Prosecution Insights
Last updated: April 19, 2026
Application No. 18/112,670

CARBON FOOTPRINT IDENTIFICATION SYSTEM

Non-Final OA §102§103§112
Filed
Feb 22, 2023
Examiner
OUELLETTE, JONATHAN P
Art Unit
3629
Tech Center
3600 — Transportation & Electronic Commerce
Assignee
Toshiba Global Commerce Solutions, Inc.
OA Round
3 (Non-Final)
66%
Grant Probability
Favorable
3-4
OA Rounds
3y 9m
To Grant
96%
With Interview

Examiner Intelligence

Grants 66% — above average
66%
Career Allow Rate
755 granted / 1140 resolved
+14.2% vs TC avg
Strong +30% interview lift
Without
With
+30.0%
Interview Lift
resolved cases with interview
Typical timeline
3y 9m
Avg Prosecution
35 currently pending
Career history
1175
Total Applications
across all art units

Statute-Specific Performance

§101
28.9%
-11.1% vs TC avg
§103
18.5%
-21.5% vs TC avg
§102
27.8%
-12.2% vs TC avg
§112
10.9%
-29.1% vs TC avg
Black line = Tech Center average estimate • Based on career data from 1140 resolved cases

Office Action

§102 §103 §112
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 . Request for Continued Examination 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and the fee set forth in 37 CFR 1.17(e) has been timely paid, the finality of the previous Office action has been withdrawn pursuant to 37 CFR 1.114.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 11/6/2025 has been entered. Status of Claims Claim 21 has been added by Applicant as new; therefore, Claims 1-21 are currently pending in application 18/112,670. 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. Claims 1-21 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 112(a) 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, at the time the application was filed, had possession of the claimed invention. Independent claims 1 and 14 disclose the following: “outputting, for display by the POS device, a visual representation that includes at least a portion of the carbon footprint information and the computed environmental impact score” The Examiner Notes the an “Environmental Impact Score” (EIS) is generally considered in the art as broader than a Carbon Footprint, as the carbon footprint is just one component (greenhouse gas emissions) within a larger EIS, which uses Life Cycle Assessment (LCA) to cover multiple impacts like water use, toxicity, land use, and resource depletion, often summarized into a single score or category. While a carbon footprint quantifies CO2 equivalents, an EIS assesses the full "environmental footprint" across many categories, providing a more holistic view. However, the Applicant’s Specification, fails to expressly disclose the calculation of a specific “Environmental Impact Score” and outputting, for display by the POS device, a visual representation that includes the computed environmental impact score. The Applicant’s specification does disclose that “Carbon footprint information can include waste recycling information, waste disposal instructions, incentives to reduce carbon footprint impact, and more eco-friendly alternatives to purchased items (e.g., products).” (Para 0009), and tracking multiple categories of carbon footprint data (packaging information, transaction information, recycling information), “These three carbon footprint categories can be used to create a carbon footprint profile for one or more items purchased by a consumer.” (Para 0011). The disclosed carbon footprint profile for one or more items purchased by a consumer could be considered a type of Environmental Impact score; however, the specification only discloses displaying for the user/ customer alternative items, recycling information, and possible incentive information at the POS terminal display. (Applicant’s Specification Para 0073-0075; Fig.1B, 162, 163-164, and 169). The Specification never discloses the calculation of an Environmental Impact Score, nor the outputting/ displaying the “score” for display by the POS device; therefore, the claimed subject matter is 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, at the time the application was filed, had possession of the claimed invention. Dependent Claims 2-13 and 15-21 are rejected for the same the same reasons as independent claims 1 and 14, in which they depend. Claim Rejections - 35 USC § 102 In the event the determination of the status of the application as subject to AIA 35 U.S.C. 102 and 103 (or as subject to pre-AIA 35 U.S.C. 102 and 103) is incorrect, any correction of the statutory basis (i.e., changing from AIA to pre-AIA ) for the rejection will not be considered a new ground of rejection if the prior art relied upon, and the rationale supporting the rejection, would be the same under either status. The following is a quotation of the appropriate paragraphs of 35 U.S.C. 102 that form the basis for the rejections under this section made in this Office action: A person shall be entitled to a patent unless – (a)(1) the claimed invention was patented, described in a printed publication, or in public use, on