An In Program Design

ANAO Report No.11 2014–15 The Award of Grants under the Clean Technology Program 54 Program and the Clean Technology Food and Foundries Investment Program. [ANAO emphasis]

2.31 The

reasons for the department’s decision not to rank applications may relate to the difficulty in establishing the relative merits of applications for projects that involve substantively different activities. In this regard, the department separately advised ANAO in June 2014 that: There is significant variation in project size, complexity, activity and outcomes depending on the nature of the emission reductions measures to be undertaken and industry sector. The value of projects considered to date ranges from 50 000 to 70 million. Projects can encompass activities ranging from replacement of lighting fixtures, modifying an existing manufacturing process, installing a co‐generation plant, covering anaerobic lagoons or replacing an entire manufacturing site. Reductions in emissions intensity will vary significantly depending on the nature of the emissions reduction measures included in the project. Given the significant variation between projects, applications are assessed individually against the program merit criteria rather than against other projects within a funding round.

2.32 However,

these factors were not documented at the time that the assessment and selection process was decided upon.

2.33 A

program in which applications were individually assessed against merit criteria would more accurately be described as a merit‐based, non‐ competitive program which is the definition adopted by the CGRGs, as well as in ANAO’s Grants Administration Better Practice Guide. However, the process used also exhibited some of the characteristics of a demand‐driven program as 74 per cent of the applications that were considered by the program delegate were approved. 68 Following advice from ANAO in June 2013 prior to the commencement of the audit, the department acknowledged that the programs were not competitive grants programs, in the context of the 2013 CGGs, by updating the program guidelines to reflect that applications would be individually assessed against the merit criteria. The department advised ANAO in October 2014 that ‘despite this reclassification, there was no change to the assessment process’.

2.34 Given

that there was no change to the assessment process or the definition of a competitive grants program that was provided in the ANAO’s 2010 Grants Administration Better Practice Guide, the department did not 68 The program delegate approved 603 of the 814 applications that were considered. ‐ ‐ ‐ ‐ ANAO Report No.11 2014–15 The Award of Grants under the Clean Technology Program