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 .
Election/Restrictions
Applicant’s election without traverse of claims 1-13 in the reply filed on 10/14/2025 is acknowledged. Claims 14-25 have been cancelled.
Claim Objections
Claims 1-13 are objected to because of the following informalities:
Regarding claim 1, line 8, the phrase “feed stream for producing sulfur trioxide” is likely intended to read “feed stream to produce sulfur trioxide”.
Claims 2-13 depend from claim 1 and thus are also objected to.
Appropriate correction is required.
Claim Rejections - 35 USC § 112
The following is a quotation of 35 U.S.C. 112(b):
(b) CONCLUSION.—The specification shall conclude with one or more claims particularly pointing out and distinctly claiming the subject matter which the inventor or a joint inventor regards as the invention.
The following is a quotation of 35 U.S.C. 112 (pre-AIA ), second paragraph:
The specification shall conclude with one or more claims particularly pointing out and distinctly claiming the subject matter which the applicant regards as his invention.
Claims 7 and 8 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 112(b) or 35 U.S.C. 112 (pre-AIA ), second paragraph, as being indefinite for failing to particularly point out and distinctly claim the subject matter which the inventor or a joint inventor (or for applications subject to pre-AIA 35 U.S.C. 112, the applicant), regards as the invention.
Regarding claims 7 and 8, the term “operably co-acting” is unclear. It is unclear from the claim in what manner the sulfur dioxide feed stream is interacting with the heat exchanger such that the interaction is “operably co-acting”. The term is not defined in the instant specification and the term is not commonly used in the art such that a skilled artisan could readily surmise the metes and bounds of the term. In the interest of compact prosecution and in view of the instant invention, feeding a sulfur dioxide containing feed stream to a heat exchanger to remove heat is interpreted to be considered “operably co-acting.”
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.
Claims 1-2 and 5-13 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 102(a)(1) as being anticipated by Menon (WO01/36324A1).
Regarding claim 1, Menon teaches a process for the generation of SO3 comprising oxidizing SO2 in a catalytic converter (Abstract; Pg. 4, lines 25-26). Menon teaches a SO2-enriched gas containing oxygen (30) is combined with a source of molecular oxygen (42) to form a converter feed gas stream (48) that is then passed through a catalytic converter (45) that includes at least three catalyst beds (60, 63, 66) (Pg. 23, line 20-Pg. 24, lines 10; Fig. 1). Menon teaching a SO2-enriched gas stream is fed into a catalytic converter for oxidizing SO2 into SO3 meets the limitation “(a) introducing a sulfur dioxide feed stream into a catalytic converter for converting sulfur dioxide to sulfur trioxide.” Menon teaching that a source of molecular oxygen is added to the SO2-enriched gas stream that is fed to the catalytic converter meets the limitation “(b) introducing an oxygen-enriched feed stream, a pure oxygen feed stream, or both the oxygen-enriched feed stream and the pure oxygen feed stream into the catalytic converter.”
Menon teaches the catalysts are oxidation catalysts performing the oxidation of SO2 to SO3 (Pg. 25, lines 3-24; Pg. 26, lines 15-16). Menon teaching the catalytic converter performs catalytic oxidation and that the process generates SO3 from a SO2-enirched gas meets the limitation “(c) catalytically oxidizing at least a portion of the sulfur dioxide from the sulfur dioxide feed stream to produce sulfur trioxide.” Fig. 1 is reproduced below for convenience:
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Regarding claim 2, Menon teaches a feed stream containing SO2 (30) is added an oxygen source (42) prior to entering the catalytic converter (45) (Fig. 1; Pg. 23, line 20-Pg. 24, line 10; Pg. 23, line 20-24). The oxygen source (42) enters the catalytic converter (45) before it is added mixed with the stream containing SO2 (30), thereby forming an oxygen-enriched feed stream and meeting the limitation “adding the oxygen enriched stream to the catalytic converter.”
Regarding claim 5, Menon teaches the oxygen source that is mixed with the SO2-enriched gas can include air (Pg. 23, lines 24-30).
Regarding claim 6, Menon teaches the catalytic converter (45) has three beds (60, 63, 66) that convert SO2 to SO3 (Fig. 1; Pg. 24, lines 19-32).
