Browsing by Author "Díaz Hernández, Miguel"

Within the general fight to tackle Climate Change, the field of Patent Law has not received the consideration that its potential to control research and entry to the market might have, especially when contrasting it with other fields of Law. The aim of this Thesis is to analyze the current Patent Law framework and create amendments that can help pursue the objective of environmental sustainability. It departs from the constitutional presence and relations between the right to an environment, which we can consider a third generation right, and the most classical right to property, especially intellectual property. We then discuss the developments and adaptations that Patent Law has undergone, its process of internationalization, stopping to revise its primary features: the balance between public interest and incentive to invent. We also enter the topic of business patent strategies, trying to see how it should be shaped to advance on this objective. After defining the concept of ‘green patent’ through the related concept of sustainability, and with the aid of environmental science, we analyze some proposals to modify the law, derived from either Patent Law itself, other fields of Law or other fields of science. We do this following the classical scheme to analyze alternatives in the formulation of public policies, although we focus heavily on the legal implications of the change. The main conclusion we achieve is suggesting three different policies: in a first stage, we consider the creation of incentives both for green patents themselves and for the development of inclusive patents. In a later stage, we aim to use the ‘serious prejudice to the environment’ clause in art. 27.2 TRIPS to outright exclude from patentability any technologies that may have clearly negative environmental impact. The main objective is to spur discussion on the topic and include better proposals to tackle climate change in our current situation through Patent Law.