2 attack had damaged two of the refinery's three crude distillation units, putting pressure on its operations and triggering energy security concerns for the nearby Moscow area.

The facility was last reported to have reached 70% of its processing capacity after restarting damaged units and was expected to return to full capacity in September.

Repeated hits to the refinery mark a concerted effort from Ukraine to squeeze Russian fuel supplies. Other high-profile targets, including Lukoil's Volgograd refinery and Rosneft's Syzran, were attacked repeatedly in August, frustrating reconstruction efforts as companies have worked to minimize the operational impact of attacks. Similarly, a key pumping station supporting flows through the Druzhba crude oil pipeline system was struck three times, extending downtime and hiking repair costs.

Over the past month, Ukrainian drones have struck at least 10 Russian refineries, spanning from close to the border in the country's south to Novokuybishev in the country's west.

Persistent attacks saw Russian gasoline prices soar to record highs in late August, and have triggered government intervention, including a gasoline export ban and talk of potential shut-ins for diesel, the country's larger export market.

Refinery outages appeared to put some pressure on Russian gasoil exports around mid-August, when volumes hit a low of around 670,000 b/d, down from a July average of 730,000 b/d, according to S&P Global Commodities at Sea data. Gasoline exports sunk from some 50,000 b/d in July to 34,000 b/d in August, CAS data showed.