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OPORTUNIDADES Y RETOS DE LA PROPIEDAD INDUSTRIAL EN EL ENTORNO DE CAMBIO CLIMÁTICO

Dirección

María Isabel Candelario Macías

Autores:

María José Álvarez Gil

Isabel Blanco Esguevillas

María Isabel Candelario Macías

Marta Cantos Pardo

Juan José Caselles Fornés

María Pilar Dopazo Fraguío

Emilio Elias Melo De Britto

Juan Garbayo Blanch

Manuel Magaña Rufino

Emiliano Marchisio

Fátima Mateos Candelario

Gonzalo María Nazar De La Vega

Tagore Trajano De Almeida Silva

Jeannette Valverde Chaves

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OPORTUNIDADES Y RETOS DE LA PROPIEDAD INDUSTRIAL EN EL ENTORNO DE CAMBIO CLIMÁTICO

COMITÉ CIENTÍFICO DE LA EDITORIAL TIRANT LO BLANCH

María José Añón Roig

Catedrática de Filosofía del Derecho de la Universidad de Valencia

Ana Cañizares Laso

Catedrática de Derecho Civil de la Universidad de Málaga

Jorge A. Cerdio Herrán

Catedrático de Teoría y Filosofía de Derecho.

Instituto Tecnológico Autónomo de México

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José Luis González Cussac

Catedrático de Derecho Penal de la Universidad de Valencia

Luis López Guerra

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Ángel M. López y López

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Marta Lorente Sariñena

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Javier de Lucas Martín

Catedrático de Filosofía del Derecho y Filosofía Política de la Universidad de Valencia

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Francisco Muñoz Conde

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Angelika Nussberger

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Tomás Sala Franco

Catedrático de Derecho del Trabajo y de la Seguridad Social de la Universidad de Valencia Ignacio Sancho Gargallo Magistrado de la Sala Primera (Civil) del Tribunal Supremo de España

Elisa Speckmann Guerra

Directora del Instituto de Investigaciones

Históricas de la UNAM

Ruth Zimmerling

Catedrática de Ciencia Política de la Universidad de Mainz (Alemania)

Fueron miembros de este Comité:

Emilio Beltrán Sánchez, Rosario Valpuesta Fernández y Tomás S. Vives Antón

Procedimiento de selección de originales, ver página web: www.tirant.net/index.php/editorial/procedimiento-de-seleccion-de-originales

OPORTUNIDADES Y RETOS DE LA PROPIEDAD INDUSTRIAL EN EL ENTORNO DE CAMBIO CLIMÁTICO

Dirección:

María Isabel Candelario Macías

Autores:

María José Álvarez Gil

Isabel Blanco Esguevillas

María Isabel Candelario Macías

Marta Cantos Pardo

Juan José Caselles Fornés

María Pilar Dopazo Fraguío

Emilio Elias Melo De Britto

Juan Garbayo Blanch

Manuel Magaña Rufino

Emiliano Marchisio

Fátima Mateos Candelario

Gonzalo María Nazar De La Vega

Tagore Trajano De Almeida Silva

Jeannette Valverde Chaves

tirant lo blanch

Valencia, 2023

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2. La industria de la moda y la economía circular: especial atención al reciclado, la re-manufactura y la reparación de bienes. ........................................

3.Estrategias empresariales en la transición a la economía circular y ODS. .......

4. La protección de la propiedad industrial en el mundo de la moda y su relación con los ODS.

5. Mirando hacia el futuro próximo.

Nota de la directora de la obra:

Esta monografía de autores varios tiene su antecedente y es generada gracias a la celebración del Congreso Internacional: Oportunidades y Retos de la Propiedad Industrial en el entorno de cambio climático, celebrado los días 20 y 21 de octubre de 2022, Universidad Carlos III de Madrid. En particular, agradecer de una parte por la concesión de las ayudas de Decanato para la celebración de eventos de divulgación científica de la Facultad de Ciencias Sociales y Jurídicas de la UC3M, así como el aprovechamiento de las ayudas del programa propio de investigación de la precitada Universidad. De otro, a todos los participantes siempre tan solícitos en la intervención.

