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 .
Claim Objections
Claim 9 is objected to because of the following informalities:
In claim 9, line 3, delete “neighbouring” and replace with “neighboring”
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 5-6, 9, 18 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.
Claim 5 recites the limitation "a first safety feature" in line 3. There is insufficient antecedent basis for this limitation in the claim.
Claim 6 recites the limitation "a first safety feature" in line 2. There is insufficient antecedent basis for this limitation in the claim.
Claims 9 and 18 recites the limitation "a first safety feature" in line 2. There is insufficient antecedent basis for this limitation in the claim.
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) 1-5, 10-13, 15-16, 20 is/are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 102(a)(1) as being anticipated by Wright, JR. et al. US 2013/0241479 (hereinafter Wright).
Regarding claim 1, Wright discloses an electric vehicle charging station (¶ 0035; an EV charging station 10 including an enclosure 20 mounted onto a foundation 40), comprising:
a housing (¶¶ 0017, 0034; an electrical vehicle charging system comprising an
enclosure);
a motion sensor mounted within the housing (Claim 6; the enclosure including an electronic board containing a motion sensor);
a processor communicably coupled to the motion sensor (¶ 0037; Control unit 21 monitors the signals from each of the sensors 24 and 34),
the processor being configured to:
obtain sensor output of the motion sensor (¶¶ 0037, 0046; the motion sensor 102 senses a selected amount of movement and outputs a signal to electronic board 100 which in turn, causes the remote circuit breaker to trip which de-energizes the incoming voltage to the enclosure);
detect a first motion of the housing based on the obtained sensor output (¶ 0046 and claim 6; the motion sensor 102 can sense slight movements of a few thousandths of an inch); and
in response to detecting the first motion, initiate an auxiliary operation for activating a first safety feature corresponding to the detected first motion in connection with the electric vehicle charging station (claim 6 and ¶¶ 0022, 0037, 0046; an electronic board containing a motion sensor, said sensor capable of sensing a selected amount
of movement of said enclosure whereupon said electronic board sends a trip signal to a remotely located shunt trip main circuit breaker in response to a selected amount of movement of said enclosure as sensed by said motion sensor, thus causing said main circuit breaker to remove incoming power from said enclosure).
Regarding claim 2, Wright discloses wherein the housing comprises a bollard assembly (¶ 0006; many of these charging stations are similarly protected by bollards).
Regarding claims 3 and 16, Wright discloses wherein the motion sensor comprises at least one of: an accelerometer; a gyroscope; or a tilt indicator (¶¶ 0044, 0046).
Regarding claim 4, Wright discloses wherein detecting the first motion of the housing comprises determining that a tilt of at least a portion of the housing has occurred (claim 6 and ¶ 0046).
Regarding claim 5, Wright discloses the electric vehicle charging station further comprising an electric vehicle charger unit including at least one power converter module (¶ 0046; Board 100 is a control board for the EV charge station and is located inside converter box 12 in the EV charging station 10),
wherein initiating the auxiliary operation for activating a first safety feature comprises controlling operation of an auxiliary component that is different from the electric vehicle charger unit (¶ 0039; control unit 21 responds by applying a voltage across wires 53 which energizes the trip coil 51 on the main power shunt trip breaker
55. Energizing coil 55 causes the contacts of breaker 55 to open and thus, the power wires in cable 14 now carry no voltage and are thus safe to touch).
Regarding claim 10, Wright discloses wherein at least a portion of the motion sensor is disposed vertically above a threshold height of the housing (¶ 0022; It is an object of the present invention to detect when either sensor informs the control circuit that the "Protected System" is being physically moved either vertically, horizontally,
laterally more than a few thousandths of an inch;).
Regarding claim 11, Wright discloses wherein the processor is further configured to determine that at least a portion of the housing that is vertically above the threshold height undergoes the first motion (¶ 0022).
Regarding claim 12, Wright discloses wherein the processor is further configured to identify the first safety feature based on a mapping between one or more detectable motions of the housing and one or more defined safety operations associated with the electric vehicle charging station (¶ 0022).
Regarding claim 13, Wright discloses wherein detecting the first motion of the housing comprises determining a tilt angle of the housing (¶¶ 0021, 0034; by tilt sensor, angle sensor).
