§ Mr. Gordon Wilsonasked the Secretary of State for Scotland what is the expected rise in expansion in demand for electricity in Scotland in each year to 1980, and the expected average in the five year periods to 1985, 1990, 1995 and 2000.
§ Mr. William RossIt is the practice to plan power station development against estimates of demand for about six years ahead, and the Scottish electricity boards' latest estimate is that the maximum demand on the Scottish system in 1981–82 will be about 9,000 MW, compared with about 5,600 MW in 1974–75. It is not the practice to publish short-term annual figures because these can be affected by temporary factors and do not materially influence the power station ordering programme. The problems of long-term forecasting of electricity demand were discussed in Section 4 of Cmnd. 5731 "Choice of Thermal Reactor Systems—Report of the Nuclear Power Advisory Board" which gave estimates of Scottish electricity demand to 1990–91. No worthwhile forecasts can be given beyond that date.
§ Mr. Gordon Wilsonasked the Secretary of State for Scotland what was the simultaneous maximum demand on the SSEB and NSHB systems, respectively, in the winters of 1970–71, 1971–72, 1972–73, 1973–74 and 1974–75; what were the respective generation capacities; and what was any surplus or deficit in capacity, expressed as a percentage of overall capacity.
§ Mr. William RossI am asking the chairmen of the boards to write to the hon. Member.