Appeal No. 2004-2053
Application 09/773,704
fuel cell terminals.” See the Brief, page 14. However, the
appellants argue that Bonnefoy does not teach or suggest
“determining whether to route excess energy to the battery; and
thus, it follows, Bonnefoy does not teach or suggest selectively
routing based on such a determination” as required by claim 1.
See the Brief, page 15. We do not agree.
As pointed out by the examiner (Answer, page 5), Bonnefoy
teaches at column 2, lines 58-60 that “[i]f the load 4 requires
an electric power lower than the one available at the fuel cell 1
terminals, the battery takes profit from the excess of electric
energy and recharges.” Implicit in this teaching is that some
form of determination is necessarily or inherently made as to
routing excess electric energy to a battery before the excess
energy is delivered to the battery. Even if the excess electri-
cal energy is automatically routed to a battery as urged by the
appellants, the term “automatically” as explained by the examiner
at page 6 of the Answer implies having a self-acting or self-
regulating mechanism. In other words, some form of determination
is made by one of ordinary skill in the art or by a self-
regulating mechanism regarding whether to route the excess
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