Ex Parte ILO

Patent Trials and Appeals Board

Feb 14, 2019

14781514 - (D) (P.T.A.B. Feb. 14, 2019)

UNITED STA TES p A TENT AND TRADEMARK OFFICE
APPLICATION NO. FILING DATE
14/781,514 09/30/2015
27799 7590 02/19/2019
Cozen O'Connor
277 Park A venue, 20th floor
NEW YORK, NY 10172
FIRST NAMED INVENTOR
AlbanaILO
UNITED STATES DEPARTMENT OF COMMERCE
United States Patent and Trademark Office
Address: COMMISSIONER FOR PATENTS
P.O. Box 1450
Alexandria, Virginia 22313-1450
www .uspto.gov
ATTORNEY DOCKET NO. CONFIRMATION NO.
5029- l 428PUS/375355 8902
EXAMINER
PATEL, JIGNESHKUMAR C
ART UNIT PAPER NUMBER
2118
NOTIFICATION DATE DELIVERY MODE
02/19/2019 ELECTRONIC
Please find below and/or attached an Office communication concerning this application or proceeding.
The time period for reply, if any, is set in the attached communication.
Notice of the Office communication was sent electronically on above-indicated "Notification Date" to the
following e-mail address(es):
patentsecretary@cozen.com
patentdocket@cozen.com
patentsorter@cozen.com
PTOL-90A (Rev. 04/07)
UNITED STATES PATENT AND TRADEMARK OFFICE
BEFORE THE PATENT TRIAL AND APPEAL BOARD
Ex parte ALBANA IL0 1
Appeal2018-007105
Application 14/781,514
Technology Center 2100
Before BRADLEY W. BAUMEISTER, SHARON PENICK, and
RUSSELL E. CASS, Administrative Patent Judges.
BAUMEISTER, Administrative Patent Judge.
DECISION ON APPEAL
Appellant appeals under 35 U.S.C. § 134(a) from the Examiner's
Final Rejection of claims 7-17, which constitute all the claims pending in
this application. App. Br. 1-8. 2 We have jurisdiction under 35 U.S.C.
§ 6(b ).
We reverse.
1 Appellant lists Siemens AG as the real party in interest. Appeal Brief filed
March 28, 2018 ("App. Br.") 2.
2 Rather than repeat the Examiner's positions and Appellant's arguments in
their entirety, we refer to the above mentioned appeal brief, as well as the
following documents for their respective details: the Final Action mailed
October 13, 2017 ("Final Act."); the Examiner's Answer mailed May 1,
2018 ("Ans."); and the Reply Brief filed July 2, 2018 ("Reply Br.").
Appeal2018-007105
Application 14/781,514
STATEMENT OF THE CASE
Appellant describes the present invention as follows:
A method for operating an energy supply network,
wherein energy generation is decentralized, the energy supply
network has three supply levels, and energy is generated in each
supply level and is fed into the particular supply level, where the
three supply levels each form an independent control unit that is
connectable or disconnectable via interfaces between the control
units as needed, an operator region is associated with each of the
control units, in which operator region an energy feed-in and an
energy consumption for the respective associated control unit are
combined and controlled, and where an exchange of energy
amounts between the control units is then controlled, such as in
a demand-oriented manner, by the respective operator areas via
the interfaces between associated control units by the control of
parameters defined between the control units, such that the entire
energy supply network can be dynamically controlled in a simple
manner.
Replacement Abstract filed Sept. 30, 2015.
Independent claim 7, reproduced below, illustrates the appealed claims:
7. A method for operating an entire single energy supply
network system having three supply levels, energy being
generated and fed into each supply level by producers, the
method comprising:
configuring each of the three supply levels of the single
energy supply network system as an independent regulating unit
which is connected or disconnected via interfaces between
respective regulating units as required;
assigning a respective operator region to each of the
regulating units, energy feed-in by producers and energy
consumption by consumer loads of a respective supply level
being combined and a respective regulating unit being controlled
by the respective operator region; and
controlling an exchange of energy amounts between
respective regulating units by each associated operator region,
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Appeal2018-007105
Application 14/781,514
via an interface between the respective regulating units, by
controlling parameters defined between the respective regulating
units.
Claims 7-17 stand rejected under 35 U.S.C. § I03(a) as obvious
over Kim (US 2012/0166002 Al; published June 28, 2012) and Cherian
(US 2012/0029720 Al; published February 2, 2012). Final Act. 3-10.
We review the appealed rejections for error based upon the issues
identified by Appellant, and in light of the arguments and evidence produced
thereon. Ex parte Frye, 94 USPQ2d 1072, 1075 (BPAI 2010) (precedential).
FINDINGS AND CONTENTIONS
The Examiner finds that "Kim teaches a method for operating an
entire [single] energy supply network system having three supply levels[,
with] ... energy being generated and fed into each supply level by
producers." Final Act. 4. The Examiner finds that "Kim does not
specifically teach configuring each of the three supply levels ... as an
independent regulating unit [that] ... is connected or disconnected via
interfaces between respective regulating units[,] as required." Id. The
Examiner further finds that Kim does not teach the further steps of assigning
a respective operator region to each of the regulating units, or controlling an
exchange of energy amounts among the respective regulating units by each
associated operator region. Id. at 4--5. The Examiner finds that Cherian
teaches these additional claim elements (id. at 5-7) and that motivation
existed to combine the references' teachings:
[I]t would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art
... to modify [Kim's] the three[-]level supply with power
generation at each level . . . to include the independent local
control module with regional control module of Cherian with the
