Does a photo show Moscow "dark due to severe electricity shortage" in August 2024? No, that's not true: The image of the Kremlin without its lights on is from 2014 and was taken for a World Wildlife Fund event. The photo does not show Moscow in 2024 amid the full-scale Russian invasion of Ukraine. There are no reports of electricity shortages causing power outages in Moscow as of August 30, 2024.
The claim appeared in a post (archived here) on X, formerly known as Twitter, on August 21, 2024. It said:
Moscow remains dark due to severe electricity shortage -- rosZMI
The reason is difficulties in servicing foreign turbines at russian thermal power plants due to Western sanctions.
This is how the post looked at the time of the writing of this fact check:
(Source: X screenshot taken on Fri Aug 30 16:53:29 2024 UTC)
A reverse image search of the photo on Tineye.com (archived here) returned the image of Moscow in darkness from the 2014 World Wildlife Fund Earth Hour event. A March 29, 2014, article on the Russian mainstream news website Gazeta.ru (archived here) included the image. Google Translate's literal translation of the article's title is "The Kremlin is going into the shadows."
The article's photo of a dark Kremlin with light only from passing cars is the same as the one in the post on X.
Here is a screenshot of the image in the article:
(Source: Gazeta website screenshot taken on Fri Aug 30 16:55:43 2024 UTC)
A Google search of keywords (archived here) returned no reliable news reports about a power outage or electricity shortages in Moscow attributed to Western sanctions.
The Moscow Times published an article (archived here) on August 21, 2024, that said Moscow could face electricity shortages by 2030 due to difficulties servicing foreign equipment, according to the Russian Power System Operator. It included a link to this report (archived here). That report is not related to the photo shared on the social media post nor to anything happening in Moscow in late August 2024.
The Reuters news agency and the fact checking outlet Full Fact also have debunked this same claim.
Other Lead Stories fact checks of claims about the Russia-Ukraine war can be found here.
