Appeal 2007-0489
Application 10/190,822
Appellants invented a fuel cell system that includes a main fuel
cell, a fuel stream delivery system, an oxidant stream delivery system,
and a sensor system (Specification 3: 22-25). The sensor functions to
detect chemicals that are poisonous to the fuel cell systems
(Specification 2: 20-24). Exemplary poisons to the fuel cell system
include sulfur and carbon monoxide (Specification paragraph bridging
pages 4 and 5).
Meltser describes a method for efficiently reducing the carbon
monoxide (CO) content of an H2 rich fuel gas for a H2 and O2 fuel cell
(Meltser, col. 2, ll. 58-65). Meltser discloses that carbon monoxide
contained in a hydrogen rich reformate stream must be removed or reduced
to very low concentrations through the use of a preferential oxidation
reaction in a PROX reactor (Meltser, cols. 1-2). Meltser discloses that a
sufficient amount of oxygen must be supplied to the fuel stream to react with
and reduce the carbon monoxide present (Meltser, col. 3, ll. 5-11). Meltser
discloses the sensors measure a concentration of hydrogen in the fuel stream
and sends the corresponding signal to the electronic control module
(Meltser, col. 4, ll. 17-24). Since the sensors of Meltser function to measure
the hydrogen content in the fuel stream, there is also a determination as to
the carbon monoxide content in the fuel stream, so that the appropriate
amount of oxygen can be added to the fuel stream for reaction with the
carbon monoxide. Thus, the chemical sensors of Meltser provide an
indication of when the chemical sensor is exposed to at least one of the
electrocatalytic poisons.
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