Zelensky has proposed an energy truce: Russia stops attacking Ukraine’s electricity and heating infrastructure, while Ukraine stops hitting Russian refineries and other energy facilities.
Trump supports the idea. Moscow has also shown interest, although it wants Russian seaborne energy exports and sanctions brought into the discussion.
The problem is that energy has become one of the most effective weapons available to both sides.
Ukraine’s refinery campaign has helped push Russian refinery throughput to its lowest level in more than two decades, squeezing fuel production and export capacity.
Russia has the opposite leverage. Its winter strikes are designed to overwhelm Ukraine’s electricity and heating systems precisely when civilians depend on them most.
So each side would be giving up something that is currently hurting the other.
And they have tried this before.
A U.S.-backed energy moratorium in 2025 quickly descended into competing accusations because there was no serious independent mechanism for determining who had actually violated it.
That may be the real lesson.
An energy truce probably doesn’t need to survive without violations.
It needs to survive the very first.
Source: Center for Strategic & International Studies (CSIS) / Writer: Oliver
