The largest mobile operator Kyivstar plans to increase the battery life to six hours on 30% of the network in the second quarter of 2025.

As the company's president Oleksandr Komarov reported, now 65% of the network can operate autonomously for up to four hours.

"Of course, energy is the biggest challenge. Now approximately 65% of the network is 4 hours of durability and the rest is about 2 hours... And we are looking at how to reach 6 hours of backup on 30% of the network in the second quarter (of 2025), "he said at the Global Outlook: Fostering Unity conference, organized by the European Business Association.

According to Komarov, in 2023, Kyivstar tried to make 100% of the network autonomous for four hours, but without success, including due to a number of errors.

"We tried to bring the entire network to 4 hours (of autonomous operation) in 2023, but there were errors such as, for example, buying lead batteries. They simply cannot withstand these modes, unregulated blackouts, when you have no power supply for 8 hours and it is available for 2 hours. In fact, their ability to work decreases in direct proportion to this instability. Now we are changing them and want to reach 4 hours of backup in the near future," Komarov said.

Currently, there are about 2,500 generators in use on the Kyivstar network, and their number will increase by about 1,000 in the near future.

"I think that we will reach about 25% of such conditional theoretical provision with generators. Because stationary ones are turned off, and mobile generators require teams that will service them - move, refuel them," Komarov said.

He recalled that at the beginning of 2022, each of the sites could last in autonomous mode for an average of no more than one hour. At that time, there was no need for alternative power sources, since Ukraine had a surplus of electricity produced at its own capacities. In addition, a stable distribution system was created.

Komarov pointed out that Kyivstar is guided by the requirements of the State Service of Special Communications and Information Protection to ensure the autonomy of base stations for 10 hours, but achieving this figure does not look realistic in the near future.

"I can't say that we are fulfilling them, we are moving in that direction. Perhaps not 10 hours, but 6 hours...", he said, noting that the obstacle to such a radical increase in battery life are physical barriers, in particular the need to replace power supply racks at each of the sites.

"There is an understanding that energy sustainability needs to be invested in, but there are logistical barriers, procurement, operational. In order to increase from 4 to 6 hours (battery life), we need to replace power supply racks at each of the sites," Komarov said.

He specified that the work to replace a rack takes time - half a day of work for a team to replace it at one site. In total, there are more than 15,000 sites where this should happen.