Name: A novel idea for cleaning up oil spills
Uploaded: 2012-07-05T14:57:06Z
Duration: 14 min 13 s
Description: When TED Senior Fellow Cesar Harada heard about the devastating effects of the BP Oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico in 2010, he quit his dream job and moved to New Orleans to develop a more efficient way to soak up the oil. He designed a highly maneuverable, flexible boat capable of cleaning large tracts quickly. But rather than turn a profit, he has opted to open-source the design.

When TED Senior Fellow Cesar Harada heard about the devastating effects of the BP Oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico in 2010, he quit his dream job and moved to New Orleans to develop a more efficient way to soak up the oil. He designed a highly maneuverable, flexible boat capable of cleaning large tracts quickly. But rather than turn a profit, he has opted to open-source the design.

A novel idea for cleaning up oil spills

Harnessing natural forces, a flexible, shape-shifting sailing robot was designed to tackle oil spills more efficiently than traditional cleanup boats, which collected only three percent of the surface oil during the BP disaster. By making the technology open-source, innovators worldwide improved and shared designs instead of patenting them. Collaboration and rapid, peer-driven prototyping transformed a simple idea into a global network for environmental action.