Innovation is a driver for economic growth and is referred to as important indicator for the transition towards a competitive, secure and sustainable energy system. For a measurement regarding the innovation impacts of energy efficiency, first we identify relevant energy saving technologies from the ODYSSEE, which provides diffusion data showing the share of stock and sales for energy efficient technologies (i.e. appliances of a certain energy efficiency class, efficient heating systems, etc.). These energy saving technologies and the technological details related to energy efficiency are identified and then linked to suitable classes and sub-classes of the International Patent Classification (IPC) system. This strategy is supported by the search of certain energy efficiency related keywords in the abstract and title of patents.

For the patents found by this strategy, which are available for example from the PATSTAT database, the relative patent share (RPA) is calculated by putting the patent share of the country for the given energy efficiency technology of scope in relation to patent shares of the country in all fields. If the patent share for a technology is over-proportionally large then the RPA takes a positive value. This implies that – compared to other technologies – there is more national innovation activity. However, if a country is generally strong in patents, it is more difficult for a technology to achieve a positive RPA value.

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