Report shows jump in water tech investment

The US Patent and Trademark Office is granting increasing numbers of patents directed to water technology, according to a report published by Foley & Lardner LLP.

Foley & Lardner studied patents covering five areas – purification; desalination; metering; irrigation; and groundwater – which were granted from 2009 to 2012.

The number of patents decreased from 471 in 2009 to 377 in 2010, before rising to 395 in 2011. Last year, the report showed, 557 patents were granted in the US, representing a 41 percent increase from 2011.

The large jump between 2011 and 2012 may owe to the rise in purification activity, the report said. Of the 557 patents issued last year, 406 came from the purification sector.

Scott Anderson, partner at Foley & Lardner LLP and the report’s author, said he considered patents in the purification category to cover the treatment and filtration of water, which might include equipment, filter media or individual elements of a treatment system.

“Anything involved in the direct cleaning of water,” he explained.

Anderson said economic factors may also be behind the jump last year. After they are filed, he said, patents can take about two years to be granted. That means the decrease in 2010 may reflect lower budgets in 2008, during the financial crisis, while increases thereafter may match steadily increasing economic prosperity.

“By 2010 the economy was coming back ... and companies felt more comfortable investing in water technology,” Anderson said.

According to the US Environmental Protection Agency, Americans drink more than one billion glasses of tap water per day.

The report – Water Technology U.S. Patent Landscape Annual Report – is available here.