Shortening the duration of patents is key to solve climate change---free availability is key.
Van Dycke 7/11 [Lodewijk; Researcher, policy advisory, and consultant who Is specialized in international and European agricultural law and policy; 7/11/2024; GRUR International; “Why Patents on Climate Technologies Must Be Cut Short”; https://academic.oup.com/grurint/advance-article-abstract/doi/10.1093/grurint/ikae087/7712463?redirectedFrom=fulltext]//kaviWaRu
This contribution questions the term of protection for patents under circumstances of climate change. Patents typically last for 20 years but, for climate-related technologies, this is arguably too long. Under the 1.5°C scenario of the Paris Agreement, we need to make significant headway before 2030. Luckily, the technologies that need to be implemented broadly to reach the 2030 threshold have been developed already. To save civilisation from the worst impacts of climate change, the roll-out of existing technologies (static efficiency) is more important than the development of new ones (dynamic efficiency).
However, patent terms take neither static efficiency nor the climate timeframe into account. Technologies developed today will come off patent only in the 2040s, limiting their free availability when their wide roll-out should be the main concern. Conversely, the climate technologies that come off patent today were developed in the early 2000s, long before climate change acquired its current urgency and investment in climate technologies was ramped up.