asked the Secretary of State for Energy whether the price of fuel oil supplied to the Central Electricity Generating Board has risen as fast as the price of crude oil since 1973; what is the current average works cost of generation per ton of (a) oil fuel and (b) coal and coke supplied to power stations in Great Britain engaged in public supply, what increases are in the pipeline; and what is the corresponding cost per useful therm.

Figures published in Tables 88 and 99 of the Digest of United Kingdom Energy Statistics 1979 show the movements in the average price of oil for burning by the public electricity supply industry in Great Britain and the average value per tonne of crude oil imported into the United Kingdom from all sources between 1973 and 1978, the last year for which the comparison is available. The relevant figures are:

£/tonne
	Oil for burning used by ESI (Great Britain)	United Kingdom crude oil imports
1973	11·69	11·44
1978	49·72	53·53

The works cost per kWh of electricity supplied from coal, gas and oil-fired steam power stations in 1978–79 is published in Table 9 of the CEGB's Statistical Yearbook 1978–79. Average generation costs in 1978–79 for oil and coal-fired stations commissioned after 1 April 1965 are given separately in Table 11 of the same publication as follows:

p/kWh
	Coal-fired stations	Oil-fired stations
Total inclusive fuel costs	1·0796	1·1253
Operation, maintenance and insurances	0·1195	0·0887
Capital charges	0·0928	0·0995
Total generation costs	1·2919	1·3135

The above generation costs expressed in pence per therm are coal fired stations 37·9 and oil-fired stations 38·5.No information is available on further increases in these costs.