Court Opinion

ID: 9450839
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-04 16:59:21.935477+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T17:32:28.584593
License: Public Domain

SMITH, Judge,
(dissenting in part, with whom RICH, J., joins).
Study of the record has convinced me that the board committed no reversible error in sustaining the rejection of claims 1-12 as unpatentable over the prior art, and I agree with the majority that that aspect of the appealed decision should be affirmed.
I do not agree, however, that appellants’ disclosure is inadequate. See my concurring opinion in appeal No. 7284, 347 F.2d 557 decided concurrently herewith. It is clear that a person of ordinary skill in this art, viewing the present disclosure, would reasonably expect that appellants’ invention will operate as claimed.
Regarding the problem of escaping steam noted in the Project Gnome experiment, I agree with appellants that:
* * * Appellants’ specification clearly points out to one skilled in the art that the cavity should be thermally and pressure insulated. Accordingly, one skilled in the art following Appellants’ suggestion will do his utmost to thermally and pressure insulate the cavern. The proper amount of plugging to be placed in the drill hole can be easily determined by those skilled in the art in order to perform a process which will probably work.
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* * * js true that in some cases, particularly in the early stages of development, the pressure and heat seal may fail as was the case in the Gnome Project. However, this is true not only in the early stages of a new art, but even after the art is old and well known. * * *
Moreover, this court pointed out in In re Chilowsky, 229 F.2d 457, 43 CCPA 775, that the failure of other devices designed for the same general purpose does not prove that an applicant’s claimed invention could not operate successfully. This principle is even more applicable here, in view of the many differences between the method claimed by appellants and that employed in Project Gnome. As appellants point out, the access drill hole disclosed by them is different from the shaft and horizontal tunnel used in the Gnome Project. In addition, the Gnome Project did not employ a salt dome formation. Thus there is no basis for concluding that the Gnome Project results portend even occasional failure for appellants’ claimed method.
The rejection of claims 13-20 predicated on inadequacy of appellants’ disclosure should, in my opinion, be reversed.