Special report 11/2026: Innovation Fund – High potential, but slow progress and little impact on emissions reduction.
The Innovation Fund supports targeted investments in innovative technologies with the potential to reduce greenhouse gas emissions. We carried out this audit to assess whether the Innovation Fund is helping to scale up demonstration projects which contribute effectively to the EU's decarbonisation objectives. We found that the Innovation Fund promotes large-scale innovative technologies, but it is not delivering the expected level of reductions in greenhouse gas emissions. We also found that the level of financial resources is uncertain, there is no structured analysis underlying their allocation, and projects face delays and cancellations. We recommend that the Commission should establish a structured analysis to guide resource allocation, examine additional measures capable of accelerating the deployment of funds, and improve project assessment.