Four years of war: what Ukrainian cities’ resilience teaches us

It has been four years since Russia launched its full-scale invasion of Ukraine. Four years of war and devastation that have scarred the country and its people. Yet across Ukraine, cities have shown extraordinary resilience. Despite continuous aggression and hardship, Energy Cities members and Covenant of Mayors signatories in Ukraine have continued in their determination to decarbonise, strengthen local energy systems and involve their communities. And this very determination has made them more resilient in the harshest of times. 

The main lesson we can pull from their experience: the energy transition is not only about climate change. It’s also about security, sovereignty and survival. Russia’s systematic weaponisation of energy – targeting power plants, substations and heating infrastructure in the dead of winter – has demonstrated how dangerous dependence on centralised, fossil-based systems can be.  

For many Ukrainian cities, decentralised renewable energy has become a lifeline. 

In Kharkiv, one of Ukraine’s largest cities and an early Covenant of Mayors signatory as well as a flagship municipality of the Sun4Ukraine Project, repeated strikes have destroyed much of the region’s thermal generation capacity. After a major attack in February 2026 on the city’s combined heat and power plant and key substations, 300,000 residents were left without electricity.  

With nearly 90% of thermal capacity neutralised in the region, residents endure rolling blackouts and limited daily access to power. In subzero temperatures, decentralised solutions — modular cogeneration units, local renewables, and autonomous systems supported through a newly launched state programme called SvitloDim — have become essential to keep water pumps and heating functioning in high-rise buildings. The shift to a distributed model has enhanced the city’s security as smaller, renewable assets, are not only more flexible; they are also harder targets than large, centralised plants. 

The experience of Slavutych tells a similar story. Long known for its progressive energy policies and home to Ukraine’s only energy cooperative, “Sunny City”, Slavutych has faced repeated total blackouts following targeted attacks. One overnight strike in January 2026 cut electricity to all 8,500 households. Yet the city’s earlier investments in decentralised generation — including a 10.5 MW biomass boiler and community solar — have helped cushion the impact.  

New solar installations for municipal boiler houses and additional decentralised heating facilities are now under development. For Slavutych, diversification of supply has helped them reduce not only emissions, but also vulnerabilities. 

In smaller cities such as Zlatopil, the link between climate action and crisis preparedness is equally tangible. When strikes in January 2026 plunged the town into darkness for more than 30 hours, hospitals, water supply and heating systems continued operating thanks to solar plants, battery storage and backup systems secured through years of cooperation with European partners. Temperatures had dropped to minus ten degrees. The investments made as part of their climate ambitions after joining the Covenant of Mayors proved decisive for basic survival. 

Across these cities, a pattern emerges. The more local, diversified and renewable the energy system, the greater the resilience. Decentralisation reduces the risk of losing all power at once. Local generation strengthens community control. Storage and flexibility keep essential services running when central grids collapse. 

Rebuilding wisely has also strengthened Ukrainian cities’ resilience. 

Resilience is not built on energy supply alone. It also depends on how efficiently that energy is used — a lesson shaping Ukraine’s broader reconstruction. As cities rebuild under the pressure of war, climate neutrality is no longer a distant ambition but a practical framework for managing scarce resources, lowering energy demand and reducing vulnerability.  

In Kyiv, for instance, despite enduring one of the harshest winters in years and constant missile strikes on critical infrastructure that trigger recurring power and heating outages, organisations such as Ecoaction are laying the groundwork for sustainable reconstruction. Working with local authorities and private partners, they are tackling the reality that much of Ukraine’s residential stock falls into the lowest energy efficiency classes (E–G), leaving buildings expensive to heat and difficult to sustain during disruptions. Their interactive Residential Building Energy Efficiency Map — first launched in Kyiv and now expanding to other cities — visualises buildings’ energy classes, estimates heat losses and enables comparisons across neighbourhoods. By equipping renters and buyers with transparent information, signalling higher standards to developers, and providing municipalities with data to guide renovation strategies, the initiative helps steer reconstruction towards a more resilient, resource-efficient housing stock – essential in times of crisis. 

These stories should serve as a wake-up call for Europe. 

Energy security must mean a decisive move away from gas in favour of local, renewable energy sources 

As Europe focuses on ramping up its defence capabilities faced to Russian threats, energy policy and infrastructure have moved to the centre of the debate. Yet continued dependence on gas just means trading one dependency for another. Europe should instead focus on building an agile, resilient system from the ground-up – one that does not rely on continuous imports of fossil fuels. 

Because today, it’s not only Russia exerting pressure. An increasingly hostile United States government has been pressuring Europe to succumb to its new worldview – one in which neither Ukrainian sovereignty nor democracy are worth defending, and where a unified Europe has no place.  

Europe will remain vulnerable to American coercion as long as the United States remains its largest supplier of gas. As anti-democratic tendencies close in on either side, Europe must defend its values by unapologetically shifting to an energy system that is sourced, cared for and developed within Europe. This means to have an energy system based on homegrown renewable resources, supported by storage, flexibility, and more resilient and smart grids. Such a system will be largely deployed at the local level, where cities and regions have a strong role to play.  

Ukrainian cities are demonstrating, under the harshest imaginable conditions, that the path to decentralised, clean energy is also the path to security. Europe would do well to listen.