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 .
Allowable Subject Matter
The indicated allowability of claims 2-12 and 14-20 is withdrawn in view of the newly discovered reference(s) to Schluderberg (4,361,009) and Bostick et al (WO 2023219610). Rejections based on the newly cited reference(s) follow.
Claim Objections
Claim 5 objected to because of the following informalities:
In line 2, change “horizontally” to –horizontal--.
Appropriate correction is required.
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.
Claim(s) 2-7, 9, and 16-19 is/are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 102(a)(1) as being anticipated by Schluderberg (4,361,009). Schluderberg discloses a steam generation system (Figure 1) including a silo (10) configured to receive granular material (13) into the silo at an upper portion of the silo (Figure 1), a heater (heat exchanger 14A-F as per column 6, lines 3-6) arranged at or in the upper portion of the silo to heat the granular material received into the silo, a material transfer system (28) arranged to remove granular material exiting from a bottom of the silo, and a heat exchanger (18A-B) disposed in a lower portion of the silo and arranged to contact granular material flowing downward inside the silo wherein the heat exchanger includes at least one bank of steam generating tubes (SEE Figure 1, wherein line 113 is understood to carry feedwater between the heat exchangers 18A and 18B as per column 6, lines 51-60 and the tubes communicate with boiler 54 as per column 7, lines 23-27 and are thus steam generating tubes); the operation of the heat exchanger (18) increase enthalpy of feedwater entering the boiler above normal enthalpy levels resulting in the production of steam in the boiler. In re claim 3, Schluderberg discloses that the steam generating tubes are oriented vertically (SEE the arrangement of 18A & 18B in Figure 1). In re claim 4, Schluderberg discloses that the heat exchanger further includes an economizer (52) disposed beneath at least one bank of the steam generating tubes. In re claim 5, Schluderberg discloses that the tubes of the at least one economizer are horizontal and the material transfer system includes a conveyor belt (28) (SEE Figure 3) arranged parallel with the tubes of the economizer. In re claim 6, Schluderberg discloses a steam drum (56) operatively connected with the at least one bank of steam generating tubes (Figure 1). In re claim 7, Schluderberg discloses that the heat exchanger further includes a superheater (62) connected to receive water or steam from the steam drum (SEE Figure 1). In re claim 9, Schluderberg discloses a storage silo (72) connected to the material transfer system (28) configured to receive granular material (Figure 3) removed from the silo by the material transfer system at an upper portion of the storage silo (SEE Figure 7) and wherein the material transfer system is further configured to transfer granular material from the storage silo to the upper portion of the silo (SEE elements 146, 130 and 128 of Figure 7). In re claim 16, Schluderberg discloses a steam generation system comprising: a silo (71) configured to receive granular material (13) into the silo at an upper portion of the silo (Figure 7); a heater (122) arranged to heat the received granular material to generate heated granular material (SEE column 9, lines 32-34); a heat exchanger (124) disposed in a lower portion of the silo (Figure 7) and arranged to extract heat from the heated granular material flowing downward in the silo to generate cooled granular material (SEE column 9, lines 40-42); a material transfer system (126) arranged to remove the cooled granular material exiting from a bottom of the silo (column 9, lines 42-44); and a storage silo (72) connected to store the cooled granular material removed by the material transfer system and to transfer granular material from the storage silo to the upper portion of the silo (column 9, lines 42-46, the cooled particles flow from silo 71 onto discharge conveyor 126 for transportation to bucket elevator 150 for recycle through the system via conveyors 146 and 128 and elevator 130 as per Figure 7). In re claim 17, Schluderberg discloses that the heat exchanger comprises at least one bank of vertically-oriented steam-generating tubes (SEE the heat exchanger arrangement of 18A & 18B for reference). In re claim 18, Schluderberg discloses that the heat exchanger further includes at least one economizer (52) comprising horizontally-oriented tubes disposed beneath the at least one bank of steam-generating tubes (SEE Figures 1 or 6 for reference). In re claim 19, Schluderberg discloses that the material transfer system (126, 146) includes conveyor belts arranged parallel with the horizontally-oriented tubes of the at least one economizer (SEE Figures 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 (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.
