SummaryThe Clean Development Mechanism (CDM) is expected to stimulate the North-South transfer of climate-friendly technologies. This paper provides an assessment of the technology transfers that take place through the CDM using a unique data set of 644 registered projects. It provides a detailed description of the transfers (frequency, type, by sector, by host country, etc.). It also includes an econometric analysis of their drivers. We show that transfer likeliness increases with the size of the projects. The transfer probability is 50% higher in projects implemented in a subsidiary of Annex 1 companies while the presence of an official credit buyer has a lower -albeit positiveimpact. The analysis also yields interesting results on how technological capabilities of the host country influence technology diffusion in the CDM.

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CERNA WORKING PAPER SERIES 2010-12International audienceChina is the largest solar photovoltaic cell producer in the world, with more than one third of worldwide production in 2008, exporting more than 95 percent of what it produces. The purpose of this paper is to understand the drivers of this success and its limits, with a particular emphasis on the role of technology transfers and innovation. Our analysis combines a review of international patent data at a detailed technology level with field interviews of ten Chinese PV companies. We show that Chinese producers have acquired the technologies and skills necessary to produce PV products through two main channels: the purchasing of manufacturing equipment in a competitive international market and the recruitment of skilled executives from the Chinese diaspora who built pioneer PV firms. The success of these firms in their market is, however, not reflected in their performance in terms of innovation. Rather, patent data rather highlight a policy-driven effort to catch up in critical technological areas

The authors are grateful to the publisher, Elsevier, for letting the manuscript being archived in this Open Access repository.International audienceIn a companion paper [Dechezleprêtre, A., Glachant, M., Ménière, Y., 2008. The Clean Development Mechanism and the international diffusion of technologies: An empirical study, Energy Policy 36, 1273–1283], we gave a general description of technology transfers by Clean Development Mechanism (CDM) projects and we analyzed their drivers. In this paper, we use the same data and similar econometric models to explain inter-country differences. We focus on 4 countries gathering about 75% of the CDM projects: Brazil, China, India and Mexico. Sixty eight percent of Mexican projects include an international transfer of technology. The rates are, respectively, 12%, 40% and 59% for India, Brazil and China. Our results show that transfers to Mexico and Brazil are mainly related to the strong involvement of foreign partners and good technological capabilities. Besides a relative advantage with respect to these factors, the higher rate of international transfers in Mexico seems to be due to a sector-composition effect. The involvement of foreign partners is less frequent in India and China, where investment opportunities generated by fast growing economies seem to play a more important role in facilitating international technology transfers through the CDM. International transfers are also related to strong technology capabilities in China. In contrast, the lower rate of international transfer (12%) in India may be due to a better capability to diffuse domestic technologies

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. We use annual wind power generation to capture the stringency of the portfolio of demand--pull policies in place (e.g., guaranteed tariffs, investment and production tax credits), and patent data as an indicator of innovation activity. We find that wind technology improvements respond positively to policies both home and abroad, but the marginal effect of domestic policies is 12 times greater. The influence of foreign polices is reduced by barriers to technology diffusion, in particular lax intellectual property rights. Reducing such barriers therefore constitutes a powerful policy leverage for boosting environmental innovation globally.JEL CLASSIFICATION: O31, Q42, Q55

CERNA WORKING PAPER SERIES 2010-03International audienceArticle Abstract : Technology transfer plays a key role in global efforts to reduce greenhouse gas emissions. In this paper, we characterize the factors that promote or hinder the international diffusion of climate-friendly technologies using detailed patent data from 96 countries for the period 1995-2007. The data provide strong evidence that lax Intellectual Property regimes have a strong and negative impact on the international diffusion of patented knowledge. Restrictions on international trade and foreign direct investment also hinder the diffusion of climate-friendly technologies. Surprisingly, local technological capabilities tend to discourage transfers. While broad indicators of technology capabilities are expected to facilitate transfers, this latter result stems from our technology-specific definition of local capabilities, which makes it possible to capture a substitution effect between local and foreign inventions.
Working paper abstract: Using patent data from 66 countries for the period 1990-2003, we characterize the factors which promote or hinder the international diffusion of climate-friendly technologies on a global scale. Regression results show that technology-specific capabilities of the recipient countries are determinant factors. In contrast, the general level of education is less important. We also show that restrictions to international trade--e.g., high tariff rates--and to a lesser extent lax intellectual property regimes negatively influence the international diffusion of patented knowledge. A counter-intuitive result is that barriers to foreign direct investments can promote transfers. We discuss different possible interpretations

When adopted in 1993, the European Union's Eco‐Management and Audit Scheme (EMAS) was viewed as emblematic of a new policy approach involving more flexible and market‐based environmental instruments. A few years after coming into force, EMAS does not appear to be a tremendous success in terms of industrial participation. Apart from in Germany and Austria, participation is insignificant and comparatively very far behind that in ISO 14001, the environmental management standard of the International Organization for Standardization. The paper seeks to explain this modest result. It focuses on the influence of the European and national regulators on industrial participation. Using a comparative analysis of the implementation of EMAS in France, Germany, the Netherlands and the United Kingdom, it argues that the most powerful participation leverage has been the granting of regulatory relief for registered companies. This leads one to be pessimistic as to the future of EMAS. The possibility and scope for a lighter regulatory touch are primarily nationally specific since they are related to the national regulatory traditions. Consequently, the systematic and comprehensive use of this leverage is unlikely to generalize. Copyright © 2002 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd. and ERP Environment.

In reality, most voluntary agreements with polluters (VAs) are not enforceable in the sense that no legal tools are available to enforce …rms'commitments. We examine whether such VAs are able to achieve an e¢ cient level of environmental protection when they are obtained under the legislative threat of a pollution quota.We show that they can improve social welfare relative to legislative intervention when lobbying Congress is very e¤ective and when the polluter and the regulator do not discount future costs and bene…ts heavily. These …ndings suggest that VAs should be used selectively, taking into account sector characteristics and the degree of in ‡uence of lobbying on Congress.