sale, or otherwise available to the public before the effective filing date of the claimed invention. (a)(2) the claimed invention was described in a patent issued under section 151, or in an application for patent published or deemed published under section 122(b), in which the patent or application, as the case may be, names another inventor and was effectively filed before the effective filing date of the claimed invention. Claims 1-6, 8-18, and 20-21 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 102(a)(1) as being anticipated by Jawaharlal et al. (US 2019/0108516 A1). As per independent Claims 1 and 14, Jawaharlal discloses a method (POS Device), comprising: by a point of sale (POS) device (See at least Para 0021, “The merchant terminals 120 (e.g., computers, tablets, mobile devices, POS terminals, and the like)…”) having a processing circuitry operationally coupled to a sensing device (Internet of Things (IoT) sensors) operable to sense an identifier specific to and disposed with a container configured to transport one or more items associated with checkout of those items by the POS device (See at least Figs.1-3, Para 0022, “According to various embodiments, any of the merchant terminals 120 may transmit carbon footprint information as part of a transaction processing request to a blockchain peer 110. Here, the customer (e.g., user 130 and user terminal 140 in FIG. 1) may be a customer visiting the merchant in-person, an online shopping customer, a call customer, and the like. The carbon footprint information provided by a merchant may include an identification of a user (e.g., SSN, ADHAR, driver's license, username, password, etc.) which is unique to the user. The carbon footprint information may also include an identification of the items included in the purchase and a positive value, negative value, or neutral value associated with the items included in the purchase transaction. Each item may also include a unique ID (e.g., SKU, RFID, tag, etc.) that identifies the item being purchased.”; See also Para 0031-0035), the POS device (Merchant Terminal) being communicatively coupled over a network to a blockchain network that includes network nodes that are collectively configured to operate a blockchain having blocks (See at least Fig.3, Carbon Foot Distributed Ledger, 330; Para 0004, “… a blockchain may be used as a distributed public ledger to store information such as digital assets and the like. A blockchain is typically distributed across multiple points of entry (i.e., nodes or peers) and is a consensus of replicated, shared, and synchronized transactions. … A decentralized consensus transfers authority and trust to a decentralized network and enables its nodes to continuously and sequentially record their transactions on a public “block”, creating a unique “chain” referred to as a blockchain. Cryptography, via hash codes, is used with a blockchain to secure an authentication of a transaction source and removes the need for a central intermediary.”; Para 0022, Para 0024-0026), with each block having a header and a body with one or more transaction entries, with the header having a reference to a previous block on the blockchain and a reference to the transaction entries of the current block on the blockchain, the container identifier being specific to a cryptographic digital asset stored on the blockchain as a code that represents the container identifier, wherein verification of the block data associated with the cryptographic digital asset is performed based on a hash value generated by applying a hashing algorithm to a block header of a previous block on the blockchain and also includes a reference to carbon footprint information that identifies a blockchain stored, immutable environmental impact record1 associated with checked out items by the POS device that utilized the container (immutable ledger of the carbon footprint blockchain), with the container identifier code and the carbon footprint information reference being included in a transaction entry of a block on the blockchain that is associated with the cryptographic digital asset (See at least Fig.2, Blockchain Platform, 205; Fig.3, Carbon Foot Distributed Ledger, 330; Para 0030, “A chaincode may include the code interpretation of a smart contract, with additional features. As described herein, the chaincode may be program code deployed on a computing network, where it is executed and validated by chain validators together during a consensus process. The chaincode receives a hash and retrieves from the blockchain a hash associated with the data template created by use of a previously stored feature extractor. If the hashes of the hash identifier and the hash created from the stored identifier template data match, then the chaincode sends an authorization key to the requested service. The chaincode may write to the blockchain data associated with the cryptographic details.”, Chaincode/ smart contracts encapsulate business logic, including rules