DETAILED ACTION
Notice of Pre-AIA or AIA Status
The present application, filed on or after March 16, 2013, is being examined under the first inventor to file provisions of the AIA .
Continued Examination Under 37 CFR 1.114
A request for continued examination under 37 CFR 1.114, including the fee set forth in 37 CFR 1.17(e), was filed in this application after final rejection. Since this application is eligible for continued examination under 37 CFR 1.114, and the fee set forth in 37 CFR 1.17(e) has been timely paid, the finality of the previous Office action has been withdrawn pursuant to 37 CFR 1.114. Applicant's submission filed on 25 February 2026 has been entered.
Response to Arguments
Applicant’s arguments, see Remarks, filed 25 February 2026, with respect to the claim rejections under 35 USC 112 have been fully considered and are not persuasive.
Applicant argues that the present application describes the claimed subject matter such that one skilled in the art could reasonably conclude that the inventors had possession of the claimed subject matter and points paragraphs 5 and 33 of the published application to argue that in the present application it is clear that the SCADA system is for operation, control, and management of components of the plant or turbine. The examiner agrees with the argument that the SCADA system is for operation, control and management as supported by the disclosure of the application, however, what is not supported is the connection of operating, controlling or managing a plant or turbine in response to an alarm. The disclosure clearly recites a method "to identify the failure patterns and to release alarms at an early stage, which allows for the more efficient risk management of the critical components' failures and increase of the energy output by minimizing costly downtimes" in paragraph 53; in the context of said paragraph 53, management is used as managing risk, i.e., performing maintenance and/or repairs which is different from controlling as claimed and as argued.
Applicant further argues that the present application seeks to solve a failure of periodic maintenance of the prior art, the examiner points out that this solution of avoiding periodic maintenance is different from controlling a plant or turbine as claimed. Applicant further argues that a person of skill in the art would understand a solution to the prior art by releasing alarms at an early stage to effectively trigger service and control (directly in response to the alarm) for controlled maintenance (rather than periodic maintenance), the examiner respectfully points out that triggering service (when interpreted as a maintenance signal) is supported, however, triggering control is not supported. Note that the disclosure only recites releasing an alarm at an early stage for risk management, based on the disclosure, a person of skill in the art would understand that when an alarm is released, maintenance should be scheduled to correct the potential problem, however, controlling by the SCADA is in no way supported when said alarm is released.
For these reasons the arguments are not persuasive and the rejections are maintained.
Claim Rejections - 35 USC § 112
The following is a quotation of the first paragraph of 35 U.S.C. 112(a):
(a) IN GENERAL.—The specification shall contain a written description of the invention, and of the manner and process of making and using it, in such full, clear, concise, and exact terms as to enable any person skilled in the art to which it pertains, or with which it is most nearly connected, to make and use the same, and shall set forth the best mode contemplated by the inventor or joint inventor of carrying out the invention.
The following is a quotation of the first paragraph of pre-AIA 35 U.S.C. 112:
The specification shall contain a written description of the invention, and of the manner and process of making and using it, in such full, clear, concise, and exact terms as to enable any person skilled in the art to which it pertains, or with which it is most nearly connected, to make and use the same, and shall set forth the best mode contemplated by the inventor of carrying out his invention.
Claims 1-17 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 112(a) or 35 U.S.C. 112 (pre-AIA ), first paragraph, as failing to comply with the written description requirement. The claim(s) contains subject matter which was not described in the specification in such a way as to reasonably convey to one skilled in the relevant art that the inventor or a joint inventor, or for applications subject to pre-AIA 35 U.S.C. 112, the inventor(s), at the time the application was filed, had possession of the claimed invention.
Claims 1 and 15 (and claims 2-14 and 16-17 via dependency) recite “… controlling, by the SCADA control system, operation of the selected at least one wind turbine component in response to the alarm in accordance with the identified failure patterns to perform risk management of failures of the selected at least one wind turbine component.” However, the original disclosure does not support the claim limitations above. Note that the original disclosure supports (based on US 20230184223 A1 citations) “step 12 of the method comprises acquiring supervisory control and data acquisition (SCADA) data of the wind farm, or of the one part of the wind farm comprising a minimum of two wind turbines. In one preferred embodiment, the SCADA data across whole farm is collected. The SCADA data contains operation data of the wind turbine or wind farm. In general, the SCADA system is a control system of a plant or turbine used for high-level process supervisory management. The SCADA system performs a supervisory operation over a variety of the devices and components of the controlled system” (¶33) … “Using the method according to the invention it is possible to identify the failure patterns and to release alarms at an early stage, which allows for the more efficient risk management of the critical components' failures and increase of the energy output by minimizing costly downtimes” (¶53) (emphasis added). Nowhere in the original disclosure, there is a relationship of “controlling, by the SCADA control system, operation … in response to the alarm…”; even though the original disclosure supports the SCADA control system being used for high-level process supervisory management and performing supervisory operations, however, no connection is supported for the SCADA control system controlling operation in response to the alarm. Therefore, the claims contains subject matter the written description does not support to show the inventor(s) had possession of the claimed invention at the time the application was filed.
Conclusion
Any inquiry concerning this communication or earlier communications from the examiner should be directed to JUAN G FLORES whose telephone number is (571)272-3486. The examiner can normally be reached Monday - Friday, 8:30am - 5:30pm Pacific Time.
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/JUAN G FLORES/Primary Examiner, Art Unit 3745