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 .
Priority
Applicant’s claim of priority as a 35 U.S.C. §371 national stage entry of
PCT/US2022/020544 filed March 16, 2022, which claims priority to Provisional Application 63/161,625 filed March 16, 2021, is hereby acknowledged.
Election/Restriction
Applicant’s election, with traverse, of Group I (claims 1-18 and 24-29) in the reply filed on April 16, 2026, to the restriction requirement dated Feb. 19, 2026, is hereby acknowledged. .
Accordingly, claims 1-18 and 24-29 have been examined in the instant Office action, whereas claims 19-23 have been withdrawn from consideration as drawn to a nonelected invention but remain pending with the present application.
Claim Rejections - 35 USC § 103
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.
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 1-15, 18 and 24-26 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. §103 as unpatentable over Sankaranarayanan (US 2019/0233350 A1 to Sankaranarayanan et al., published Aug. 1, 2019).
Examiner notes that the range limitation recited in dependent claim 4 (wherein the combustion products produced … comprise less than 5% of elemental carbon) is anticipated by zero/none of the products produced having elemental carbon.
Sankaranarayanan discloses a process for converting hydrocarbons to two carbon unsaturated hydrocarbons and syngas products, wherein the process includes
combustion/cracking of hydrocarbons, dry oxidative reforming of methane, and catalytic hydrogenation of acetylene, wherein the products formed among the integrated processes may be distributed and recycled among the processes for the conversion of the hydrocarbon feedstock (abstract; [0001]). The process can include subjecting a hydrocarbon feedstock to an oxidative pyrolysis process to form at least acetylene, a carbon dioxide product, and a first syngas product; hydrogenating acetylene to form one or more of ethylene and a hydrogenation product; and converting a portion of the formed carbon dioxide product to a second syngas product through an oxidative dry reforming process, wherein the first syngas products can possess a ratio of 2:1 hydrogen gas to carbon monoxide and wherein the second syngas product can have a ratio of 1.5 hydrogen gas to carbon monoxide [0004]; [0013]; [0041]; [0043]; Example 1).
Sankaranarayanan also discloses that the process can include reactions such as methane (carbon-containing carbon) with elemental oxygen to provide acetylene, carbon monoxide, hydrogen gas, carbon dioxide, and water (at 100°C), wherein carbon efficiency can be improved according to a shift in the ratio of hydrogen molecule to carbon monoxide (syngas products) by recycling the carbon dioxide side product, among other products, throughout reaction processes, such as reforming carbon dioxide, wherein the formed syngas may be recycled as fuel to drive methane pyrolysis, or as a hydrogen source for acetylene catalytic hydrogenation ([0017]; [0019]). Processing conditions can depend upon the net methane (carbon) to/oxygen (CH4/O2) ratio, wherein the amount of oxygen feed delivered to the combustion process and present throughout the reaction system dictates the reduction reaction or elimination of coke/soot formation, wherein the carbon to oxygen ratio may also affect the ratio of generated acetylene to synthesis gas, or syngas, comprising carbon monoxide and hydrogen gas, wherein at a lower oxygen content for methane combustion, the combustion does not produce enough heat for the cracking of methane to acetylene, and wherein at a higher oxygen content for methane combustion, a greater amount of methane is converted to carbon dioxide ([0013] to[0022]). Thus, a feed ratio/mole for the oxidant (e.g., oxygen) and hydrocarbon feedstock (e.g., methane) can be from about 1.7 to about 1.8, which is fuel rich ([0023] to [0026]; Examples 2 and 3, Tables 2 and 3). The combustion temperature can be between 1200°C and 1800°C ([0058]). Because the ratio of hydrogen gas to carbon monoxide produced is less than 2, the carbon dioxide can be subjected to a separate dry oxidative reforming process allowing for the production of a 2:1 hydrogen gas/carbon monoxide mixture and a 1.5:1 ratio from the dry oxidative reforming process ([0021]).
