How Ukraine refinery strikes and US sanctions are squeezing Russia at home

Ukraine has been repeatedly targeting Russian oil refineries, intensifying the strain on both the country’s military operation and its wider economy.

This comes as the US imposes heavy sanctions on Russia's two largest oil companies. Russia is facing growing disruption at the pumps as Ukrainian drone strikes also target fuel stations.

Analysis by Sky News over the past three months shows that Ukraine is repeatedly striking several of the same refineries. Refineries hit again, and again Ten refineries stand out for having been struck twice or more since the beginning of August 2025.

The attacks are predominantly in the west of the country, within drone range from Ukraine. Clay Seigle, senior fellow at the Centre for Strategic and International Studies, told Sky News that Ukraine's restriking tactic is partially due to the limited damage that can be caused by single drone attacks.

To put pressure on Russia, Seigle said: "The Ukrainian strikes have to come at a faster pace with greater effect than the Russians are able to repair." Pressure on Russian oil is not just coming from Ukraine. The latest refinery to be struck, the Ryazan refinery, is owned by the Rosneft oil company, which was sanctioned by US President Donald Trump on Wednesday.

Mr Trump imposed new sanctions on Russia's two largest oil companies - Rosneft and Lukoil. Between the two companies, 13 of their refineries have been targeted, and five of these have been targeted multiple times.

Seigle said while the sanctions are the strongest card in terms of ones that the United States has played, "it's all about the implementation". "The first thing that we have with these new sanctions is a 30-day period for companies doing business with Rosneft and Lukoil to wind down their operations," Seigle explained.

Sanctioned refinery hit again last night Ukraine struck the Ryazan refinery overnight in a suspected drone strike, the third time the refinery has been hit in three months. Sky News geolocated footage posted to social media that show part of the refinery on fire.

The Armed Forces of Ukraine confirmed the attack and said the refinery had been targeted for its involvement in supplying the Russian army. The refinery was also hit on 2 August and 5 September.

The strikes appeared to hit key areas of the refinery, according to videos and stills geolocated by Sky News. Video from August showed smoke billowing from Ryazan.

Later reports stated that two crude distillation units - the first crude oil processing unit, and thus one of the refinery's most critical functions - had been hit. Stills from September appeared to show a large fire at the primary oil processing unit, where crude oil is desalted and then separated into kerosene, gasoline, diesel and oil for fuel.

The most recent strike appeared to target an installation next to the areas previously struck. Speaking to Sky News, Russian economist at the CASE Centre, Vladislav Inozemtsev, said: "Ryazan is quite badly affected, the repairs will take between two to six months if there are no further attacks." Panic as pumps hit by strikes and shortages In its October oil market report, the International Energy Agency estimated that persistent attacks on Russian energy infrastructure have cut Russian crude processing by an estimated 500 thousand barrels per day.

Other parts of oil infrastructure, including petrol stations, have also been targeted. The average price of 95-octane petrol (the standard petrol in Russia) at Russian pumps has risen by more than 30% since the start of the Ukraine war in 2022, according to the Russian state data provider Rosstat.

In the last two months, the average price has risen by around 5% and now stands at more than 67 rubles per litre. Emily Ferris, Senior Research Fellow in Russian and Eurasian Security at RUSI, explained that Ukraine's strategy has intensified in recent months.

"Ukraine has been doing this for at least a year, but these latest strikes on Russia's critical national infrastructure are more serious," Ferris told Sky News. "The Ukrainian drones are capable of attacking more frequently and deeper into Russian territory, as well as hitting some refineries numerous times." The strategy behind the strikes, Ferris says, is to damage the Russian economy.

She said: "Attacking refineries in Russia does temporarily have an impact on production, and Ukraine is hoping that this will be sufficiently debilitating to Russia's economy - which depends on hydrocarbon production - to slow the progress of the war." The reduction of crude processing has resulted in domestic fuel shortages. There are signs that this is having real effects on Russian people, who have taken to social media with videos of queues at petrol stations.

This month, queues were filmed at petrol stations in Khabarovsk, in the far east of Russia. Seigle believes part of the Ukrainian strategy is "bringing the consequences home to these remote regions [of Russia] that are far from the front, it kind of brings more people into the risk factor of perpetuating this war against Ukraine".

Analysis from the independent Russian monitoring group thinktank Re:Russia showed searches for explanations of oil shortages on the Russian search engine Yandex have increased in 2025. Russian economic data is hard to verify, but the Sky News Data and Forensics team has mapped reports of fuel shortages from Russian social media and news reports.

Ferris explains that while fires at oil refineries and fuel shortages are impacting people's daily lives, "local complaints do not often translate into coordinated mass protests capable of challenging the status quo or forcing Putin's hand". The Data and Forensics team is a multi-skilled unit dedicated to providing transparent journalism from Sky News.

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