for verifying digital asset data by checking transaction integrity and linking blocks via cryptographic hashes, ensuring data immutability and ownership authentication as part of the blockchain consensus. It defines how to manage assets and transactions, accessing ledger data and enforcing rules, while the blockchain's core mechanism uses hashing (like in a Merkle tree) to chain blocks, validating data integrity through cryptographic links.; Para 0032, “The carbon footprint blockchain 330 may include a decentralized scheme (and in some cases distributed) on which the blockchain protocol is based, and which transfers authority and trust to a decentralized virtual network of peers. The blockchain peer 320 may record transactions on a public block thereby creating a unique chain (i.e., the carbon footprint blockchain). Each successive block may include a hash of the previous code; therefore, cryptography (via hash codes) may be used to secure the authentication of the transaction source and removes the need for a central intermediary. The combination of cryptography and blockchain technology together may ensure that there is never a duplicate recording of the same transaction.”; See also Para 0004, Para 0022-0024, and Para 0028-0033), 1Support in Applicant’s Specification, Para 0013, “A blockchain is an immutable public or private digital ledger, once a transaction is recorded it cannot be modified. Further, a blockchain can enable a reusable container having a container identifier to be linked to carbon footprint information associated with the checkout of one or more items by a POS device that utilize that container. By linking a reusable container recorded on the blockchain to associated carbon footprint information, the carbon footprint information associated with that reusable container can be obtained and tracked. By doing so, any individual or entity can obtain access to this carbon footprint information to incentivize the user of the reusable container such as to recognize a reduced carbon footprint impact or to provide a discount towards one or more items.” Para 0015, “… Every block 107a-b on the blockchain 105 can be verified by determining the reference values using the associated hashing function. The references included on the blockchain 105 can be hash values generated by applying one or more hashing algorithms to the corresponding data. In one example, the reference to the previous block 107a can be a hash value generated by applying a hashing algorithm to the block header 109a of the previous block 107a. The use of the references reflects the immutability of the blockchain 105, as a change to any transaction entry 113a-1-n, 113b-1-m on the blockchain 105 would result in a different reference value, which would result in the block header 109a-b of the corresponding block 107a-b to be changed, which in turn would result in a difference reference value for that block header 109a-b, requiring the block headers of all previous blocks to change. The set of transaction entries 113a-1-n, 113b-1-m can be represented by a hash tree. For example, the set of transaction entries 113a-1-n, 113b-1-m can be represented by a Merkle tree. A Merkle tree is a hash-based tree structure with each leaf node being a hash of a block 107a-b, and each non-leaf node being a hash of the children of each block 107a-b. Merkle trees can have a branching factor of two with each node having up to two children.” sensing, via the sensing device2, the identifier specific to and disposed with the container during a checkout of one or more items by the POS device (See at least Para 0006, “… a network interface configured to receive a transaction processing request from a merchant terminal, the transaction processing request may include an identification of an item and a user identification…”; Para 0022, “The carbon footprint information may also include an identification of the items included in the purchase and a positive value, negative value, or neutral value associated with the items included in the purchase transaction. Each item may also include a unique ID (e.g., SKU, RFID, tag, etc.) that identifies the item being purchased.”; Para 0031, “ … It should be appreciated that the network 300 may be included within the network 100 shown in FIG. 1, or it may be a different network. Referring to FIG. 3, the blockchain network 300 includes a merchant computing system 310, a blockchain peer node 320, a carbon footprint blockchain 330, and Internet of Things (IoT) sensors. The merchant computer 310 and the IoT sensors 340 may be connected to the blockchain peer 320 via a network such as the Internet, payment network, private network, and the like. …”, Perception layer in IoT architecture); 2Support in Applicant’s Specification, Para 0014, “… The POS device 121 can include one or more sensing devices 127a-b (e.g., camera, QR or bar code scanner, RFID device, NFC device), a weight scale 123, the like, or any combination thereof. The POS device 121 can