More than two decades ago, Christopher Freeman wrote about the emergence of a new green techno-economic paradigm (TEP), concluding that: “It is therefore not soon to start thinking about and designing and building institutions and technologies which are likely to combine in a sixth (environmental) TEP” (Freeman, 1992: 207). In the debate which followed the MIT models of the 1970s on the limits to growth, two opposing parties were formed: the ‘pessimists’ (arguing for the ‘zero growth’) and the ‘optimists’ who included the SPRU and the author himself. The latter claimed that growth could and should continue into the 21st century provided two conditions were met: the implementation of a set of institutional changes favouring a different world development path; and the reorientation of the R&D system with a shift in the rate and direction of technical change to secure the first objective. In response to increasing greenhouse effects, much progress had been made mostly due to institutional change rather than to technological change (Freeman, 1992: 191). Important outcomes had been already achieved. In Freeman’s view, however, a much bigger effort had to be carried out regarding the improvement and development of new technologies, ICT being a good starting point. Quite surprisingly, this subject has been almost absent from the field of innovation economics (or innovation studies) till recently, that is for about two decades. Meanwhile, a new research field has emerged and organised in recent years focusing on the subject of transition (or transitions) to sustainability. Taking stock and reflecting about the future of innovation studies (Fagerberg, Martin e Andersen, eds., 2013), a few authors have brought to the forefront the environmental issue (particularly Perez, 2013 and Soete, 2013; but also referred to by Dosi, 2013, Nelson, 2013, and Martin, 2013), questioning the existence of excessive creative destruction and “ecologically unsustainable, innovation-led consumerism growth path” (Soete, 2013, p.136). In a final synthesis, green growth and sustainable development have been included in the future research agenda (Lundvall, 2013) together with the need for a determined state intervention (Mazzucato, 2013). Economics of innovation has provided analytical tools to think about this issue, namely through concepts such as technological trajectories, technological regimes, lock-in and path dependence, and techno-economic paradigms. In practical terms, however, and in spite of a remarkable progress in new energy technologies, the transitions to sustainability as analysed by the transitions scholars do not seem to be pushed by radical technological innovations. Radical innovations (and not so radical) make them viable. Transition is analysed from the perspective of the planet and civilisation sustainability – the driving force - and has been gradually making its way via major shifts at institutional, policy and values levels (Unruh, 2000 and 2002; Van den Bergh and Kemp, 2006; Geels, 2010), resorting to ongoing technological progress. Therefore, socio-technical transitions according to the transitions literature, even when addressing a much broader domain than the energy system (Geels, 2004), are not equivalent to shifts in techno-economic paradigms (Perez, 1988 and 2010). Paradoxically, they are broader and stricter in scope at the same time: broader, because they entail huge shifts to preserve the planet and the civilisation on a scale that outpaces the long waves reach (Smith et al, 2005); stricter, because they are mostly concerned with the energy system (Geels, 2004). This fact - together with the instrumental role of technological innovation - creates dissonance between economics of innovation and the transitions field. Of course, there are also complementarities between the two. Three topics are fundamental: the first consists of sharing many (similar) concepts originated in the innovation economics, as above mentioned; the second consists of the contribution that transitions literature may bring into innovation economics, which has by and large overlooked the environmental issue; finally, the third topic derives from the fact that economics of innovation may give a crucial contribution to the study of the creation and development of renewable energy technologies. We can forecast that a fruitful dialogue between the two domains will be established in the near future in domains to be explored in this paper.

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environmental sustainability; innovation studies; transitions to sustainability studies