(The landscape of Bug-Gardiv Palanka. PHOTO: Yara Shark, Wikimedia)
The Mykolaiv District Administrative Court ruled that the decision by the Ministry of Culture and Strategic Communications of Ukraine—which had approved the project to complete construction of the Tashlyk Pumped-Storage Power Plant—was unlawful and overturned it.
According to Inna Tymchenko, an associate professor in the Department of Landscape Architecture and Ecology at Taras Shevchenko National University of Luhansk, the issue concerns the part of the project in which the water level of the Oleksandrivsk Reservoir is planned to be raised to 16.9 meters.
The lawsuit was filed by war veteran Oleksandr Prutyan, who argued that the flooding threatens to submerge a cultural heritage site of national significance—the historic landscape of the center of the Bug-Gardivska Palanka of the Zaporizhian Host.
Inna Tymchenko reported that one of the key pieces of evidence presented in court was a report compiled by a commission under the Mykolaiv Regional Military Administration, which established that there is a threat of destruction and loss of cultural heritage sites located in the specified area.
These include the territories of the “Granite-Steppe Pobuzhzhya” Regional Landscape Park and the “Buzky Gard” National Nature Park, which are part of Ukraine’s nature reserve fund. It also concerns the site of national significance for landscape, history, and archaeology, “The Historical Landscape of the Center of the Bug-Gard Palanka of the Zaporizhzhia Army.”
In the spring of 2025, the National Ecological Center of Ukraine (NECU) reported on renewed attempts to complete construction of the Tashlyk Pumped-Storage Power Plant (PSPP) and plans to raise the water level of the Oleksandrivka Reservoir, but activists opposed these plans. In December 2025, the Mykolaiv District Administrative Court ruled that the Ministry of Culture had failed to take action to protect cultural heritage in this matter.The court also ordered the Ministry of Culture of Ukraine to implement protective measures for the monument “Historical Landscape of the Center of the Bug-Gardivska Palanka of the Zaporizhian Host” due to the threat of its destruction or damage resulting from the construction of the Tashlyk Pumped-Storage Power Plant.
Meanwhile, in June 2026, the National Anti-Corruption Bureau and the Specialized Anti-Corruption Prosecutor’s Office reported the uncovering of an alleged scheme to embezzle funds from the state-ownedenterprise “NAEK ‘Energoatom’” during thecompletion of the Tashlyk Pumped-Storage Power Plant, located in the Mykolaiv region. The purchase of equipment at inflated prices could have caused losses to the state amounting to nearly 170 million hryvnias.
Кирило Бойко