La casi totalidad de las contribuciones fueron expuestas en conferencias y comunicaciones en el referido Congreso. La obra ha sido sometida previamente a revisor de pares ciegos según la normativa de la editorial. Derivado del lapso habido hasta la publicación, algunas de las aportaciones se han visto enriquecidas y actualizadas por la constante normativa habida sobre la materia objeto de investigación y divulgación, que se encuadran como resultados de investigación dentro del Proyecto TED2021130344B-100,  Desafíos y Retos de la Ordenación de las innovaciones de cambio climático financiado por MCIN/AEI/10.13039/501100011033 y por la UE NextGenerationEU/PRTR como IP.

Capítulo 1. Patents and Climate Change1

Summary:1. Introduction. 2. Climate change and its determinants. A preamble. 3. The rationale behind patent law and its relevance to the issue at stake. 3.1 Patent law provides incentives not (only) to inventiveness but (especially) to financing. 4. Climate change and IPRs in international agreements. 4.1 The role of patents within international agreements on climate change. 4.2 The goal of climate change mitigation within international agreements on patents. 4.3 The overall picture on international agreements. 5. Main issues and problems involved in current IPRs discipline with respect to promotion of “greener” technologies, along with some proposals to confront them. 5.1 Art. 27(2) TRIPS, rejection of patent applications dangerous for the environment and the problem of revocation of already granted patents. 5.2 Reallocation of exclusive rights in case of public financing. 5.3 Rules to promote availability of “green” technologies: compulsory licenses. 5.4 Rules to promote availability of “green” technologies in case of insufficient production capacity of the patent holder: competition law and FRANDs.5.5 Rules on compulsory licenses for “derivative” inventions to increase availability of “green” technologies on the market. 5.6 Special price conditions, financial supports and corresponding limitation of exhaustion of exclusive rights. 5.7 Proposal on enforcement and adaptation of the rules on description of the invention. 5.8 The issue of “defensive patenting”. 6. Conclusions. Reference List.

1. INTRODUCTION.

There is an increasing interest, in current legal and political debate, on “sustainable development”2. This concept refers to the need to harmonize the satisfaction of the needs of the current generation(s) with the needs

1 MARCHISIO, Emiliano, associate professor of Commercial Law at the “Giustino Fortunato” University of Benevento (I). ORCID: 0000-0002-2139-0656. This contribution has been exposed at the International Congress: Opportunities and Challenges of Industrial Property in the environment of climate change, held on October 20 and 21, 2022, University Carlos III de Madrid.

2 Under a legal point of view see, among others: Kotze L, Adelman S, Dube F (2022); Barral V (2012); Rieu-Clarke A (2005); Schrijver N J, Weiss F (2004); Cordonier Segger M-C, Khalfan A (2004); Decleris M (2000); Boyle A, Freestone D (1999). More in general see also: Griggs D, Stafford-Smith M, Gaffney O, Rockström J, Öhman M C, Shyamsundar P, Steffen W, Glaser G, Kanie N, Noble I (2013); Martinet V (2012); Barbier E (2011); Jabareen Y (2006).

of future ones with respect to a plurality of social, economic and environmental areas.

Among the issues falling within the scopes of “sustainable development” there is that of environmental protection in general and, specifically, that of climate change abatement or mitigation3. The environment is a “global public good” that refers to the conditions of the whole planet4 and human activity in any place of the globe invariably influences the whole system; therefore, environmental issues are regularly addressed within the international community with the scope of defining common shared paths of action for the future, as it will be noted below, at § 4.1. The goals of sustainable development and preservation of the environment are believed to being recognised increasing relevance in the next years, following the definition of specific sustainable development goals by the United Nations5.

If one admits that current climate change may be, at least in part, determined by human activities (as discussed briefly in § 2), then it is unavoidable that current and future research take into appropriate consideration the need that technology moves toward “greener” alternatives, in order to reduce anthropic impact on the environment. Such a move can be enhanced through different means: from direct public research to financing of private research centres, from tax benefits to producers and users of “clean(er)” technologies to awareness raising among citizens etc..