also include a user interface device 125, 126 (e.g., touchscreen display, LED, keypad, payment reader, printer, credit card reader), or the like. …” sending, to a network node of the blockchain network over the network, an indication that includes a request for block data associated with the cryptographic digital asset based on the sensed container identifier so that the carbon footprint information associated with the checked out items by the POS device that utilized the container can be obtained based on the carbon footprint information reference; receiving, from the network node of the blockchain network over the network, an indication that includes the block data associated with the digital asset; obtaining the carbon footprint information from the block data based on the carbon footprint information reference (See at least Para 0006, “… a computing system that includes one or more of a storage configured to store a plurality of transactions in a carbon footprint blockchain, where each stored transaction may include one or more items included in the transaction and a carbon footprint associated with the one or more items included in the transaction, a network interface configured to receive a transaction processing request from a merchant terminal, the transaction processing request may include an identification of an item and a user identification, and a processor configured to perform one or more of execute chaincode which determines an aggregate carbon footprint of the user based on a carbon footprint of the item and a carbon footprint of one or more previous purchases of the user stored in the carbon footprint blockchain, wherein the processor may be further configured to control the network interface to transmit information about the determined aggregate carbon footprint of the user to the merchant terminal.”, Para 0019, “The transactions executed and stored in the carbon footprint blockchain may include information associated with the transaction including a user ID (or family/group ID), an item ID or item IDs, a carbon footprint level (e.g., positive, negative, neutral, etc.), a time stamp, and the like.”; See also Figs.1-4, Para 0022, Para 0034, and Para 0037-0039, Determines an aggregate carbon footprint of the user based on a carbon footprint of the item and a carbon footprint of one or more previous purchases of the user stored in the carbon footprint blockchain); and computing an “environmental impact score” based at least on the obtained carbon-footprint information (See at least Para 0007, “… receiving a transaction processing request from a merchant terminal, the transaction processing request may include an identification of an item and a user identification, executing chaincode which determines an aggregate carbon footprint of the user based on a carbon footprint of the item and a carbon footprint of one or more previous purchases of the user stored in the carbon footprint blockchain, …”; See also Para 0037, “… For example, each transaction may include a user identification of a purchaser of the transaction, and a positive or a negative carbon footprint amount associated with the one or more items included in the transaction. In some embodiments, the carbon footprint may include a carbon footprint level or a carbon footprint amount inserted into the transaction processing request by the merchant terminal during a purchase transaction.”); and outputting, for display by the POS device, a visual representation that includes at least a portion of the carbon footprint information (carbon footprint information of purchased item)3 (See at least Fig.5, Para 0007, “… transmitting information about the determined aggregate carbon footprint of the user to the merchant terminal.”; Para 0018, “… Manufacturers, distributors, merchants, and the like, may assign a carbon footprint amount to items (e.g., goods and services). When a user purchases or attempts to purchase an item through a purchase transaction with a merchant, the merchant may execute/process the transaction through a carbon footprint blockchain and a result of the transaction may be stored on the carbon footprint blockchain. … As another example, the carbon footprint blockchain may suggest a different item to be purchased in place of the item initially desired by the user. …” [See Para 0009 of Applicant’s Spec, Carbon footprint information can include waste recycling information, waste disposal instructions, incentives to reduce carbon footprint impact, and more eco-friendly alternatives to purchased items (e.g., products).”]; Para 0019, “The transactions executed and stored in the carbon footprint blockchain may include information associated with the transaction including a user ID (or family/group ID), an item ID or item IDs, a carbon footprint level (e.g., positive, negative, neutral, etc.), a time stamp, and the like. Each time the user attempts to purchase an item from any merchant associated with the carbon footprint blockchain network, the carbon footprint blockchain (e.g., smart contract, chaincode, etc.) may determine a previous amount of carbon footprint consumed by the user during a predetermined period of time, and provide this information to the merchant at the time of transaction, …”; Para 0023, “… the blockchain peers 110 may transmit information about the determined aggregate carbon footprint of the user to any of the merchant terminals 120.”; Para 0040, “… The output 530 may output data to an embedded display of the computing system 500, an externally connected display, a cloud platform, and the like. …”; See also Para 0022, Para 0034, and Para 0037-0040). 