EIR/202600514981 · FOI/EIR · partially withheld
Average cost of electricity generation in Scotland: EIR release
Information requested
This is a follow up request to a previous FOI response. Your ref: 202600512110
The above referenced response includes this excerpt from a document dated 11th March 2024: “Current GB wholesale electricity market arrangements mean the single price of electricity in GB (and therefore Scotland) is primarily determined by volatile global gas prices. This means Scottish consumers are paying more for their electricity than the average cost of generation in Scotland. The current market prevents Scotland’s consumers, communities and businesses from benefiting from the lower marginal cost of renewable power generation in Scotland.”
Please provide the figure used for the “average cost of generation in Scotland”, along with the calculations and sources used to arrive at the figure.
Please also provide the figure used for the “marginal cost of renewable power generation in Scotland”, along with the calculations and sources used to arrive at this figure.
Response
As the information you have requested is ‘environmental information’ for the purposes of the Environmental Information (Scotland) Regulations 2004 (EIRs), we are required to deal with your request under those Regulations. We are applying the exemption at section 39(2) of the Freedom of Information (Scotland) Act 2002 (FOISA), so that we do not also have to deal with your request under FOISA.
This exemption is subject to the ‘public interest test’. Therefore, taking account of all the circumstances of this case, we have considered if the public interest in disclosing the information outweighs the public interest in applying the exemption. We have found that, on balance, the public interest lies in favour of upholding the exemption, because there is no public interest in dealing with the same request under two different regimes. This is essentially a technical point and has no material effect on the outcome of your request.
Regarding your request to provide cost figures, some of the information you have requested is available from a UK Government publication “Electricity Generation Costs”. The statistics, published by the UK Government, provide details on the levelised costs across different generation technologies based in Great Britain.
A levelised cost is the average cost of the lifetime of the plant per MWh of electricity generated. They reflect the cost of building, operating, and decommissioning a generic plant for each technology. While this metric does not capture individual Scotland level project considerations, levelised costs are a wellestablished, and widely used approach for comparing the average costs of energy generation across different technologies.
At the time the briefing was produced (March 2024), the latest available data was the 2023 Electricity Generation Costs Report, which can be accessed via the following link: Electricity generation costs 2023 - GOV.UK
Please note, there has now been an updated version of the publication. The latest report can be accessed via the following link: Electricity generation costs 2025 - GOV.UK
Under regulation 6(1)(b) of the EIRs, we do not have to give you information which is already publicly available and easily accessible to you in another form or format. If, however, you do not have internet access to obtain this information from the website listed, then please contact me again and I will send you a paper copy.
About FOI
The Scottish Government is committed to publishing all information released in response to Freedom of Information requests. View all FOI responses at https://www.gov.scot/foi-responses.
Contact Please quote the FOI reference Central Correspondence Unit Email: contactus@gov.scot Phone: 0300 244 4000 The Scottish Government St Andrew's House Regent Road Edinburgh EH1 3DG
Detected exemption language
We are applying the exemption at section 39(2) of the Freedom of Information (Scotland) Act 2002 (FOISA), so that we do not also have to deal with your request under FOISA. This exemption is subject to the ‘public interest test’. Therefore, taking account of all the circumstances of this case, we have considered if the public interest in disclosing the information outweighs the public interest in applying the exemption. We have found that, on balance, the public interest lies in favour of upholding the exemption, because there is no public interest in dealing with the same request under two different regimes.
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