Sienkevych: Mykolaiv actually buys water from the new water pipeline, and this may affect the tariff, because the state has installed a meter at the end of the pipe

Pumping station of the new water pipeline for Mykolaiv, photo by NikVesti

Mykolaiv Mayor Oleksandr Senkevych announced that the city now pays for water from the new water pipeline according to the meter, which may affect the tariff for consumers.

The mayor said this during his report on his activities for 2025, according to NikVesti.

«The water pipeline is located in the region. Mykolaivvodokanal actually buys this water. This pipe was built and transferred to the State Agency for Water Resources. The pipe enters the territory of the water utility, where there is a meter. In fact, we now pay them monthly for the water they supply to us. If the water from the Dnipro was supplied through our pumping station, we paid for the use of water resources. Today, we are actually buying this water — a service. This water has a price. In fact, since this component has changed, this is the answer to the question of why the tariff should increase. At a minimum, we are buying this water,» said Oleksandr Sienkevych.

It should be noted that Mykolaiv previously received water from the Dnipro River. At that time, Mykolaivvodokanal maintained the entire water supply system itself: it paid for electricity for pumping, staff salaries, network repair and maintenance, as well as state payments for the use of water resources. In other words, the city covered all expenses at its own expense and did not actually pay the state for water.

Now this model has changed. The new water pipeline is on the balance sheet of the Regional Water Resources Office in the Mykolaiv region, and it is the office that ensures its operation — paying for electricity, staff, maintenance and water supply. Mykolaivvodokanal has a contract with the office and pays for the volume of water received according to the meter. In other words, the city does not pay for water, but for a range of services related to its pumping and maintenance of the pipeline.

See also the article «When will Mykolaiv get drinking water in its taps and how much will it cost?»

In particular, it says that new water treatment facilities for centralised water supply in Mykolaiv are promised to be launched as early as January 2026, but they are promised to be fully operational later. They were built with funds saved during the construction of the new water pipeline.

Initially, it was planned to take out an EIB loan for the construction of new water treatment facilities for Mykolaiv, with Denmark providing part of the funding as a grant. The project was expected to take several years to complete and was intended to help provide the city with water of European standards.

However, the head of the State Agency for Reconstruction, Serhii Sukhomlyn, later said that this idea had been abandoned. It was decided to build new water treatment facilities using state funds — those saved during the construction of a new water pipeline for the city.

However, Mykolaiv Mayor Oleksandr Sienkevych supports the modernisation of new water treatment facilities with a loan from the European Investment Bank, but believes that the state should pay for it.

Water pipeline for Mykolaiv. A bit of history

It has been more than three years since Russian troops damaged the water pipeline that supplied Mykolaiv with water. Since then, the city of almost half a million people has been left without a centralised supply of quality water.

All this time, Mykolaiv residents have been receiving water from a backup source, which raises many questions about the quality of such water and its salt content. Salt water has damaged 1,200 kilometres of the city's water supply network. Borys Dudenko, director of Mykolaivvodokanal, said that it is impossible to replace the entire length of the network that was damaged by the supply of salty water.

For a long time, representatives of the state and local authorities sought options for restoring the drinking water supply in Mykolaiv. A final decision was reached in 2024: a new water pipeline will be laid from Nova Odesa, and the money will be allocated from the state budget.

The regional restoration service even selected contractors who would work on a «design-build» basis. These were three companies, each responsible for one of three sections of the work: Ukrtransmist, Rostdorstroi and Avtostrada. However, both the customer and the construction contractor were subsequently changed. The customer for the construction of the new water pipeline was the Infrastructure Restoration and Development Service in the Dnipropetrovsk region, and the contractor was the Autostrada group of companies.

The new water pipeline for Mykolaiv was put into operation on 7 October 2025 and connected to the water supply network.