DETAILED ACTION
The present application, filed on or after March 16, 2013, is being examined under the first inventor to file provisions of the AIA .
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 1 is rejected under 35 U.S.C. 102(a)(1) as being anticipated by Wei et al. CN 110323767 B (“Wei”).
Wei discloses:
1. A system and method for unbalance adjustment for inverter split-phase controlling and distribution transformer current, which is applied to a power distribution system, the power distribution system comprising a distribution transformer and an a-phase line, a b-phase line, a c-phase line, and a neutral line n connected to a low voltage side of the distribution transformer (e.g., Fig. 1: “A, B, C, N”), wherein the system for unbalance adjustment for inverter split-phase controlling and distribution transformer current comprises:
a distributed power supply equipped with a positive power output terminal and a negative power output terminal (e.g., Fig. 1 #1, “energy storage battery 1”);
a three-phase full-bridge inverter provided with a positive inverter input terminal, a negative inverter input terminal, an inverter a-phase output terminal, an inverter b-phase output terminal, and an inverter c-phase output terminal, wherein the positive inverter input terminal is connected to the positive power output terminal, the negative inverter input terminal is connected to the negative power output terminal (e.g., Fig. 1, The inverter is depicted as the box in the upper left portion of Fig. 1. The two input terminals on the left of the box are connected to the battery 1), the inverter a-phase output terminal, the inverter b-phase output terminal, and the inverter c-phase output terminal are connected to the a-phase line, the b-phase line, and the c-phase line, respectively, through a three-phase reactor (e.g., Fig. 1, The three output terminals on the right side of the inverter box are connected to inductors L which correspond to the claimed three-phase reactor.); wherein the three-phase full-bridge inverter is configured to output corresponding compensation currents to the a-phase line, the b-phase line, and the c-phase line, respectively, through the three-phase reactor, so as to perform three-phase unbalance adjustment (Contents of Invention: “distribution area balance control method and system, capable of effectively compensating the negative sequence and zero sequence current in the table area in the balance current”);
a first filter capacitor connected to the positive inverter input terminal and the positive power output terminal (e.g., Fig. 1, The two capacitors are depicted in the upper left portion of Fig. 1. They are connected in series, with one end connected to the positive terminals of the battery and inverter, and with the other end connected to the negative terminals of the battery and inverter. The inverter is the box depicted to the right of the capacitors.);
a second filter capacitor connected in series with the first filter capacitor, wherein the second filter capacitor is connected to the negative inverter input terminal and the negative power output terminal, and the neutral line n is connected between the first filter capacitor and the second filter capacitor (e.g., Fig. 1, The two capacitors are depicted in the upper left portion of Fig. 1. They are connected in series, with one end connected to the positive terminals of the battery and inverter, and with the other end connected to the negative terminals of the battery and inverter. The inverter is the box depicted to the right of the capacitors. There is also a line depicted as being connected between the capacitors and neutral line N.).
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 2 and 3 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Wei in view of Jiang et al. CN 105449709 A (“Jiang”).
Wei discloses:
2. The system and method for unbalance adjustment for inverter split-phase controlling and distribution transformer current according to claim 1, wherein the distributed power supply adopts distributed
3. The system and method for unbalance adjustment for inverter split-phase controlling and distribution transformer current according to claim 2, wherein, when load currents of the a-phase line, the b-phase line, and the c-phase line are unbalanced, the distributed power supply operates in a maximum power mode, wherein the three-phase full-bridge inverter outputs a compensation current for each phase based on the load currents of the a-phase line, the b-phase line and the c-phase line, respectively, to adjust current of each phase of the distribution transformer to a balanced state;
wherein, when load currents of the a-phase line, the b-phase line, and the c-phase line are balanced, power output to the a-phase line, the b-phase line and the c-phase line by the three-phase full-bridge inverter is equal, and the total output power of the three-phase full- bridge inverter is equal to the total output power of the distributed photovoltaic power supply (“sends the direct current voltage equalizing control module to obtain the zero sequence current reference instruction”).
Wei does not explicitly discloses that the distributed power supply is photovoltaic, as recited in claim 2.
Jiang discloses a photovoltaic power supply connected to a grid through an inverter (e.g., abstract: “an essential grid-connected inverter in photovoltaic power generation is adopted”).
Wei and Jiang are analogous art since both pertain to balancing three-phase current when connecting a power supply to a three-phase grid.
It would have been obvious to one having ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to modify Wei with Jiang since photovoltaic power supplies are ubiquitous in the art and have well-known benefits for supplementing grid power, and thus one of ordinary skill in the art could easily substitute the photovoltaic power supply of Jiang for the generic power supply battery discloses by Wei.
One of ordinary skill in the art would have additionally been motivated to make such a modification in order to simultaneously achieve injection of active power into a distributed power grid and compensation on the harmonic wave, the reactive power of the load and the unbalanced three-phase current of the grid-connected point, as taught by Wei (abstract).
Allowable Subject Matter
Claims 4-10 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.
The following is a statement of reasons for the indication of allowable subject matter:
The prior art of record fails to teach or fairly suggest the features recited claim 4, in combination with the remaining features and elements of the claimed invention.
Claims 5-10 depend from claim 4 and thus are also allowable by virtue of this dependency.
Conclusion
Any inquiry concerning this communication or earlier communications from the examiner should be directed to RYAN A JARRETT whose telephone number is (571)272-3742. The examiner can normally be reached M-F 9:00-5:30.
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/RYAN A JARRETT/Primary Examiner, Art Unit 2116
02/19/26