Ukraine is using precise drone attacks on Russian oil refineries to damage Russia’s energy system, weaken its economy, and limit its ability to fight. The Ryazan refinery strike on 20 November 2025 shows how hitting key fuel sites far from the front can ripple through Russia’s economy, daily life, and the global energy market. The campaign suggests that in modern war, energy and industry are now central targets, not just troops and weapons.
Strikes Deep Inside Russia
On 20 November 2025, Ukrainian forces hit the Ryazan oil refinery, about 180 kilometers southeast of Moscow. Ryazan is Russia’s fourth-largest refinery and can handle around 260,000 barrels of crude oil a day, which is about 5 percent of the country’s total refining capacity. The plant also produces roughly 1 million tons of jet fuel a year, including TS-1 fuel used by Russia’s air forces, so damage here affects both civilian and military aviation.
Earlier strikes in October and November had already hurt the plant, and the latest attack left it mostly idle, pushing Moscow to quickly ban gasoline exports and exposing a serious domestic fuel problem. The refinery’s main crude distillation unit, which provides nearly half of its total output, was hit multiple times during 2025.
Because repairs from earlier attacks were not finished, the new strikes kept production stalled. Ukrainian drones reached Ryazan despite Russian air defenses, showing that facilities deep in Russian territory are not safe. By proving that distant industrial sites can be repeatedly hit, Ukraine highlights how vulnerable Russia’s energy network is and how single points of failure can produce big strategic and economic effects.
Economic Warfare Through Energy
Since August 2025, Ukraine has carried out a series of coordinated attacks that disabled a large amount of Russia’s refining capacity. Overall refining output fell because Russia brought reserve capacity online and shifted production to other refineries in regions such as Saratov, Volgograd, Samara, and Novorossiysk. Still, every damaged refinery forces Russia to spend more on repairs, change production plans, and rely on less efficient processes. This shows that modern conflict can use economic pressure alongside fighting at the front, turning fuel and industry into tools of war.
The strikes have driven up fuel prices inside Russia, and over 20 regions from Sakhalin in the Far East to Nizhny Novgorod have faced fuel shortages. Gasoline and diesel output has dropped, and supplies of aviation fuel for both domestic flights and military operations have tightened.
People in many areas now deal with long lines at fuel stations and rationing, especially in remote regions. As fuel becomes scarcer and more expensive, transport and industrial costs rise, food and other goods become pricier, and the national currency weakens as energy revenues fall, putting more pressure on households and complicating the central bank’s efforts to keep the economy stable.
Russia’s Strained Industrial Response
To protect key facilities, Russian refineries are adding anti-drone defenses, such as netting and covers over important units. Some plants like the Volgograd refinery have managed partial recovery after repeated hits, but repair work is slowed by Western sanctions that limit access to equipment and technology.
The Lukoil Nizhegorodnefteorgsintez refinery, which supplies about 30 percent of the Moscow region’s gasoline, has suffered extended shutdowns following strikes in November. To make up for lost output, Russia is converting naphtha into Euro-3 gasoline, which may cover around 60 percent of demand, but this method is more expensive, less efficient, and puts extra stress on secondary processing units, highlighting the sector’s structural weaknesses.
These industrial strains also affect workers and local communities. Refinery employees face layoffs, frozen wages, and ongoing psychological stress from the constant threat of drone attacks. At the Sterlitamak plant in Bashkortostan, part of the water purification system failed on 4 November 2025 after an incident, forcing repair crews to work under risky conditions. Many of these plants sit in single-industry towns, so families there confront serious economic uncertainty if production falls, in a context where union power is limited and social protection is often weak.
Global Impact and Future Warfare
Russia’s November 2025 ban on gasoline exports removes a major supplier from markets in Europe and Asia, because fuel that would usually be sold abroad is now needed at home. As a result of damage and export limits, Russia’s oil revenues have dropped to their lowest level since March 2023. This tightening of Russian exports pushes global fuel prices upward, while producers in the Middle East and North America fill the gap and gain market share; major players such as Saudi Aramco and refineries in the United Arab Emirates benefit from higher prices and greater demand, while Russian firms like Lukoil and Gazprom suffer steep revenue declines.
Inside Russia, people are adapting to fuel scarcity by carpooling more, working remotely when possible, and using public transport more often. Rural areas often see the longest queues for fuel, and there are more cancellations of domestic flights because of aviation fuel shortages, changing daily life especially in regions that rely heavily on air travel and road transport.
The government has deployed S-400 and Pantsir-S1 air defense systems around refineries and regularly reports drone interceptions, while fuel export bans and plans to import gasoline mark a sharp break from earlier claims of complete energy self-sufficiency. Ukraine’s 2025 campaign of precise strikes on refineries like Ryazan is reshaping how conflict is fought by tying energy security and industrial resilience directly to military power, pointing to a future where controlling fuel flows and disrupting economies is as important as holding territory on the ground.
Sources
Kyiv Independent. “Ukraine confirms drone strikes on key Russian oil refinery, petrochemical plant.” November 4, 2025.
Kyiv Post. “Drones Hit Russian Oil Refinery, Power Plant in Overnight Strikes.” October 2025.
UNITED24 Media. “Revealed: Full List of Russian Sites Hit by Ukraine’s FP-1 and FP-5 in 2025 Deep Strikes.” 2025.
Carnegie Endowment. “Have Ukrainian Drones Really Knocked Out 38% of Russia’s Oil Refineries?” October 2025.
Moscow Times. “Ukrainian Drones Hit Major Russian Oil Refinery, Chemical Plant.” October 3, 2025.
Euronews. “Built in the shadows, launched at night: Ukraine’s long-range drone strikes on Russian refineries.” November 3, 2025.