Green inventions can help society, and patenting them can reap rewards for up to 20 years.
When it comes to protecting the intellectual property underlying green innovations, Marc Maidment (Director and Patent Attorney at Albright IP) takes a keen interest, and you should too if you are developing new and improved products or processes.
How familiar are you with the UK patent system, and the tax benefits you can get from it? Get a granted UK patent for your latest product or process invention and it could be financially lucrative, and if it protects a green invention then you could start benefitting even faster…
What counts as an invention?
Inventions come in all shapes and sizes. Some are utterly ground breaking and far-removed from anything that’s ever been done before. Often though, an invention is just an incremental but still important improvement on a known product or process.
A common theme in the UK and Europe is that an invention needs to solve some sort of technical problem to be patentable. Take the problem of recycling plastics, for example. I expect that we can all agree that waste plastic pollution is bad for our planet, but how to begin tackling the ever-accumulating tons of it… Stop making so many plastic items in the first place? Wishful thinking. Re-use existing plastic items? Impractical in most cases. Invent and patent a way to bulk thermo-catalytically crack them back to useful hydrocarbon gases? Bingo.
Even if we were already recycling all plastics, some waste plastic would likely still find its way into waterways and begin to break down, but you could use bubble barriers to catch them before they reach the sea. Even without that, people are inventing ways to filter microplastics from seawater, and even ways to make graphene from microplastics.
Importantly, if the invention is new and not obvious compared to any so-called ‘prior art’ – i.e. things that are already publicly known – then two of the key criteria for patentability are met. Whatever your inventions are, it is worth discussing them with a patent attorney at an early stage.
Getting to patent grant quicker
If you’ve ever been through the patent process, you’d be forgiven for thinking glaciers move faster than some Patent Offices (and they probably do in view of climate change). It usually takes years to get a patent granted.
Not so for green inventions if you apply for a patent at the UK Intellectual Property Office. The “Green Channel” allows you to fast-track patent prosecution for green inventions, meaning that you can sometimes receive a granted UK patent in a matter of months. You can actually search which applications have been accelerated under the Green Channel, which gives some insight into green technologies which might be perceived to be relatively more important.
Other types of invention aren’t offered the same accelerated treatment as green inventions, which is essentially a policy issue. Climate change is bad for the planet (or at least for human life as we currently know it), and the Green Channel is one way to encourage commercialisation of green innovations. It’s no good having a green idea if it’s never put into practice, and getting a granted patent is good news for getting investment.
Speaking of climate change, there are plenty of green inventions on that front – indeed, far too many to list here. From carbon dioxide removal by a new direct air capture plant in Iceland, to sending bundles of Sargassum seaweed to an oxygen-deprived abyss, to dusting crop fields with crushed basalt, to making recycled cement using electric arc furnaces (which, unsurprisingly, is patent pending), there are plenty of ways that carbon is being captured or not released in the first place. But, the headline innovation isn’t always the core thing being patented. The key invention in some cases can be a small component of a larger system or tweak to a process – but if it confers a technical advantage, then it is worth protecting.
From tax paid to your money back
Now to the Patent Box – it’s a UK government scheme that rewards you for ‘qualifying development’ for a patented product or process. Under the Patent Box, the effective rate of corporation tax on your profits related to the patented product or process is effectively reduced to 10%. So, getting a UK patent granted really can yield dividends.
The catch is that you can only make a Patent Box claim once your patent is granted. And that’s where the Green Channel comes in; patent applications for green inventions can jump the queue and more quickly realise the benefits of Patent Box tax relief, making a profitable invention even more profitable.
With all of this in mind, it’s important to consider patenting at an early stage whenever you or your team find ways to improve something. And until you apply for a patent, keep your invention secret! Otherwise, telling the world about your invention will take away your option to patent it.
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