Correspondence regarding electricity costs: EIR release

Information requested

For the period 8th September 2023 - date, please provide any correspondence or documentation held by the Chief Economist, Constitution, Energy and Climate Change, or Offshore Wind directorates which discusses the cost of electricity generated by Scottish renewables.

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.

Some of the information that was found to be in scope of this request can be found, as below:

“Review of Energy Policy 2025” report - produced by the UK Energy Research Centre (UKERC). The report brings together research findings to bear on energy policy in the UK. The report can be accessed via the following link: Review of Energy Policy 2025 | UKERC | The UK Energy Research Centre

In addition, further information was found in a briefing note. A copy of the relevant information has been included alongside this response.

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(s) listed, then please contact me again and I will send you a paper copy.

An exemption under regulation 10(4)(e) of EIRs (internal communications), and regulation 11(2) (personal data relating to third party) applies to some of the information.

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.

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.

EIR 202600512110 - Information Released - Annex

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