Appeal No. 1999-0700 Page 14
Application No. 08/590,580
derived from a de-inking station of a paper recycling plant for use as the "fibrous waste sludge" starting
material in the process of Kok and would have been motivated to use such sludge in Kok's process in
order to recycle the primary de-inked sludge in an economical and environmentally safe manner to
produce a useful product rather than dumping it into landfills. As to the particular moisture content
ranges recited, it would have been obvious to provide sludge having a moisture content between 55 and
65% by weight in order to facilitate the pellet forming operation, as taught by Kok (column 2, lines 54-
66). Further, as Kok does not disclose breaking down or cutting the fibrous waste sludge, one of
ordinary skill in the art would have inferred that such a step is not necessary in the Kok process.
Therefore, to provide the de-inked sludge in "non-broken down and uncut" form as required by claims
1-4, 10-12 and 19-23 would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art.
As to claim 9, as the teachings of Lowe and Knapick suggest that the sludge derived from a
tissue-grade de-inking mill is suitable as a starting material in producing useful absorbent material, such
as animal litter or industrial absorbents for oil and water, it would have been obvious to one of ordinary
skill in the art to utilize such sludge as the "fibrous waste sludge" in the Kok process in order to avoid
the cost and adverse environmental effects of sending these materials to a landfill or incinerator.
For the reasons discussed above, the combined teachings of Kok, Lowe and Knapick are
sufficient to have suggested the subject matter of claims 1-4, 8-12 and 19-23 so as to establish a prima
facie case of obviousness under 35 U.S.C. § 103.
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