Enhancement of research and development (hereinafter also: R&D) in “greener” technologies may be pursues also through various incentives that legislation may provide to researchers and developers in this sector. If one recalls that the grounding for intellectual property rights (hereinafter also: IPRs) is that of promoting “the progress of science and useful arts, by securing for limited times to authors and inventors the exclusive right to their respective writings

3 See, among others: Harry S, Morad M (2013); Halsnaes K, Markandya A, Shukla P (2011); Matthew R A, Hammill A (2009); Banuri T (2009); Halsnas K, Shukla P R, Garg A (2008).

4 In fact, the environment is one of those “public goods” that solicited scholars to develop the concept of “global public goods”, to be understood as including all territories on earth: e.g., see Stiglitz J E (2006); Tiebout C M (1956). As regards consideration of “global public goods” by international institutions see, among others: European Commission (2002); OECD Development Centre, Soto M (2004); International Task Force on Global Public Goods (2006).

5 ONU, Sustainable Development Goals, 2015, https://sdgs.un.org/goals.

and discoveries”, as stated in the US Constitution6, it is somehow inescapable to consider the impact patent law has and may (and perhaps should) have on the way technology could (and should) evolve to mitigate climate change and, more generally, to preserve the environment7. This is true notwithstanding some Authors believe that such a contribution could be only marginal, due to many factors prevailing to the opposite direction8.

In this respect, after a preamble on climate change and its determinants (see § 2), I will briefly recall some theory behind patent law and its capability of providing incentives to R&D (see § 3). I acknowledge from the very beginning that patent legislation is only one of the variables capable of enhancing the dissemination of “greener” technologies, especially with respect to developing countries, where limited know-how, reduced technological capability and lack of financial resources may prevent diffusion of new technologies more than IPR reform could promote it.

However, current debate shows that such a variable is not irrelevant9. In this perspective, I will make synthetic and anthological reference to international agreements as regards both patents and climate change, in order to verify if and how they interact with each other and, on this basis, the way they are called to balance or prevail on each other (see § 4).

I will list, then, some issues and problems involved in current IPRs discipline with respect to promotion of “greener” technologies, with special reference to the interplay between developed and developing countries, and draft some proposals to confront them (see § 5).

At the end, a synthetic set of conclusions will be provided (see § 6).

6 Art. I, Sect. 8, Clause 8 of the USA constitution.

7 See, among others: Rimmer M (ed.) (2018); Menell PS, Tran SM (eds.) (2014); Rimmer M (2011); Brown A (2019); Zhuang W (2017).

8 Drahos P (2011); Tur-Sinai O (2018).

9 In fact, developing countries include limitation of patent rights within the support they require from developed countries in international negotiations – reference being made, here, e.g. to negotiations at the UN Conference on Sustainable Development (the so-called “RIO+20 summit”), the developing countries insistently to the developed ones for limitation on patent rights in relation to climate technologies: UN, General Assembly, 66th session, “Resolution adopted by the General Assembly on 27 July 2012 – The future we want”, A/RES/66/288 of 11 September 2012. Information on the debate on patent limitation may be found in Machnicka A A (2016), p. 425.

1. CLIMATE CHANGE AND ITS DETERMINANTS. A PREAMBLE.

There is a large, and increasing, debate on climate change. Discussion is not limited to specialists but is often carried out in informative debate. One of the most relevant contrasts among experts relates to the determinants of the changes experienced in the last decades10 Some researchers believe that periodical climate changes are natural phenomena independent of human activity that have always occurred on our planet and, on this basis, believe that the current situation cannot (and should not) be considered pathological. If one adopts this point of view, technology may relate to climate changes only in a narrow sense, to help humans and other forms of life to adapt to this cyclical move (so-called adaptation technologies).

Others believe that human activities, especially highly polluting ones, have a role in the climate changes humanity has been facing in the last decades, especially as regards the celerity and intensity such changes are showing. Under this hypothesis, technology is called to play a wider role: it helps not only to adapt to changing circumstances but also to mitigate and eventually reduce determinants of climate change (so-called climate change abatement technologies).

