20 February 2012: The Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) has published a working paper titled “International Technology Agreements for Climate Change– Analysis Based on Co-Invention Data,” which measures the effects of multilateral energy technology initiatives on patent submission levels.

The paper, by Ivan Haščič, Nick Johnstone, and Nadja Kahrobaie, examines energy patent data from 33 countries over the period from 1970-2009. It found that these initiatives, often called Implementing Agreements, have an important catalytic affect on co-invention of energy technologies. It also found that extending these agreements to other counties would increase co-inventions of wind and fuel cell technology by up to 90%, and more than this for biofuel, solar and Carbon Capture and Storage (CCS) technologies. [Publication: International Technology Agreements for Climate Change– Analysis Based on Co-Invention Data]