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The world is increasingly threatened by climate change. As the dimensions of this danger grow, it becomes essential to develop the most effective policies to mitigate its impacts and adapt to these new conditions. Technology is one of the most crucial components of this process, and this study focuses on examining climate change adaptation technologies. The aim of the study is to investigate the entire spectrum of technology actors and to concentrate on the technology citation network established from the past to the present, aiming to identify the core actors within this structure and provide a more comprehensive outlook.

The study explores patent citation relationships using social network analysis. It utilizes patent data published between 2000 and 2023 and registered by the US Patent and Trademark Office.

Study findings reveal that technologies related to greenhouse technologies in agriculture, technologies for combatting vector-borne diseases in the health sector, rainwater harvesting technologies for water management, and urban green infrastructure technologies for infrastructure systems emerge as the most suitable technologies for adaptation. For instance, greenhouse technologies hold significant potential for sustainable agricultural production and coping with the adverse effects of climate change. Additionally, ICTs establish intensive connections with nearly all other technologies, thus supporting our efforts in climate change adaptation. These technologies facilitate data collection, analysis, and management, contributing to a better understanding of the impacts of climate change.

Existing patent analysis methods often fall short in detailing the unique contributions of each technology within a technological network. This study addresses this deficiency by comprehensively examining and evaluating each technology within the network, thereby enabling us to better understand how these technologies interact with each other and contribute to the overall technological landscape.

The building and construction industry has a significant potential to reduce adverse climate change effects. There are plans to improve the natural resource use and greenhouse gas emissions caused by the buildings by choosing energy-efficient technologies, renewable energy sources and sustainable architectural and constructional elements. This study systematically reviews the patent data for climate change mitigation technologies related to buildings, aiming to detect their relative importance and evaluate each technology in the Y02B network.

The applied approach covers the process of (1) selecting high-impact technology, (2) collecting patent data from the USPTO database, (3) creating a citation frequency matrix using cooperative patent classification codes, (4) linking high-impact patents with analytical network process method, (5) limiting centrality of identifying core technologies from indicators and (6) creating a technology network map with social network analysis.

The study results show that energy-saving control techniques, energy-efficient lighting devices, end-user electricity consumption, management technologies and systems that convert solar energy into electrical energy are core solutions that reduce the effects of climate change. In addition, solutions that will support core technologies and whose effects are expected to increase in the coming years are energy-efficient heating, ventilating and air conditioning systems, smart grid integration, hybrid renewable energy systems, fuel cells, free cooling and heat recovery units and glazing technologies.

Most of the studies on patent analysis have failed to demonstrate any convincing evidence down to the lowest component groups of an entire technology network. The applied approach considers and evaluates each component included in a technology network from a holistic perspective.