Pollution Prevention 101

Guide from the University of Illinois Law Library

If you’re new to the process of protecting your rights to your invention by applying for a patent, you’re in the right place. This page will direct you to everything you need to know about U.S. and international patents. If what you see doesn’t answer your questions, we’ll show you where to go to dig deeper.

The Patent Public Search tool is a web-based search application for patents and patent application publications. Patent Public Search has two user-selectable modern interfaces that provide enhanced access to prior art. The new, powerful, and flexible capabilities of the application will improve the overall patent searching process.

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Search international patent applications.

Google Patents includes over 120 million patent publications from 100+ patent offices around the world, as well as many more technical documents and books indexed in Google Scholar and Google Books, and documents from the Prior Art Archive.

Find ASTM standards

The Greenhouse Gas Protocol (GHG Protocol) is the most widely used international accounting tool for government and business leaders to understand, quantify, and manage greenhouse gas emissions.

The ISO 9000 family addresses various aspects of quality management and contains some of ISO's best known standards. The standards provide guidance and tools for companies and organizations who want to ensure that their products and services consistently meet customer’s requirements, and that quality is consistently improved.

The ISO 14000 family addresses various aspects of environmental management. It provides practical tools for companies and organizations looking to identify and control their environmental impact and constantly improve their environmental performance. ISO 14001:2004 and ISO 14004:2004 focus on environmental management systems. The other standards in the family focus on specific environmental aspects such as life cycle analysis, communication and auditing.

ISO 26000 provides guidance on how businesses and organizations can operate in a socially responsible way. This means acting in an ethical and transparent way that contributes to the health and welfare of society.

For organizations committed to addressing their impact, conserving resources and improving the bottom line through efficient energy management, we developed ISO 50001. Designed to support organizations in all sectors, this ISO standard provides a practical way to improve energy use, through the development of an energy management system (EnMS).

ISO 50001 is an energy management system standard designed to support organizations in all sectors and provide a practical way to improve energy use. The standard gives organizations a recognized framework for developing an effective energy management system. Like other ISO management system standards, it follows the “Plan-Do-Check-Act” process for continual improvement.

The U.S. Department of Energy's 50001 Ready program recognizes facilities and organizations that attest to the implementation of an ISO 50001-based energy management system. The program is a self-paced, no-cost way for organizations to build a culture of structured energy improvement that leads to deeper and sustained savings that does not require any external audits or certifications. 50001 Ready partners with utilities and other organizations that support and facilitate the implementation of 50001 Ready energy management systems.

This compendium describes the sampling and analytical methods used in the Lake Michigan Mass Budget/Mass Balance (LMMB) Study.

A free, web-based, searchable compendium of environmental methods. NEMI is maintained under the direction of the Methods and Data Comparability Board, a partnership of water-quality experts from Federal agencies, States, municipalities, industry, and private organizations.

EPA offices, laboratories, and outside organizations, have developed approved methods for measuring the concentration of a substance or pollutant. This page links to EPA test methods by category.