The role of patent protection in (clean/green) technology transfer
Bronwyn Hall & Christian Helmers
#2010-046
Global climate change mitigation will require the development and
diffusion of a large number and variety of new technologies. How will
patent protection affect this process? In this paper we first review the
evidence on the role of patents for innovation and international
technology transfer in general. The literature suggests that patent
protection in a host country encourages technology transfer to that
country but that its impact on innovation and development is much more
ambiguous. We then discuss the implications of these findings and other
technology-specific evidence for the diffusion of climate change-related
technologies. We conclude that the "gdouble externality" problem, that
is the presence of both environmental and knowledge externalities,
implies that IP may not be the ideal and cannot be the only policy
instrument to encourage innovation in this area and that the range and
variety of green technologies as well as the need for local adaptation
of technologies means that patent protection may be neither available
nor useful in some settings.
UNU-MERIT Working Papers
ISSN 1871-9872