The growing value of green ideas

Evi­dence of green tech­nol­o­gy shift­ing from an alter­na­tive invest­ment to a main­stay of the econ­o­my is all around us. Around 40% of UK homes and busi­ness­es had a smart meter installed by the end of Sep­tem­ber 2020; on Box­ing Day 2020, wind tur­bines pro­vid­ed the major­i­ty (50.7 per cent) of the nation’s elec­tric­i­ty. 

“Com­pa­nies exposed to the ener­gy tran­si­tion are like­ly to deliv­er unprece­dent­ed growth over the com­ing decades,” Gold­man Sachs ana­lysts told investors at the start of Jan­u­ary. 

How­ev­er, it seems cre­ators of emerg­ing low-car­bon tech­nolo­gies hop­ing to take a slice of this growth are often unaware of the pro­tec­tion intel­lec­tu­al prop­er­ty (IP) rights can afford them. The Inter­na­tion­al Ener­gy Agency reports that “while the ini­tial val­ue of many ener­gy tech­nol­o­gy star­tups lies in the patents they hold, few­er patents have been filed for low-car­bon ener­gy tech­nolo­gies each year since 2011”. 

This means green tech devel­op­ers could be los­ing out on oppor­tu­ni­ties to attract invest­ment, pro­tect, license and sell their work. 

Europe’s green IP goals

The Euro­pean Com­mis­sion wants to change this. In Novem­ber, it released its Action Plan on IP, upgrad­ing its IP offer for Euro­pean Union busi­ness­es hop­ing to cap­i­talise on their low-car­bon ideas. 

Accord­ing to the Com­mis­sion, the goal is to boost green IP uptake, espe­cial­ly in the field of pub­licly fund­ed research, with 35 per cent of the EU’s Hori­zon research and devel­op­ment (R&D) bud­get now set aside for green projects. For the clean tech­nol­o­gy devel­oped through the pro­gramme, the Com­mis­sion will sup­port match­mak­ing oppor­tu­ni­ties with investors to com­mer­cialise it. 

But what about green IP devel­op­ment in the UK? One thing seems clear: post-Brex­it, there will be more paper­work. Mark Mar­fé and Anna Harley, who spe­cialise in patent lit­i­ga­tion and IP issues at law firm Pin­sent Masons, say Brex­it does present a chal­lenge in respect of IP rights.

“For exam­ple, new trade­marks or designs are no longer rec­i­p­ro­cal. Both UK and EU appli­ca­tions will now be required, rather than a sin­gle appli­ca­tion applic­a­ble across Europe. Con­verse­ly, the patent sys­tem was large­ly unaf­fect­ed by Brex­it,” they point out.

The UK’s competing green tech ambition

But Mar­fé and Harley believe the UK is well aware of the valu­able nature of home­grown IP and is tak­ing it as seri­ous­ly as its Con­ti­nen­tal coun­ter­parts. “The gov­ern­ment is clear­ly pri­ori­tis­ing both arti­fi­cial intel­li­gence (AI) and clean tech­nolo­gies, so we antic­i­pate sub­stan­tial growth and invest­ment. The pri­vate sec­tor, research insti­tu­tions and the pub­lic sec­tor are all focus­ing on clean tech­nol­o­gy, which includes the devel­op­ment of green IP as a con­se­quence,” they say.

Pri­vate cap­i­tal is often vital for a green start­up to move towards com­mer­cial via­bil­i­ty with its IP. Green Angel Syndicate’s port­fo­lio, ded­i­cat­ed to angel invest­ments in com­pa­nies whose prod­ucts or ser­vices help mit­i­gate cli­mate change, includes Pow­er Roll, mak­er of a flex­i­ble, recy­clable solar film said to be 20 times cheap­er than tra­di­tion­al solar pan­els, and Smile Plas­tics, which uses waste plas­tic to man­u­fac­ture prod­ucts for the design and archi­tec­ture indus­tries.  

Chief exec­u­tive Nick Lyth says the dri­ving force behind form­ing Green Angel Syn­di­cate in 2013 was “the qual­i­ty and quan­ti­ty of ener­gy, water, trans­port and recy­cling tech­nol­o­gy and process inno­va­tion emerg­ing from transna­tion­al research and applied research projects sup­port­ed by the EU”. 

Post-Brex­it, this sup­port has now splin­tered from the UK. “British R&D has become iso­lat­ed from both Euro­pean fund­ing and the even more essen­tial part­ner­ships through­out lead­ing research estab­lish­ments across Europe,” he says. 

While the UK is rich in its own research insti­tu­tions and pri­vate cap­i­tal, “high-qual­i­ty, rapid grass­roots inno­va­tion in the fight against cli­mate change has become that lit­tle bit hard­er in the UK”, says Lyth. “Europe’s Action Plan on IP is sup­port­ed by mil­lions of euros in incen­tives, from which UK research estab­lish­ments are exclud­ed. It is a shame for them, but more impor­tant­ly a fail­ure of com­mu­nal action against a com­mu­nal prob­lem.”

To hoard green IP or share?

The ques­tion of whether a more col­lab­o­ra­tive approach to com­mer­cial­is­ing green tech­nol­o­gy is need­ed is a press­ing one. Is it fair to keep inven­tions that could dra­mat­i­cal­ly improve liv­ing con­di­tions under the lock and key of IP? What if a pro­tect­ed prod­uct, shared inter­na­tion­al­ly, could dra­mat­i­cal­ly curb car­bon emis­sions? Should an AI algo­rithm that cuts util­i­ty bills, there­by alle­vi­at­ing ener­gy pover­ty, be made acces­si­ble to all? 

Mar­fé and Harley say the pan­dem­ic is cre­at­ing a shift in per­spec­tive on the social role and pur­pose of IP. They point to the cre­ation of the Open COVID Pledge, a com­mit­ment made by IP own­ers to share some or all of their IP for the pur­pos­es of end­ing and mit­i­gat­ing COVID-19. This spir­it of shared pur­pose can be applied to anoth­er glob­al health cri­sis, cli­mate change. 

“Over the last year we saw uni­ver­si­ties and busi­ness­es recog­nis­ing that their research and exper­tise are crit­i­cal to the efforts of over­com­ing the glob­al pan­dem­ic. This sort of col­lab­o­ra­tion is equal­ly applic­a­ble to cli­mate change, glob­al car­bon reduc­tion and sus­tain­abil­i­ty-enhanc­ing tech­nolo­gies,” they say.  

Lyth agrees and sug­gests IP isn’t real­ly what is hold­ing back green tech­nol­o­gy cre­ators from achiev­ing their full poten­tial. He says green inno­va­tion “is not con­strained by IP pol­i­cy, but by the slow­ness with which gov­ern­ments around the world are tack­ling cli­mate change”.

“The atmos­phere sur­rounds us all, regard­less of where bor­ders and IP treaties are drawn on a map. It is far more impor­tant for com­pa­nies and gov­ern­ments through­out the entire world to act rapid­ly to slow, and ulti­mate­ly reverse, green­house gas pol­lu­tion,” he con­cludes.