Review of the evaluation of the Energy Innovation Agenda

The Netherlands Enterprise Agency (RVO.nl) has carried out an evaluation of key parts of the Energy Innovation Agenda. The evaluation concerns €117 million in public funds that were spent on energy innovation in the period 2008-2016. Since RVO evaluates a scheme that RVO itself has implemented, the impression could arise that the evaluation may not be unbiased (“the student grades his own paper”). Therefore, RVO has asked Carl Koopmans to provide an independent review of the evaluation.

The overall conclusion of the review is that – given the limited possibilities to evaluate innovation policy – a good approach has been followed, which is also partly innovative. A lot of useful information has been collected. The evaluation not only gives rise to conclusions about past policy measures, but also to important recommendations for future innovation policy.