Environmental policies and green innovation - Grantham Research Institute on climate change and the environment

Our work examines the impact of environmental and climate change policies on the development of new clean technologies, and on their international diffusion, in particular to developing countries. We investigate to what extent leadership in environmental regulation may lead to technological leadership at the global level.

Key publications:

Antoine Dechezleprêtre, Ralf Martin and Myra Mohnen, 2013. Knowledge spillovers from clean and dirty technologies: a patent citation analysis
How much should governments subsidize the development of new clean technologies?
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Dechezleprêtre, A., Glachant, M. July 2013. Does foreign environmental policy influence domestic innovation? Evidence from the wind industry. In: Environmental and Resource Economics.
This paper analyses the relative influence of domestic and foreign demand-pull policies in wind power across OECD countries on the rate of innovation in this technology.
– Link to paper

Antoine Dechezleprêtre, 2013. Fast-tracking “green” patent applications: an empirical analysis
This paper presents the first empirical analysis of programmes to fast-track ‘green’ patent applications in place in seven Intellectual Property offices around the world.
– Link to paper

Philippe Aghion, Antoine Dechezleprêtre, David Hemous, Ralf Martin and John Van Reenen. 2012. Carbon taxes, path dependency and directed technical change: evidence from the auto industry
Can directed technical change be used to combat climate change?
– Link to paper

Raphael Calel and Antoine Dechezleprêtre, 2012. Environmental policy and directed technological change: evidence from the European carbon market
This paper investigates the impact of the EU Emissions Trading Scheme (EU ETS)on technological change.
– Link to paper

Antoine Dechezleprêtre, Richard Perkins and Eric Neumayer. 2012. Environmental regulation and the cross-border diffusion of new technology: evidence from automobile patents
This article examines the impact of environmental regulation within countries, as well as regulatory distance between countries on international technology transfer.
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Dechezleprêtre, A., Glachant, M., Ménière, Y. February 2013. What drives the international transfer of climate change mitigation technologies? Empirical evidence from patent data. Environmental and Resource Economics, v.54, pp.161-178.
– Link to paper

Antoine Dechezleprêtre and Ralf Martin. 2010. Low-carbon innovation in the UK: evidence from patent data
UK policy makers increasingly see new technologies related to the mitigation of greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions as a potential source of income growth for the UK economy.
– Link to paper

Dechezleprêtre, A., Glachant, M., Ménière, Y. February 2009. Technology transfer by CDM projects: a comparison of Brazil, China, India and Mexico. Energy Policy, v.37, pp.703-711.
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Dechezleprêtre, A., Glachant, M., Hascic, I., Johnstone, N., and Ménière, Y. 2009. Invention and transfer of climate change mitigation technologies on a global scale: A study drawing on patent data. Report for AFD (French Development Agency).
In-depth analysis of the geographic distribution of climate mitigation inventions since 1978 and their international diffusion on a global scale.
– Link to paper

Dechezleprêtre, A., Glachant, M., Ménière, Y. April 2008. The Clean Development Mechanism and the international diffusion of technologies: an empirical study. Energy Policy, v.36, pp.1273-1283.
This paper provides an assessment of the technology transfers that take place through the CDM using a data set of 644 registered projects.
– Link to paper