Ukraine’s Regulated Gas Tariff Hid More Than €2 Billion in Subsidies in 2024

Ukraine’s regulated household gas tariff cost the state more than two billion euros in concealed subsidies in 2024, according to a report by Berlin Economics commissioned by Greenpeace Ukraine. Domestic consumers paid approximately 7.96 hryvnias — around 0.16 euros — per cubic meter, well below wholesale market rates, while total household consumption exceeded ten billion cubic meters in 2024.

Greenpeace argues that keeping the regulated tariff in place does more than drain public finances. Artificially cheap gas weakens the economic case for building insulation and installing heat pumps — precisely the technologies that would reduce Ukraine’s energy vulnerability. Russia’s sustained strikes on centralized energy infrastructure have made that vulnerability impossible to ignore.

Mariné Abramyan, Greenpeace Ukraine’s green energy campaigns coordinator, framed the stakes plainly: “Decentralized renewable energy keeps homes warm and lit — and is far harder to destroy.”

The organization is pressing Ukraine’s government to redirect support gradually: phase out blanket gas subsidies in favor of targeted assistance for vulnerable households, expand grants through the Energy Efficiency Fund, broaden access to affordable credit, and remove administrative barriers tied to distribution operators and tariff-setting. International partners and the European Union are urged to give sustainable heating projects priority status in reconstruction planning.

A retrofitted apartment building in Trostyanets offers a working template: heat pumps and a rooftop solar array now serve sixty flats. The upgrade is projected to cut final energy consumption by 36 percent and eliminate gas from the building’s heating system entirely.

Source: Greenpeace Україна