ECA Special Report on Intelligent Energy Programme 2003-2006
The European Court of Auditors (ECA), has published in the Official Journal of the European Union, on November 1st, its Special Report n° 7/2008 concerning the Intelligent Energy Programme, 2003-2006.
The Intelligent European Energy (IEE) Programme for 2003-2006 had a budget of 250 M€ to promote energy efficiency, the use of renewable energy sources and energy diversification. This was used to support nearly 450 projects involving more than 1,700 bodies. The programme promoted exchanges of experience and know-how, rather than the development of new technology.
The Commission translated the objectives of the IEE programme into a detailed work programme and made use of outside experts to appraise proposals. On the other hand the planning of the programme fell short of best practice, and the distribution of spending over many areas of activities limited the potential to achieve significant and verifiable progress in any particular area. IEE was not a clearly focused expenditure programme.
The IEE Programme for the period 2007-2013 counts upon a 724.26 M€ budget.
The Court’s audit was conducted at the Commission and at the Executive Agency now charged with running the programme, and made use of a survey questionnaire to obtain the views of participants. Questionnaire addressed the following topics:
- How the Commission allocated IEE funds.
- How the Commission monitored and evaluated the programme.
- What were the administrative costs of the programme.
- What difference the executive agency made to the management of the programme.
The Commission monitored progress on projects, but monitoring and evaluation did not make it possible to form a view of the overall quality and design of the programme. The Commission was not in a position to assess whether local and regional energy agencies made a significant impact, nor to assess whether they improved the coordination of promotion of energy-efficient technology. Evaluation reports have not been available in time to influence legislative discussions.
Administrative costs of IEE Programme
The costs of preparing proposals, reporting on projects and programme management (including such costs borne by successful applicants) are estimated to be equal to the amount disbursed over the period 2003-2006. Taking account of future disbursements the total costs of these activities can be expected to be more than one-sixth of the sums disbursed. Although the European Commission runs many schemes with a similar design to IEE, it does not have a framework for assessing their administrative costs. It is not therefore possible readily to compare the administrative costs of IEE with those of other schemes.
The Executive Agency
The Executive Agency has had a positive impact on client satisfaction: participants (and particularly, project coordinators) prefer dealing with the Agency to dealing with the Commission.
ECA recommendations for design and implementation of future IEE Programmes (and similar)
- Programme proposals which are based on an explicit policy model and reflect the expected link between expenditure, output and impact.
- Monitoring which looks beyond individual projects and assist in forming a view of a programme as a whole, and responds to the announced objective of the programme.
- Evaluation of programmes in a way which maximises its usefulness as a source of "feed back" information, perhaps including more use of "longitudinal" evaluation - looking at the impact of key categories of projects through successive spending frameworks.
- More systematic recording and analysis of information on the administrative cost of programmes, taking account of costs borne by beneficiaries, and the use of this information to compare programmes and to identify and spread best practice.