For the purposes of this paper, I will assume that climate change has, at least in part, an anthropogenic origin – which is the majority opinion. Therefore, I will also assume that evolution toward “greener” technologies may bring an impact on climate change and, therefore, should be encouraged and supported11

10 The debate is well summarised in Berlie A B (2018). Maslin M (2021) provide an overview on international action. See also Evans A, Steven D (2007).

11 By the way, I note that ecological sustainability should be encouraged notwithstanding the idea one may have on the reasons behind climate change. Pollution and damage to the ecosystem harm the life of human beings regardless of how temperature evolves over time. For this reason, I will deal with the issue at stake referring not only to “climate change” but, in general, also to pollution and “damage to the environment”.

2. THE RATIONALE BEHIND PATENT LAW AND ITS RELEVANCE TO THE ISSUE AT STAKE.

The grounding behind the idea that patent law can enhance research and development of new technologies by conferring exclusive rights12 is that technology in itself (and not manufacts incorporating it13) represents a “public good”. This means that it is non-rivalrous, i.e.: use by one individual does not reduce availability to others, and non-excludable, i.e.: individuals cannot be excluded from use or could benefit from it without paying for it14.

Non-rivalry and non-excludability make “public goods” prone to the free-riding problem, insofar as, without any market corrective, firms are discouraged from engaging in R&D on new technology because results deriving therefrom would be enjoyed by all without paying any fee for it. In such a scenario competitors would be unfairly advantaged on the firm that invented the new technology: they would be able to sell products incorporating the new technology at lower prices since they do not need to recover the costs borne for R&D (costs including other projects failed with no possibility of regaining investments).

This is one of the current justifications of IPRs in general and of patents in particular (along with other functions such as that of disseminating information): they represent exclusion mechanisms capable of turning “pub-

12 Grossman G, Helpman E (1991); Greenhalgh C, Rogers M (2010). The opposite view is upheld in Boldrin M, Levine D K (2008). Maskus K E (2000) proposes that there is not a single solution to the problem and that efficiency of strong IPRs depends on many variables and also on the context of their application.

13 This distinction lies at the very grounding of the concept of “intellectual property”. In fact, property is a right that requires a good to be referred to. Patents (and all IPRs) do not relate to goods but to cultural works which may be incorporated into goods but are not restricted to them. Therefore, application of property to cultural works, which was sought to attribute full legal protection to the latter, required a further conceptual step: that of assimilating cultural works to goods. Such a step was made by Josef Kohler, who posed the concept of immaterial goods and the distinction between corpus mysticum (the cultural work embodied in a physical support) and corpus mechanicum (the physical support): among others, see Kohler J (1887); Kohler J (1894).

14 This concept was introduced in the 1950s, when Paul Samuelson explicitly differentiated for the purposes of economic analysis between “private consumption goods” and “collective consumption goods”: Samuelson P A (1954). For current definitions of public goods see any microeconomics textbook, e.g.: Varian H R (1992); Mas-Colell A (1995); Gravelle H, Rees R (2004).

lic goods” into “club goods” (i.e.: a peculiar subtype of public goods that are non-rivalrous but excludable)15 insofar as they obliterate the intrinsic non-excludable nature of inventions by prohibiting reproduction of manufacts incorporating it16.

Thus, if one looks at patents ex post, they certainly impose inefficiencies on the market deriving from attribution of a legal monopoly17. In fact, the final goal pursued by the legal system is to increase the public domain (i.e.: the technological knowledge available), to contribute to the welfare and wellbeing of all humans. In order to reach this final goal, patent law grants temporary exclusive rights in order to promote inventive activity through the economic incentive deriving therefrom. If one looks at it ex ante, therefore, patents represent an efficient instrument insofar as without the granting of exclusive rights some research would not be carried out in the first place18.

2.1. Patent law provides incentives not (only) to inventiveness but (especially) to financing.

It is somehow common to believe that the incentive provided by patent law is granted in favour of researchers and inventors only19. It is true that,

15 Cornes R, Sandler T (1996); Mendoza R L (2012).

16 In this sense, granting of IPRs, and patents in particular, represents a normative surrogate for natural exclusivity of use and exploitation of tangible assets.

