Voice of Ukraine

From: Maia Mikhaluk (836th Day)

“Creativity and constraints are friends.”
“What doesn’t kill us makes us stronger.”

Those thoughts were coming through my mind a lot during the last few days.

Over the past week, we have had minimal hours of electrical power. Most of the time it was 2 hours of power, then 6 hours of no power. Blackouts are not new to us, but they have been longer than usual and have created a lot of challenges for work and for life. We kept thinking that it was good that this “rehearsal” of what was most likely going to be our reality in the winter was happening now – giving us time to figure out solutions before the weather turned cold.

So one of the possible solutions is a hybrid power system that allows to generate and store power in high capacity batteries. During the sunny months energy can be generated through solar panels and in the winter batteries could charge from central power grid during limited hours between blackouts or from a fuel generator. It’s not a cheap solution but it is really good on so many levels. It would be great for our churches! This good idea came to mind of many people in Ukraine during the last few days – the companies that install solar panels and sustainable energy systems are not able to manage with the spike in demand!

Ruzzians keep destroying our energy infrastructure hoping Ukrainians would just give up fighting and surrender. Instead people keep looking for ways to keep living and working without compromising our freedom.

Before the war Ukraine was very inefficient in use of energy resources. Our infrastructure is old and as long as ruzzia kept selling to Ukraine its gas at a cheaper price there was no incentive to invest into modernization of old infrastructure. Ruzzian gas served like a drug that kept up the “drug addiction” until it kills drug addict. Ruzzia has always used gas both as bribe and as blackmailing tool – not only with Ukraine but many European countries. The war weaned us off the “drug” of dependency on ruzzian gas. The same happened to most countries in Europe (Hungary being one very obvious exception). In Ukraine ruzzians are also destroying our energy infrastructure. When we rebuild it, it will be modern and efficient. Meanwhile Ukrainians are buying into idea of solar power.

Of course, we already had solar farms in the south of Ukraine even before the war, but it was not something most people would consider for their homes. Now it becomes necessity. “What doesn’t kill us makes us stronger.”