Regarding claim 7, Menon teaches heat exchangers (75, 78) are positioned such that heat can be exchanged with the SO2-enriched feed gas stream (48) (Fig. 1; Pg. 25, line 3-Pg. 26, line 4). Menon further teaches heat exchangers (75 and 78) provide cooled partial conversion gas streams (81) that are then combined with a second portion (31) of SO2-enriched gas (30) (Fig. 1; Pg. 26, lines 5-16). Removing heat from a SO2-containing gas stream, cooling the gas stream with heat exchangers, and then mixing with a separate converter feed gas is considered to meet the limitation “operably co-acting” as outlined in the 112(b) section above.
Regarding claim 8, Menon teaches the catalytic converter (45) has three beds (60, 63, 66) that catalytically oxidizes SO2 to SO3 (Fig. 1; Pg. 24, lines 19-32). Menon further teaches heat exchangers (75 and 78) provide cooled partial conversion gas streams (81) that are then combined with a second portion (31) of SO2-enriched gas (30) (Fig. 1; Pg. 26, lines 5-16). Removing heat from a SO2-containing gas stream, cooling the gas stream with heat exchangers, and then mixing with a separate converter feed gas is considered to meet the limitation “operably co-acting” as outlined in the 112(b) section above.
Regarding claim 9, Menon teaches the catalytic converter (45) has three beds (60, 63, 66) that catalytically oxidizes SO2 to SO3 (Fig. 1; Pg. 24, lines 19-32). Menon teaches heat exchangers (75, 78) are positioned such that heat can be exchanged with the SO2-enriched feed gas stream (48) (Fig. 1; Pg. 25, line 3-Pg. 26, line 4). Menon teaching the catalyst beds (60, 63, 66) are provided with a heat exchangers (75, 78) located between each catalyst bed is consistent with an alternating arrangement (i.e. catalyst, heat exchanger, catalyst), meeting the limitation of being “alternately positioned along the catalytic converter”.
Regarding claim 10, Menon teaches the SO2-enriched feed stream (30) is mixed with oxygen source (42) prior entering the catalyst bed (60), which is the first in line in the three-bed catalyst depicted in Figure 1 and upstream of the catalyst bed series (Fig. 1; Claim 1).
Regarding claim 11, Menon teaches the SO2-enriched feed stream (30) is mixed with oxygen source (42) prior entering the catalytic converter (45), where the oxygen source stream (42) and SO2-enriched feed stream (30) can be diverted to enter the catalyst bed (63) at a position that is upstream of the heat exchanger (78) (Fig. 1).
Regarding claim 12, Menon teaches the SO2-enriched feed stream (30) is mixed with oxygen source (42) prior to entering the catalytic converter (45), where the oxygen source stream (42) and SO2-enriched feed stream (30) can be diverted to enter the catalyst bed (63) at a position that is downstream of the heat exchanger (75) (Fig. 1).
Regarding claim 13, Menon teaches the SO2-source gas can be derived from spent sulfuric acid (Pg. 10, lines 26-29) or can be derived from burning sulfur-containing material in a kiln or other suitable thermal combusiton zone (Pg. 11, lines 1-7).
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 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.
The factual inquiries for establishing a background for determining obviousness under 35 U.S.C.
103 are summarized as follows:
1. Determining the scope and contents of the prior art.
2. Ascertaining the differences between the prior art and the claims at issue.
3. Resolving the level of ordinary skill in the pertinent art.
4. Considering objective evidence present in the application indicating obviousness or
nonobviousness.
This application currently names joint inventors. In considering patentability of the claims the examiner presumes that the subject matter of the various claims was commonly owned as of the effective filing date of the claimed invention(s) absent any evidence to the contrary. Applicant is advised of the obligation under 37 CFR 1.56 to point out the inventor and effective filing dates of each claim that was not commonly owned as of the effective filing date of the later invention in order for the examiner to consider the applicability of 35 U.S.C. 102(b)(2)(C) for any potential 35 U.S.C. 102(a)(2) prior art against the later invention.
Claims 3-4 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Menon (WO01/36324A1) in view of Blakey et al. (EP0004745A1).