Regarding claims 15 and 20, Wright discloses a processor-implemented method, comprising:
obtaining sensor output of a motion sensor (¶¶ 0037, 0046; the motion sensor 102 senses a selected amount of movement and outputs a signal to electronic board 100 which in turn, causes the remote circuit breaker to trip which de-energizes the incoming voltage to the enclosure) mounted within a housing of an electric vehicle charging station (Claim 6 and ¶¶ 0017, 0034-0035; the enclosure including an electronic board containing a motion sensor);
detecting a first motion of the housing based on the obtained sensor output (¶ 0046 and claim 6; the motion sensor 102 can sense slight movements of a few thousandths of an inch); and
in response to detecting the first motion, initiating an auxiliary operation for activating a defined safety feature corresponding to the detected first motion in connection with the electric vehicle charging station (claim 6 and ¶¶ 0022, 0037, 0046; an electronic board containing a motion sensor, said sensor capable of sensing a selected amount of movement of said enclosure whereupon said electronic board sends a trip signal to a remotely located shunt trip main circuit breaker in response to a selected amount of movement of said enclosure as sensed by said motion sensor, thus causing said main circuit breaker to remove incoming power from said enclosure).
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) 6-8, 17 is/are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Wright, JR. et al. US 2013/0241479 (hereinafter Wright) in view of Haas (US 2017/0237944).
Regarding claims 6 and 17, Wright discloses wherein initiating the auxiliary operation for activating a first safety feature (Wright, claim 6 and ¶¶ 0022, 0037, 0046), but it fails to disclose the step of triggering a camera system to capture image data depicting at least a portion of an area surrounding the housing.
Haas discloses an electric vehicle charging station such as a smart Electric
Vehicle Supply Equipment (EVSE) with an integrated camera is provided in abstract. The communication module 20 may transmit an alert signal 80 to the camera APP 82 of an operator to cause the camera APP 82 to indicate that motion has been detected in ¶ 0059. The communication module 20 may transmit a still image or a live or previously stored streaming video from the built-in video camera 15 and/or the built-in still image camera 17 to the server 27 for a security determination, a monitoring function, an identification analysis and/or a payment processing in ¶¶ 0060, 0075-0076.
It would have been obvious to one skilled in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to modify Wright to incorporate with the teaching of Haas by collecting image data when motion has been detected via the camera unit, because it would be advantageous to allow electric vehicle charging stations owners to charge for services in a safe and secure environment without deploying additional equipment in ¶ 0086.
Regarding claim 7, Wright in view of Haas discloses wherein the camera system comprises one or more image sensors that are disposed on the housing (Haas, ¶ 0063 and fig. 2, element 220).
Regarding claim 8, Wright in view of Haas discloses wherein the camera system comprises one or more image sensors that are disposed externally of the housing and oriented toward an area surrounding the housing (Haas, ¶ 0075-0076 and fig. 2, element 220).
Claim(s) 9, 18 is/are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Wright in view of Gadh et al. US 2013/0179061 (hereinafter Gadh).
Regarding claims 9 and 18, Wright discloses wherein initiating the auxiliary operation for activating a first safety feature (Wright, claim 6 and ¶¶ 0022, 0037, 0046), but it fails to disclose the step of causing charging operations of at least one neighboring electric vehicle charging station to be disabled.
Gadh further discloses an expert system manages a power grid wherein charging
stations are connected to the power grid, with electric vehicles connected to the charging stations in abstract. The WINSmartEV system architecture has the
capability to monitor and store power consumption information for each vehicle that is connected to the chargers installed in ¶ 0236. The control center architecture
in WINSmartEV enables automatically controlled on/off of a charger based on various conditions from the sensor data, DR event, and user profile in ¶ 0243.
It would have been obvious to one skilled in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to modify Wright to incorporate with the teaching of Gadh by enabling automatically controlled on/off of a charger based on various conditions from the sensor data, because it would be advantageous to enhance vehicle battery health and further maintain grid stability.
Claim(s) 14, 19 is/are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Wright in view of Penilla et al. US 9,180,783 (hereinafter Penilla).
Regarding claims 14 and 19, Wright discloses wherein initiating the auxiliary operation for activating a first safety feature (Wright, claim 6 and ¶¶ 0022, 0037, 0046), but it fails to disclose the step of causing a visual indicator of an operational status of the electric vehicle charging station to be changed.
Penilla further discloses a method for managing charge status of an electric vehicle (EV) at a charge unit (CU) to enable color coding of charging units (CUs), to provide a visual indication to users of when a CU is available, unavailable, in process, out of service, etc. in Col. 2, lines 1-3 and Abstract.
It would have been obvious to one skilled in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to modify Wright to incorporate with the teaching of Penilla by including a visual indication on the charging unit, because it would be advantageous to provide clear visual feedback to operators about the status of the charging unit.
Conclusion
Any inquiry concerning this communication or earlier communications from the examiner should be directed to ZIXUAN ZHOU whose telephone number is (571)272-6739. The examiner can normally be reached 9:00 am to 5:00 pm.
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/ZIXUAN ZHOU/Primary Examiner, Art Unit 2859 06/15/2026
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