Fuel Crisis Deepens in Russia: Gasoline Sales Based on License Plate Numbers

In an effort to prevent the severe fuel shortage in Russia's Orel region, a new and extraordinary restriction has been decided upon and implemented. According to the new rule announced via a live broadcast on VKontakte by the regional governor Andrey Klyçkov, vehicles will now be able to buy gasoline in turns based on the first digit of their license plates. The system will be applied at a total of 57 gas stations operated by Rosneft and Gazprom in the region and will officially start on 4 July. According to the governor's statements, the main purpose of this step stands out as curbing the atmosphere of panic and the tendency to stockpile among the public. Authorities state that this phased distribution system will guarantee the fuel needs of the region's residents for at least one to two weeks. It is planned that the said restrictions will continue until the crisis in gasoline supply is resolved and the congestion at the stations returns to normal.

According to the detailed operation of the system, the days vehicle owners can go to gas stations will be determined by the single-digit number at the beginning of their license plates. On Saturday, 4 July, only vehicles with license plates starting with 0 and 1 will be allowed to refuel. On the following Sunday, vehicles starting with 2 and 3 will take their turn, and on Monday, vehicles with the numbers 4 and 5 will be able to pull into the stations. This regular sequencing is planned to continue with the same logic up to the number 9. At the same time, a price and quantity regulation was made on the daily limits applied to individual purchases, and the amount of fuel a person can buy at one time was increased from 30 liters to 50 liters. This increase in volume is expected to alleviate the public's constant worry of waiting in line and ensure they go to the gas station less frequently.

Within the scope of the new measures applied in the region, not only vehicles registered in the Orel region, but also transit vehicles passing through from other regions were subjected to regulations, having been considered in detail. Drivers coming from other cities whose license plates do not belong to the Orel region will be able to use only three special gas stations allocated in the city center. Governor Klyçkov emphasized very clearly that this distinction was made quite consciously and that their main priority is their own region's residents. Preventing only transit vehicles passing through or making deliveries from consuming the already limited fuel stocks in the region is among the biggest goals of this practice. Authorities, who state that such harsh measures are necessary so that the Orel public is not victimized and the daily life of the region is not disrupted, are constantly monitoring the situation closely. Thus, while the needs of the local people are met, precautions are also taken against the risk of intercity roads being closed.

This license plate-based sequencing and restriction practice in the Orel region is not actually a measure implemented for the first time in the region; it is a second-stage decision taken upon the further deepening of the current crisis. The regional administration had already imposed serious restrictions on fuel sales starting from 24 June and initiated the practice. In the first stage, a maximum of 30 liters of fuel was allowed to be sold per person at gas stations in city centers, and a maximum of 50 liters at stations on intercity highways. However, these quantity limits alone could not solve the congestion and the citizens' concerns about supply, on the contrary, they caused the queues to extend increasingly. Upon this, authorities had to adapt the daily license plate rule, previously used in some regions of Russia during the Coronavirus pandemic, to the fuel sector with a similar logic. These developments reveal how large the problems in the region's energy supply chain have become and that the crisis now directly affects daily life.

The roots of this deep fuel crisis that has emerged in Russia and affected Orel date back to May and are fundamentally based on a major infrastructure problem. Unmanned aerial vehicle attacks carried out by the Ukrainian army on various strategic oil refineries and large energy depots in the country caused production capacities to drop significantly. This situation created a major bottleneck in fuel production across the country, causing the supply chain to practically collapse, and the gasoline shortage quickly spread to more than 20 regions. According to terrible videos and news shared by Russian citizens on social media, drivers in some regions have to wait in incredible queues for a full 18 hours to fill their vehicles. Images of portable toilets lined up by the roads, people trying to stockpile by carrying gasoline to their homes, and soaring black-market prices are highly occupying the Russian agenda. The dimensions of this obvious and grave crisis have reached such a point that it is stated that Kremlin officials and even the President of Russia, Vladimir Putin, had to closely deal with the issue.