Green innovations in the basic materials industry in North Rhine-Westphalia

The climate-neutral transformation of the economy presents major challenges for the energy-intensive basic materials industry in North Rhine-Westphalia. At the same time, the development of green basic materials and production processes offers promising potential that can transform North Rhine-Westphalia into the industrial location of the future.

On the path to achieving this, the ingenuity and innovative capacity of local companies are more important than ever. To scientifically capture this innovation shift, an analysis of patent activity using the IW patent database was conducted as part of this study.

The focus was on identifying climate-relevant innovations from energy-intensive industries and energy and gas supply companies in North Rhine-Westphalia between 2010 and 2018. Since patents, by definition, aim to further develop the status quo, this study developed a narrower definition of climate-relevant patent applications to avoid a certain degree of arbitrariness, in which the positive climate impact must be the core and not merely a side effect of the innovation to be patented.

In total, approximately 8,200 patent applications (both climate-relevant and non-climate-relevant) from 220 companies were identified for the period under review, with 16.4 percent meeting the criterion of "climate-relevant in the narrower sense" and thus qualifying as green innovations. A slight increase in total patent applications can be observed over the period. Climate-relevant patent applications followed this positive trend until 2017, when they jumped by almost 37 percent. Remarkably, while a decline in non-climate-relevant patent applications was observed after the global financial crisis of 2008/2009, green patent applications actually increased. Therefore, potential cuts in the R&D budgets of some companies following the crisis apparently did not negatively impact climate-relevant innovations.

As part of the analysis of climate-relevant patent applications, this study also examined technological development trends within companies. To this end, the identified green patents were assigned to six technology fields using a keyword search. The results confirm the high importance of climate-friendly innovations in the field of renewable energies, which account for 29 percent of all climate-relevant patents. Just under a fifth of the applications each fall under the technology fields of efficiency/heat and environment. Innovations in the areas of hydrogen and the circular economy represent slightly more than 10 percent of the green patent applications. Innovations in e-mobility account for 6 percent of climate protection patents.