Parallel tracks? The national relationship between intellectual property and climate change

Climate change has been recognised through international agreements, most recently the Paris Agreement, as a key problem of contemporary society. The fact that technologies may be the subject of intellectual property rights, held in private hands, receives limited attention in climate change negotiations and certainly in final form documents.

The problems arising from this have been explored by scholars (Rimmer, Barton) as have arguments that issues could be addressed through taking new approaches to the fragmentation of international law and to treaty interpretation (Frankel, Young, Grosse-Ruse Khan).

This presentation will discuss the potential for conflict, for court adjudication and for new judicial approaches; and will make some preliminary suggestions for new court-based relationships between intellectual property, technology and climate change which would be of transnational relevance.