Regarding claim 3, Menon anticipates the process of claim 1 and the claim further requires “adding the pure oxygen feed stream to the catalytic converter.”
Menon teaches pure molecular oxygen can be added to catalyst but that the molecular oxygen is mixed with the SO2-enriched stream prior to entering the catalytic converter.
Blakey teaches a process for the catalytic oxidation of sulfur dioxide to sulfur trioxide that includes introducing a gas mixture of sulfur dioxide and oxygen flows from pipeline (120) into a series of successive catalyst layers within the catalytic converter where a separate stream of pure oxygen is introduced to the catalytic converter via pipeline (128) (Abstract; Fig. 1). Blakey teaches the oxygen introduced is commercially pure oxygen with a content of oxygen of at least 90% (Pg. 2, par. 3).
Advantageously, the addition of commercial oxygen increases the efficiency of conversion of sulfur dioxide to sulfur trioxide while increasing the rate of production (Pg. 4, par. 2-3).
Thus, prior to the effective filing date of the claimed invention, it would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art to introduce a commercially pure oxygen stream into the catalyst in the process of Menon in order to increase the efficiency of the conversion of sulfur dioxide to sulfur trioxide while also increasing the rate of production, as taught by Blakey.
Regarding claim 4, Menon anticipates the process of claim 1 and Menon further teaches adding a feed stream containing SO2 (30) is added an oxygen source (42) prior to entering the catalytic converter (45) (Fig. 1; Pg. 23, line 20-Pg. 24, line 10). Menon teaching the oxygen source (42) enters the catalytic converter (45) before it is added mixed with the stream containing SO2 (30), is equivalent with forming an oxygen-enriched feed stream and meets the limitation “adding the oxygen enriched stream to the catalytic converter.”
The claim further requires in addition to adding an oxygen-enriched feed stream to the catalytic converter a pure oxygen feed stream is also added, to which Menon does not explicitly teach.
Blakey teaches a process for the catalytic oxidation of sulfur dioxide to sulfur trioxide that includes introducing a gas mixture of sulfur dioxide and oxygen flows from pipeline (120) into a series of successive catalyst layers where a separate stream of pure oxygen is introduced to the catalyst via pipeline (128) (Abstract; Fig. 1). Blakey teaches the oxygen introduced is commercially pure oxygen and introduced in addition to a sulfur dioxide stream containing oxygen (Pg. 2, par. 3; Pg. 5, par. 9-10; Pg. 6, par. 2).
Advantageously, the addition of commercial oxygen increases the efficiency of conversion of sulfur dioxide to sulfur trioxide while increasing the rate of production (Pg. 4, par. 9-10; Pg. 2, par. 2-3;).
Thus, prior to the effective filing date of the claimed invention, it would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art to introduce a commercially pure oxygen stream into the catalyst in addition to an oxygen-enriched feed stream containing sulfur dioxide in the process of Menon in order to increase the efficiency of the conversion of sulfur dioxide to sulfur trioxide while also increasing the rate of production, as taught by Blakey.
Conclusion
The prior art made of record and not relied upon is considered pertinent to applicant's disclosure. Ashar et al. (AU2015412464B2); Guth (DE2026818A1 English); Hall et al. (US20130295001A1); Heinz et al. (CA1076775A); Huber et al. (AT402286B English); MacArthur et al. (WO1998032694A1); Mollerhoj (US9487401); Thellefsen et al. (US20190177161A1); Vydra et al. (US4016248); Watson et al. (CA1297267C); Hurlburt et al. (US4046866).
Any inquiry concerning this communication or earlier communications from the examiner should be directed to Jordan Wayne Taylor whose telephone number is (571)272-9895. The examiner can normally be reached Monday - Friday, 7:30 AM - 5 PM EST; Second Fridays Off.
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If attempts to reach the examiner by telephone are unsuccessful, the examiner’s supervisor, Sally A. Merkling can be reached on (571)272-6297. The fax phone number for the organization where this application or proceeding is assigned is 571-273-8300.
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/J.W.T./Examiner, Art Unit 1738
/SALLY A MERKLING/SPE, Art Unit 1738