Appeal 2007-4230
Application 09/984,339
The Examiner relies on the following prior art references as evidence
in rejecting the appealed claims:
Heil US 5,874,051 Feb. 23, 1999
Wiesheu US 5,984,986 Nov. 16, 1999
Claims 1 and 3 stand rejected under 35 U.S.C. § 103(a) as being
unpatentable over Wiesheu in view of Heil.
Wiesheu discloses a steam reforming process wherein a water
vapor/methanol mixture is prepared in a mixture preparation step and the
mixture is supplied to a reforming reactor (Wiesheu, Abstract, col. 2, l.
38- col. 4, l. 7). The water vapor/methanol mixing ratio is adjusted as a
function of the reforming system load condition and/or load condition
changes thereof (id.). For example, a carbon monoxide sensor (9, Fig. 1) is
provided to detect the carbon monoxide concentration in the reformate
leaving the reforming reactor. A regulation unit (7, Fig. 1) is provided for
determining the deviation from a desired carbon monoxide concentration
value and operates to feed a signal to the mixture preparation unit for
adjusting the water vapor/methanol mixture. A carbon monoxide conversion
step (not shown in Fig. 1) is performed to remove carbon monoxide from the
reformer effluent and is located downstream of the reformer and upstream of
a fuel cell arrangement that would be poisoned thereby (Wiesheu, col. 2, ll.
29-37).
The Examiner acknowledges that Wiesheu does not “specifically
disclose the measure of temperature of a reformate gas stream emerging
from a reforming reactor that comprises more than one stage (i.e., additional
oxidation stage), and thus counteracting an aging–related shift in a
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