Hewlett Packard Enterprise, Facebook and Microsoft grant free patent access for low-carbon innovators
Announced on Earth Day, the Low-Carbon Patent Pledge aims to accelerate breakthrough technologies to address climate change
Innovators developing low-carbon technologies now have free access to patents from three of the world’s largest tech companies under the Low-Carbon Patent Pledge, a commitment to help tackle climate change. Beginning today, Hewlett Packard Enterprise (NYSE: HPE), Facebook, and Microsoft are making available key patents to accelerate the adoption of low-carbon technologies. Under the HPE-led initiative, hundreds of patents that could support technologists developing low-carbon solutions for generating, storing and distributing low-carbon energy will be available royalty-free.
The Low-Carbon Patent Pledge comes amid warnings from the global scientific community that breakthrough technologies will be vital to cutting emissions fast enough to avert climate disaster. Roughly half the reductions needed to achieve net-zero emissions by 2050 require technologies that are not yet commercially available[1], according to the International Energy Agency.
The listed patents cover a broad range of preventative or adaptive technologies that can help combat climate change. These include power management, enablement of zero-carbon energy sources, efficient data center architecture, and thermal management.
“The world needs radical collaboration to meet this critical moment in the climate crisis,” said John Frey, Chief Technologist for Sustainable Transformation at Hewlett Packard Enterprise. “To achieve net-zero emissions by 2050, we need to work together to innovate faster. By opening up these patents, we hope to help accelerate and encourage innovation by enabling others to build upon our work.”
With well laid-out corporate sustainability plans of their own, the coalition partners hope that granting public access to free patents will spur researchers and scientists to unlock the technological solutions the world will need to create a lower carbon economy and a sustainable future.
"History has shown that voluntary pledges of patents can help to promote new technologies and encourage their adoption around the world,” said intellectual property law expert Jorge L. Contreras, Presidential Scholar and Professor of Law at the S.J. Quinney College of Law, University of Utah. “This is precisely the kind of initiative that's needed to combat the potentially catastrophic effects of climate change."
The list of pledged patents and terms of use are available at lowcarbonpatentpledge.org and will grow as the companies add more to the list and other tech companies join.
[1] International Energy Agency. Energy Technology Perspectives 2020 – Special Report on Clean Energy Innovation. July 2020