Technological research, innovation and sustainability
The exam tests whether you can distinguish invention from innovation, describe technology transfer, and apply life-cycle analysis with numbers rather than slogans.
R&D&i and technology transfer
- Chain: basic research → applied research → development → innovation. Innovation is the first successful commercial or organisational application of an idea; an invention need not succeed commercially.
- Types: product, process, organisational and marketing innovation; incremental (improves existing technology) versus radical (creates a new trajectory).
- Technology push versus market pull; the S-curve shows performance improving slowly, then fast, then saturating - the moment to switch technology.
- TRL 1–9 measures maturity, from basic principles to a system proven in operation.
- Patents: 20 years of protection for novelty, inventive step and industrial application; utility models are shorter (10 years in Spain) and protect small devices. Alternatives: trade secret, lead time, design registration.
- Transfer channels: licensing, spin-offs, joint ventures, contract research, standards and publications.
Life-cycle analysis
ISO 14040/14044 defines four phases: goal and scope (functional unit, system boundary), inventory, impact assessment and interpretation. Cradle-to-grave covers extraction, manufacture, use and end-of-life. Typical categories: global warming potential (kg CO2-eq), acidification, eutrophication, abiotic depletion, water use. Weighting into a single score is subjective and must be declared.
Sustainability
Circular economy, eco-design and the 6R (reduce, reuse, repair, remanufacture, recycle, recover), energy payback time of renewables, carbon footprint, ISO 14001 environmental management, the SDGs and the Paris Agreement.
Worked example
LCA of an aluminium bracket, 1.2 kg: primary aluminium 11 kg CO2-eq/kg gives 13.2 kg; transport 500 km at 0.09 kg CO2-eq per tonne-kilometre adds 0.0012 t × 500 × 0.09 = 0.05 kg; use phase 30 kWh × 0.25 kg CO2-eq/kWh = 7.5 kg. If 90 % is recycled at the end of life, remelting at about 0.5 kg CO2-eq/kg credits roughly 1.08 × (11 − 0.5) ≈ 11.3 kg. Net total ≈ 21 − 11 = 10 kg CO2-eq.
Traps that cost marks
- Presenting one LCA score without stating the weighting method.
- Confusing recyclable with recycled content.
- Treating a patent as proof of commercial success.
- Assuming TRL progress is automatic and linear.