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Appeal2018-007105
Application 14/781,514
motivation to taking action to keep supply and demand in balance
if very fast action is required to keep the system in a stable
operating condition.
Id. at 7 ( citing Cherian ,r 23).
Appellant argues, inter alia,
Cherian teaches a dynamic distributed power grid control
system with a hierarchical structure, and shows and describes
three different power generation plants service three distinct and
separate regions of power consumption (see Fig. 1 and paragraph
[001 OJ). Each local control module falls under the control of a
regional control module for management and control of the
associated power producers and consumers. The regional control
module is operable to manage power production, distribution
and/or storage within an associated region. The regional control
module is also capable of transferring power to other regions
(see, e.g., paragraph [0021]). Cherian thus teaches, e.g., a power
grid management system that is clearly used when new and
renewable energy is generated ( e.g., wind power or photovoltaic)
that depends, e.g., on weather conditions. Cherian, likewise, also
fails to teach or suggest a single entire energy network having
three supply levels, where each supply level is
regarded/configured as (an independent) regulation unit-the
supply level is the regulation unit.
App. Br. 7.
ANALYSIS
Appellant acknowledges that it previously was known to generate or
provide energy at three voltage levels-high, medium, and low voltage. See,
e.g., Spec. ,r,r 6, 7. The germane question on appeal, though, is whether the
Examiner has established that the cited art teaches or suggests configuring or
grouping one or more generation stations ( and possibly loads) for each of
these three supply or voltage levels into independent regulating units that
respectively are under the control of their own operator regions. The
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Appeal2018-007105
Application 14/781,514
Examiner has not established that it would have been obvious to combine
the cited prior art in a manner that would satisfy this claim requirement.
Cherian does disclose subdividing an energy distribution system or
grid into enterprise, regional, and local areas with their own respective
control modules. See, e.g., Cherian, FIG. 2. But the cited portions of
Cherian indicate that the areas are subdivided geographically-not by
voltage levels. See, e.g., id. ( depicting local control modules being
associated with areas that respectively include only an individual power
generation plant); see also Cherian ,r 20, cited in Final Act. 5 ( explaining
that "regional control modules are integrated into existing transmission sub-
stations and distribution sub-stations," thereby indicating that the region is
comprised of varying voltage levels). As Cherian explains:
[A] distributed control system is interfaced with an ex1stmg
power distribution grid to efficiently control power production
and distribution. The distributed control system has three
primary layers: i) enterprise control module, ii) regional control
modules, and iii) local control modules. An enterprise control
module is communicatively coupled to existing supervisory
control and data acquisition systems, and to a plurality of
regional control modules. The regional control modules are
integrated into existing transm1ss10n sub-stations and
distribution sub-stations to monitor and issue control signals to
other devices or control modules to dynamically manage power
flows on the grid.
Cherian goes on to explain that a local control module can control a
single high-voltage generation station ( e.g., a steam driven electric
generator), as well as a low-voltage generation station (e.g., a solar array):
Each regional control module is further associated with a
plurality of local control modules that interface with power
producers, including steam driven electric generators, wind
turbine farms, hydroelectric facilities and photoelectric (solar)
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Application 14/781,514
Id.
arrays, storage resources such as thermal or electric storage
devices and batteries on electric vehicles, and demand
management systems or smart appliances.
As such, the Examiner combines the references by modifying
Cherian's system for separately controlling varying expanses of
geographical coverage to instead provide separate control of high-voltage,
medium-voltage, and low-voltage power generation stations. The
Examiner's stated motivation (Final Act. 7) does not sufficiently explain
why one of ordinary skill would reasonably understand that Cherian's
scheme for balancing load supply and demand through independent
geographical generation control would be applicable to independent power
level control. Nor does the Examiner provide a reason or motivation as to
why a person of ordinary skill would have modified Cherian's geographical
control scheme to instead exchange energy between different independent
regulating units with different power supply levels. The Examiner's
combining of the cited references in this manner appears to be a result of the
Examiner impermissibly using the claim language as a roadmap. See In re
McLaughlin, 443 F.2d 1392, 1395, (CCPA 1971) (explaining that a
judgment of obviousness is improper when based upon knowledge gleaned
only from an applicant's disclosure).
For the foregoing reasons, Appellant has persuaded us of error in the
Examiner's obviousness rejection of independent claim 7. Accordingly, we
do not sustain the Examiner's rejection of that claim or of claims 8-17,
which depend from claim 7 and stand rejected based in part on the
Examiner's findings discussed above.
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Application 14/781,514
DECISION
The Examiner's decision rejecting claims 7-17 is reversed.
REVERSED
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