3Support in Applicant’s Specification, Para 0012, “During a current checkout, the POS device can display carbon footprint information associated with items scanned by the POS device during the current checkout, a previous checkout, or both. …” As per Claim 2, Jawaharlal discloses receiving, from the blockchain network node over the network, the block data associated with the cryptographic digital asset responsive to the sending of the block data request indication (See at least Figs.2-3, Para 0030-0032; See also Para 0004, Para 0022-0025, and Para 0028-0029). As per Claim 3, Jawaharlal discloses obtaining the carbon footprint information reference based on the received block data (See at least Para 0030-0032; See also Para 0004, Para 0022-0025, and Para 0028-0029). As per Claims 4 (3), 15, and 16, Jawaharlal discloses obtaining the carbon footprint information reference based on a public key or a private key associated with a corresponding carbon footprint information reference code, wherein the block data includes the carbon footprint information reference code (See at least Para 0025, “Cryptographic trust services”; Para 0033, “The carbon footprint blockchain 330 may store carbon footprint data semi-publicly in a linear container space (the block). Anyone can verify that you've placed that information because the container has a signature on it, but only an authorized user (or a program) may be able to unlock what's inside the container with a private key to that data. For example, the carbon footprint blockchain 330 may behave almost like a database, except that part of the information stored (e.g., its header) may be public. In some embodiments, the header may include user identification, item identification, and the like, associated with a carbon footprint transaction to which the block corresponds. In some embodiments, the carbon footprint blockchain 330 may bind a number of peer computers (not shown) together that commonly obey the same consensus process for releasing or recording what carbon footprint information they hold, and where all related interactions may be verified by cryptography.”; See also Para 0004, Para 0022-0025, and Para 0028-0032). As per Claim 5, Jawaharlal discloses obtaining transaction information specific to the one or more checked out items by the POS device that utilized the container; sending, by the POS device, to a network node associated with the carbon footprint information reference, an indication that includes the transaction information (See at least Para 0004, Para 0022, Para 0024-0026, and Para 0034; See also Para 0037-0039). As per Claim 6, Jawaharlal discloses receiving, by the POS device, from a network node associated with the carbon footprint information reference, an indication that includes an item that is a lower carbon footprint alternative to a corresponding item of the one or more items during the checkout, wherein the network node associated with the carbon footprint information reference is operable to determine the alternative item based on packaging information, transaction information or recycling information specific to the corresponding item and the alternative item; and outputting, for display by the POS device, a visual representation associated with the alternative item (See at least Para 0018, “… As another example, the carbon footprint blockchain may suggest a different item to be purchased in place of the item initially desired by the user. …”; Para 0034, “… In response, the blockchain peer 320 may execute a smart contract 322 or other form of chaincode which when executed can determine whether to allow the transaction, deny the transaction, suggest alternative items, etc., based on an aggregate carbon footprint of the user which may be extracted by the smart contract 322 from the carbon footprint blockchain 330. …”; See also Para 0020; Para 0033; and Para 0036, suggest alternate item). As per Claims 8, 17, and 20, Jawaharlal discloses receiving, by the POS device, from a network node associated with the carbon footprint information reference, an indication that includes an incentive associated with the one or more checked out items by the POS device that utilize the container, wherein the network node is enabled to determine an incentive specific to the carbon footprint information associated with the checked out items by the POS device that