Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development

This dataset presents patent statistics and indicators that are suitable for tracking innovation in environment-related technologies. They allow the assessment of countries and firms' innovation performance as well as the design of governments' environmental and innovation policies.

Patents are a key measure of innovation output, as patent indicators reflect the inventive performance of countries, regions, technologies, firms, etc. They are also used to track the level of diffusion of knowledge across technology areas, countries, sectors, firms, etc., and the level of internationalisation of innovative activities. Patent indicators can serve to measure the output of R&D, its productivity, structure and the development of a specific technology/industry. Among the few available indicators of technology output, patent indicators are probably the most frequently used. The relationship between patents as an intermediate output resulting from R&D inputs has been investigated extensively. Patents are often interpreted as an output indicator; however, they could also be viewed as an input indicator, as patents are used as a source of information by subsequent inventors. Like any other indicator, patent indicators have many advantages and disadvantages. The advantages of patent indicators are : patents have a close link to invention; patents cover a broad range of technologies on which there are sometimes few other sources of data; the contents of patent documents are a rich source of information (on the applicant, inventor, technology category, claims, etc.); and patent data are readily available from patent offices. However, patents are subject to certain drawbacks: the value distribution of patents is skewed as many patents have no industrial application (and hence are of little value to society) whereas a few are of substantial value; many inventions are not patented because they are not patentable or inventors may protect the inventions using other methods, such as secrecy, lead time, etc.; the propensity to patent differs across countries and industries; differences in patent regulations make it difficult to compare counts across countries; and changes in patent law over the years make it difficult to analyse trends over time.

This dataset presents patent statistics and indicators that are suitable for tracking innovation in environment-related technologies. They allow the assessment of countries and firms' innovation performance as well as the design of governments' environmental and innovation policies.

The OECD Environment Directorate, in collaboration with the Directorate for Science, Technology and Innovation, has developed patent-based innovation indicators that are suitable for tracking developments in environment-related technologies. The indicators allow the assessment of countries' and firms' innovative performance as well as the design of governments' environmental and innovation policies. The patent statistics presented here are constructed using data extracted from the Worldwide Patent Statistical Database (PATSTAT) of the European Patent Office (EPO) using algorithms developed by the OECD. Consistent with other patent statistics provided in OECD.Stat, only published applications for "patents of invention" are considered (i.e. excluding utility models, petty patents, etc.). The relevant patent documents are identified using search strategies for environment-related technologies (ENV-TECH) which were developed specifically for this purpose. They allow identifying technologies relevant to environmental management, water-related adaptation and climate change mitigation. An aggregate category labelled "selected environment-related technologies" includes all of the environmental domains presented here.

The OECD Environment Directorate, in collaboration with the Directorate for Science, Technology and Innovation, has developed patent-based innovation indicators that are suitable for tracking developments in environment-related technologies. The indicators allow the assessment of countries' and firms' innovative performance as well as the design of governments' environmental and innovation policies. The patent statistics presented here are constructed using data extracted from the Worldwide Patent Statistical Database (PATSTAT) of the European Patent Office (EPO) using algorithms developed by the OECD. Consistent with other patent statistics provided in OECD.Stat, only published applications for "patents of invention" are considered (i.e. excluding utility models, petty patents, etc.). The relevant patent documents are identified using search strategies for environment-related technologies (ENV-TECH) which were developed specifically for this purpose. They allow identifying technologies relevant to environmental management, water-related adaptation and climate change mitigation. An aggregate category labelled "selected environment-related technologies" includes all of the environmental domains presented here.

Patents are a key measure of innovation output, as patent indicators reflect the inventive performance of countries, regions, technologies, firms, etc. They are also used to track the level of diffusion of knowledge across technology areas, countries, sectors, firms, etc., and the level of internationalisation of innovative activities. Patent indicators can serve to measure the output of R&D, its productivity, structure and the development of a specific technology/industry. The relationship between patents as an intermediate output resulting from R&D inputs has been investigated extensively. Patents are often interpreted as an output indicator; however, they could also be viewed as an input indicator, as patents are used as a source of information by subsequent inventors. Like any other indicator, patent indicators have many advantages and disadvantages. The advantages of patent indicators are :patents have a close link to invention;patents cover a broad range of technologies on which there are sometimes few other sources of data;the contents of patent documents are a rich source of information (on the applicant, inventor, technology category, claims, etc.); andpatent data are readily available from patent offices. However, patents are subject to certain drawbacks:the value distribution of patents is skewed as many patents have no industrial application (and hence are of little value to society) whereas a few are of substantial value;many inventions are not patented because they are not patentable or inventors may protect the inventions using other methods, such as secrecy, lead time, etc.;the propensity to patent differs across countries and industries;differences in patent regulations make it difficult to compare counts across countries; andchanges in patent law over the years make it difficult to analyse trends over time.