Sankaranarayanan further discloses that the combustion of the methane/hydrocarbon feedstock may comprise a main reaction zone and a quenching reaction zone, wherein in main zone the processes of combustion and cracking occurs (heated hydrocarbon feedstock/methane combusted to provide sufficient energy to drive a subsequent cracking reaction and convert the methane to acetylene) wherein in the quenching zone, the acetylene product may be sufficiently cooled to prevent the decomposition of acetylene to its elemental carbon and hydrogen components (thus, low levels of elemental carbon are present) ([0029]). Alternatively, Sankaranarayanan discloses that a lower amount oxygen can be used thereby providing an incomplete combustion and thus a portion of the remaining methane/hydrocarbon feedstock can be used as a reaction component for a cracking reaction in a second step to provide acetylene by using the available heat energy from the combustion step ([0027]). Natural gas (e.g., having >85% methane) can be used as a hydrocarbon feedstock to produce ethylene and maximize yield of acetylene and ethylene in the combustion process, wherein other olefinic hydrocarbons such as ethylene, propene, butene, pentene, and/or hexene can be used, alone or in combination with the other gases ([0028] to [0031]).
Sankaranarayanan further discloses that a portion of syngas can be separated from the product mixture to yield recovered synthesis gas (by cryogenic distillation), wherein the recovered syngas is a simultaneous recovery of both hydrogen (H2) and carbon monoxide predominant products), which can be recycled back to process streams for hydrogenation of acetylene to ethylene, wherein a portion of the recovered synthesis gas can be further converted to olefins ([0034]; [0035]). Carbon dioxide separated from the combustion/cracking process can be reformed/converted to syngas via a methane dry oxidative reforming process, wherein a mixture of methane, oxygen and carbon dioxide can be contacted with a suitable catalyst to form syngas (carbon monoxide and hydrogen (H2) gas ([0035]; [0042] to [0046]).
Sankaranarayanan teaches that adjustments can be made to the reaction temperature pressure, and/or quenching time, wherein the pressure of the hydrocarbon feed stream can be maintained within the cracking reactor between 1 bar and 20 bar (100 to 2,000 kilopascals), the higher point of this range is greater than 2 atmospheres (present claim 25), to achieve the product mixture as an outlet stream ([0061]).
Sankaranarayanan does not expressly disclose all the weight percent ratios recited in the present claims, particularly, the molar ratios of carbon dioxide to either carbon monoxide or hydrogen, as recited in present dependent claims 12-14, or the stoichiometric oxygen to carbon ratio recited in present dependent claim 24.
However, it would have been within the purview of one skilled in the art at the time of the filing of the present application to select optimal/stoichiometric molar/weight ratios of the various combustion/cracking components (such as, carbon dioxide, hydrogen or oxygen containing materials) to provide an efficient cracking/combusting process as taught in Sankaranarayanan and as discussed, supra, in this action. For example, carbon efficiency can be improved by adjusting the molar ratios of the combustion reaction products (and temperature/pressure of the reaction) to provide resultant products having sufficient energy to drive a subsequent cracking reaction and convert methane to acetylene that can be used to form methanol ([0018] to [0020]). Altering, the molar ratios of components can allow for consumption of the carbon dioxide during combustion and no need to recycle the carbon dioxide back to a pyrolysis process ([0021]; [0022]).
Thus, the resultant optimal ranges of the combustion materials can be arrived by routine optimization of these variables. See MPEP §2144.05 II A.
Thus, the instant claims are unpatentable over Sankaranarayanan.
Allowable Subject Matter
Claims 16, 17 and 27-29 are objected to as 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.
Sankaranarayanan, the closest prior art, does not teach or suggest the process recited in present independent claims 1 and 24, wherein the process further includes producing the amount/molar ratio of elemental carbon specified in dependent claims 16 and 17, or graphene as a reaction/combustion product as recited in dependent claims 16 and 27-29.
Conclusion
The prior art made of record and not relied upon is considered pertinent to applicant's disclosure.
Any inquiry concerning this communication or earlier communications from the examiner should be directed to JOHN J FIGUEROA whose telephone number is (571)272-8916. The examiner can normally be reached on 8:30 am -6:00 pm. If attempts to reach the examiner by telephone are unsuccessful, the examiner’s supervisor, JOSEPH DEL SOLE can be reached on 571-272-1130. The fax phone number for the organization where this application or proceeding is assigned is 571-273-8300.
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/JOHN J FIGUEROA/Primary Examiner, Art Unit 1763
July 18, 2026
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