17 Boldrin M, Levine D K (2005); Boldrin M, Levine D K (1999).

18 Cockburn I, Long G (2015); Arora A, Ceccagnolo M, Cohen WM (2008); Chen Y, Puttitanum T (2005), Kanwar S, Evenson R (2003); Varsakelis NC (2001). Nard C A (2019); Cass R A, Hylton K N (2013), pp. 49 ff.. An evolutive approach to the issue is proposed, e.g., in: Asay C D (2016). Consent on this approach is not unanimous, however; among the dissenting voices, with reference to patents, see, e.g.: Grootendorst P, Hollis A, Levine DK, Pogge T, Edwards AM (2011); Lybecker KM, Freeman RA (2007); Heller MA, Eisenberg RS (1998). A wider dissent on IPRs in general is held in Kinsella SN (2013); Boldrin M, Levine DK (2008); Kinsella SN (2001).

Economic studies on the issue are available, even if their results are not univocal; see, e.g.: Williams HL (2017); Moser P (2013); Allred B, Park W (2007); Murray F, Stern S (2006); Rai AK (1999).

19 Such an idea is likely to derive from the tendency to find the grounding of IPRs in the result of a human intellectual activity, mainly developed in Locke J (1689), which entitles the author to claim “property” rights not only on tangible products but also on cultural works: Bettig R V (1996). This tenet evolved over time and

Capítulo 1. Patents and Climate Change

unless differently provided, exclusive rights are conferred to the inventor20. This connection between authorship and IPR protection is found in many pieces of legislation and is upheld by the inclusion of IPRs within the catalogue of human rights21.

Now: a significant part of the current R&D requires huge economic resources (for laboratories, raw materials, personnel, compliance with safety standards etc.) that are invariably provided by firms or other public or private entities. Especially within some areas, such as “green” technologies (or pharmaceutical etc.), it is very unlikely that innovation is carried out by a lonely genius in his or her garage. It is more likely that innovation is brough by large firms with great financial capabilities that hire scientists and researchers to study and research on given issues. Exclusive rights are granted accordingly22, since many western legal systems currently23 provide that if an inventor is hired for research and paid for that, the result of his or her activity (i.e.: the exclusive rights of economic exploitation of the invention) is granted to his or her employer24.

developed in the principle that cultural works are an “extension of oneself and of one’s personality” [R.T. De George (2009)] and should be protected correspondently.

20 European Patent Convention (1973), art. 60 (even if employer inventions are taken into account). In national legislation see, e.g.: in Italy, art. 63(2), d. lgs. 10 febbraio 2005, n. 30 (Codice della proprietà industriale); in Spain art. 6(1), Ley 24/2015, de 24 de julio; in the UK art. 7(2)(a) of the Patents Act 1977 of 29th July 1977; in France art. L611-6, loi n. 92-597 du 1 juillet 1992 (Code de la propriété intellectuelle); in Germany § 6 Patentgesetz, PatG 16 Dezember 1980

21 Art. 27 of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights (UDHR), in fact, recites that “everyone has the right to the protection of the moral and material interests resulting from any scientific, literary or artistic production of which he is the author” and similar provisions are contemplated in other pieces of legislation. On this issue see: WIPO (1999).

22 E.g.: the European Patent Office informed that in 2020 74% of the patent applications were filed by big enterprises while 21% were filed by individuals and SME. The remaining 5% was filed by universities and public research centres: EPO (2020).

23 The idea that the incentives produced by patent law should be addressed also to financing and not only to inventing was initially discussed in the XIX century: Wolk S (2011), p. 275.

24 One of the first legislations providing such an allocation of patent (rights and) revenues was Sweden, which introduced its Act of the Right to Employee inventions in 1949. Other countries followed on this same path and today the issue is specifically disciplined in many countries: Wolk S (2011), p. 276.

The US legal system provides recognition to the same needs while maintaining formal respect of the traditional paradigm. On the one hand, in fact, the so-called Intellectual Property Clause grants ownership of a patent to the inventor of the