Multicriteria analysis for the assessment of energy innovations in the transport sector

In the current context of environmental and global challenges, eco-innovation has become one of the European Union's priorities. A proper measurement system is a need for the promotion, long-term decision making and progress assessment of eco-innovative activities. Public and private sectors have to refocus their activities in order to pursue maximum profits, not only economic but social and environmental. Conventional indicators and metrics for innovation measurement are not suitable because they do not take into account these three dimensions of the sustainability in a balanced analysis. After identifying the minimum requirements of a method for measuring eco-innovation, a simplified multicriteria analysis based on saving-investment curves is proposed and applied to the transport sector. This approach is suitable to determine how actions should be prioritized providing the basis for further assessments. (c) 2012 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.