The Supreme Court has ruled that two inventors' patent of a method of hedging weather-related risk in energy prices cannot be granted.

The high court on Monday unanimously agreed with a lower court ruling that threw out Bernard Bilski and Rand Warsaw's patent.

The Patent Office concluded the process was too abstract. Bilski and Warsaw sued, but an appeals court ruled against them. The U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit said a process is eligible for a patent only if it is "tied to a particular machine or apparatus" or if it "transforms a particular article into a different state or thing."

The Supreme Court agreed.