KYIV — As Ukraine scrambles to repair the damage that Russian missiles are inflicting on the country’s power stations, the weary population is facing what is shaping up to be one of the worst winters of the war so far.

       Power outages are a given — because Ukraine’s energy system is already working at a deficit after receiving heavy blows from Russian strikes this year — but the estimates vary on just how bad it will be. The best-case scenario is just four hours of power cuts a day, but it could also end up being 20 hours of darkness or more a day in the depths of Ukraine’s frigid winter.