utilized the container; and outputting, for display by the POS device, a visual representation associated with the incentive (See at least Para 0018, “In some embodiments, the transaction may be approved/denied by the carbon footprint blockchain network. … As another example, the carbon footprint blockchain may levy a tax on the user if they continue with the purchase of the initial item.”; Para 0019, “The transactions executed and stored in the carbon footprint blockchain may include information associated with the transaction including a user ID (or family/group ID), an item ID or item IDs, a carbon footprint level (e.g., positive, negative, neutral, etc.), a time stamp, and the like. Each time the user attempts to purchase an item from any merchant associated with the carbon footprint blockchain network, the carbon footprint blockchain (e.g., smart contract, chaincode, etc.) may determine a previous amount of carbon footprint consumed by the user during a predetermined period of time, and provide this information to the merchant at the time of transaction, or make a determination (e.g., approval, decline, levy taxes, etc.) on the transaction at the time of purchase. In some embodiments, the determination may be based on the user's aggregated carbon footprint over a predetermined period of time (e.g., days, weeks, months, years, etc.) Here, the allowed amount of carbon footprint may be government mandated”). As per Claim 9, Jawaharlal discloses wherein the container identifier code includes a cryptographic token and a public key, with a private key associated with the container identifier code being issued to a digital wallet account associated with the cryptographic digital asset (See at least Para 0022, Para 0033-0034). As per Claim 10, Jawaharlal discloses wherein the carbon footprint information reference code includes a cryptographic token and a public key, with a private key associated with the carbon footprint information reference code being issued to a digital wallet account associated with the cryptographic digital asset (See at least Figs.1-4, Para 0022, Para 0033-0034). As per Claim 11, Jawaharlal discloses wherein the container is a reusable shopping bag composed of a non-plastic material (See at least Para 0002, Para 0018, and Para 0022, System/ method can process any type of product manufactured good). As per Claim 12, Jawaharlal discloses wherein the carbon footprint information reference includes a uniform resource locator (URL) to a network node that is configured to have access to the carbon footprint information associated with the checked out items by the POS device that utilized the container (See at least Para 0018, Para 0021, Para 0033-0034, Product Carbon Footprint data stored on network such as the internet). As per Claim 13, Jawaharlal discloses wherein the carbon footprint information reference includes a reference to a database having the carbon footprint information associated with the checked out items by the POS device that utilized the container (See at least Figs.1-4, Para 0022, Para 0033-0036, and Para 0040-0042). As per Claims 18 and 21, Jawaharlal discloses obtaining the transaction information associated with an item scanned by the POS device that utilized the container; obtaining an alternative item that has a lower carbon footprint than the scanned item based on the carbon footprint information of the scanned item and the alternative item and the transaction information associated with the scanned item; and outputting an indication that includes a visual representation associated with the alternative item (See at least Para 0018, “As another example, the carbon footprint blockchain may suggest a different item to be purchased in place of the item initially desired by the user.”; Para 0020; Para 0036, suggest alternate item; Para 0040-0042). Claim Rejections - 35 USC § 103 In the event the determination of the status of the application as subject to AIA 35 U.S.C. 102 and 103 (or as subject to pre-AIA 35 U.S.C. 102 and 103) is incorrect, any correction of the statutory basis (i.e., changing from AIA to pre-AIA ) for the rejection will not be considered a new ground of rejection if the prior art relied upon, and the rationale supporting the rejection, would be the same under either status. The following is a quotation of 35 U.S.C. 103 which forms the basis for all obviousness rejections set forth in this Office action: A patent for a claimed invention may not be obtained, notwithstanding that the claimed invention is not identically disclosed as set forth in section 102, if the differences between the claimed invention and the prior art are such that the claimed invention as a whole would have been obvious before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to a person having ordinary skill in the art to which the claimed invention pertains. Patentability shall not be negated by the manner in which the invention was made. Claims 7 and 19 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103(a) as