Claim(s) 10-12, 14 and 15 is/are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Schluderberg (4,361,009) in view of Bostwick et al (WO 2023219610). Schluderberg discloses a steam generation method comprising: providing a steam generation system including a silo (71) configured to receive granular material (13) into the silo at an upper portion of the silo (Fig. 7), a heater (heat exchanger 122) arranged at or in the upper portion of the silo (Fig. 7) to heat the granular material received into the silo (col. 9, lines 32-34: “heat is applied to the particulate matter within the silo by way of a continuous charge heat exchanger 122”), a material transfer system (conveyor 126) arranged to remove granular material exiting from a bottom of the silo (col. 9, lines. 42-44: “The now cool particles flow from silo 71 onto a discharge conveyor 126 for transportation to…”), and a heat exchanger (discharge heat exchanger 124) disposed in a lower portion of the silo (Fig. 7) and arranged to contact granular material flowing downward inside the silo (col. 9, lines. 40-42: “discharge heat exchanger 124 extracting heat from the flowing particles”; Fig. 7); delivering granular material to the upper portion of the silo of the steam generation system (col. 9, lines. 42-47: the cooled particles flow from silo 71 onto a discharge conveyor 126 for transportation to a bucket elevator 150 for recycle through the system via conveyers 146 and 128 and bucket elevator 130 in the manner previously described in connection with FIG. 3. see also sand 13 flowing into top of silo in Fig. 3); operate the heater of the steam generation system (col. 9, lines. 32-35: “heat is applied to the particulate matter within the silo by way of a continuous charge heat exchanger 122, in which illustratively, hot gas or air provides the heat source.”) and flowing a heat transfer fluid through the heat exchanger of the steam generation system (as per col. 6, lines. 52-60: “Opening valve 110 allows feedwater from line 51 upstream of reheaters 96, 98 and 100 to enter line 111 and pass through section 18b being heated therein to downstream reheater temperature. Opened valve 112 allows feedwater downstream of feedwater heaters 96, 98, and 100 to enter line 113 being joined by line 111 to pass through section 18a and rejoin main feedwater line 51 downstream of economizer 52.” Although this citation pertains to heat exchanger 18 in Fig. 1. It is not explicit that the heat exchanger 124 in Fig. 7 operates the same way. In the case that they are different embodiments, it would have been obvious to a person having ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to substitute heat exchanger 124 with heat exchanger 18 because the substitution of one known element for another would have yielded predictable results (i.e. heat exchange) to one of ordinary skill in the art at the time of the invention.).
Schluderberg does not explicitly disclose that the heater used to heat the particulate is an electric heater and therefore does not disclose “delivering electricity to… wherein delivering electricity comprises generating the electricity from solar energy or from wind energy”. However, Bostick teaches, in the same field of endeavor, a method for thermal energy storage comprising delivering electricity to operate electric heaters 158 to heat “heat storage media” wherein delivering electricity comprises generating the electricity from solar energy or from wind energy (Fig. 5A; [0063]: “In this embodiment, a renewable energy source 148 (e.g., solar) is the preferred means used for heating the storage media”).
It would have been obvious to a person having ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to modify the invention of Schluderberg by substituting the teaching of electric heater(s) powered by solar energy as taught by Bostick in place of Schluderberg’s heat exchanger 122 and arrived at the applicants claimed invention since the substitution of one known element for another would have yielded predictable results (i.e. heat exchange) to one of ordinary skill in the art at the time of the invention, yielding a more environmentally friendly system by leveraging a renewable energy source. In re claim 11, Schluderberg as modified by Bostick et al would meet the limitations of the applicants claimed invention since Schluderberg discloses heating as the sand is being delivered, therefore since the heating is now being done via electricity as taught by Bostick et al, the delivery of electricity as the sand is flowing would be occurring concurrently. In re claim 12, Schluderberg as modified by Bostick et al would meet the limitations of the applicants claimed invention since both Schluderberg and Bostick also teach that the delivered granular material comprises sand. In re claim 14, Schluderberg discloses the steam generation method of claim 10, but Schluderberg only discloses that sand reaches 800 degrees F (~427 degrees C) (col. 6, lines. 35-36). Therefore, Schluderberg, as modified, does not disclose that "the delivering of the granular material and the delivering of the electricity is effective to heat the granular material to a temperature of at least 600 °C". However, Bostick also teaches this limitation. Specifically, Bostick teaches that the delivering of the granular material and the delivering of the electricity is effective to heat the granular material to a temperature of "about 650 degrees C" which is at least 600 °C (SEE [0058]). It would have been obvious to a person having ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to heat the particulate matter to at least 600 degrees C as taught by Bostick in order to provide more thermal energy for steam generation purposes. In re claim 15, Schluderberg as modified by Bostick et al would meet the limitations of the applicants claimed invention since Schluderberg discloses that delivering of the granular material and the delivering of the electricity and the flowing of the heat transfer fluid is effective to cool the granular material exiting from the bottom of the silo to a temperature of 200 degrees C or lower (SEE column 10, lines 17-26).
Allowable Subject Matter
Claims 8 and 20 are objected to as being dependent upon a rejected base claim, but would be allowable if rewritten in independent form including all of the limitations of the base claim and any intervening claims.
Any inquiry concerning this communication or earlier communications from the examiner should be directed to GREGORY A WILSON whose telephone number is (571)272-4882. The examiner can normally be reached M-F; 7:00am-4:30pm.
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/GREGORY A WILSON/Primary Examiner, Art Unit 3762 May 22, 2026
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