being unpatentable over Jawaharlal in view of Hamilton, II et al. (US 2018/0158127 A1). As per Claims 7 and 19, Jawaharlal fails to expressly disclose receiving, by the POS device, from a network node associated with the carbon footprint information reference, an indication that includes recycling information associated with the one or more checked out items; and outputting, for display by the POS device, a visual representation associated with the recycling information. However, the analogous art of Hamilton discloses receiving, by the POS device, from a network node associated with the carbon footprint information reference, an indication that includes recycling information associated with the one or more checked out items; and outputting, for display by the POS device, a visual representation associated with the recycling information (See at least Fig. 2, Para 0007, “…segment the items based upon an additional environmental parameter and visually represent at least one attribute of an item or a group of items in the shopping cart. The environmental parameter may be green category, source, manufacturer, hazard level, recycle features, presence of heavy metals, and contribution to one or more than one greenhouse gas.”; See also Figs.1-3, 0007-0008, Para 0014, Para 0069-0072, Para 0084, Para 0090, and Claim 19). Therefore, before the effective filing date of the claimed invention, it would have been obvious for one of ordinary skill in the art to have included receiving, by the POS device, from a network node associated with the carbon footprint information reference, an indication that includes recycling information associated with the one or more checked out items; and outputting, for display by the POS device, a visual representation associated with the recycling information, as disclosed by Hamilton in the system disclosed by Jawaharlal, for the advantage of providing a method/ system of providing carbon footprint data to a user based on a purchase transaction, with the ability to increase the effectiveness of the system/ method by including in the purchaser visual transaction display of a variety of data types that make-up the carbon footprint determination (See KSR [127 S Ct. at 1739] “The combination of familiar elements according to known methods is likely to be obvious when it does no more than yield predictable results.”). Response to Arguments Applicant’s arguments filed on 6/23/2025, with respect to Claims 1-21, have been considered but are not persuasive, and/or are moot, based on the new grounds of rejection. The rejection will remain as Non-Final, based on the rejections above. Applicant's amendment necessitated the new ground(s) of rejection presented in this Office action. Applicant’s arguments are addressed in the rejection above. Conclusion Any inquiry concerning this communication or earlier communications from the examiner should be directed to JONATHAN P OUELLETTE whose telephone number is (571)272-6807. The examiner can normally be reached on M-F 8am-6pm. If attempts to reach the examiner by telephone are unsuccessful, the examiner’s supervisor, Lynda C Jasmin, can be reached at telephone number (571) 272-6782. The fax phone number for the organization where this application or proceeding is assigned is 571-273-8300. Information regarding the status of an application may be obtained from Patent Center. Status information for published applications may be obtained from Patent Center. Status information for unpublished applications is available through Patent Center for authorized users only. Should you have questions about access to Patent Center, contact the Electronic Business Center (EBC) at 866-217-9197 (toll-free). Examiner interviews are available via telephone, in-person, and video conferencing using a USPTO supplied web-based collaboration tool. To schedule an interview, applicant is encouraged to use the USPTO Automated Interview Request (AIR) Form at https://www.uspto.gov/patents/uspto-automated- interview-request-air-form. January 18, 2026 /JONATHAN P OUELLETTE/Primary Examiner, Art Unit 3629
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Prosecution Timeline

Feb 22, 2023
Application Filed
Jan 24, 2025
Non-Final Rejection — §102, §103, §112
May 27, 2025
Applicant Interview (Telephonic)
May 27, 2025
Examiner Interview Summary
Jun 23, 2025
Response Filed
Aug 06, 2025
Final Rejection — §102, §103, §112
Nov 06, 2025
Request for Continued Examination
Nov 14, 2025
Response after Non-Final Action
Jan 18, 2026
Non-Final Rejection — §102, §103, §112
Apr 15, 2026
Applicant Interview (Telephonic)
Apr 15, 2026
Examiner Interview Summary

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Prosecution Projections

3-4
Expected OA Rounds
66%
Grant Probability
96%
With Interview (+30.0%)
3y 9m
Median Time to Grant
High
PTA Risk
Based on 1140 resolved cases by this examiner. Grant probability derived from career allow rate.

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