Recent Development on Herder Commercialization

Herders (also known as surface collecting agents) are made of surface active compounds (surfactants). They reduce the surface tension of water and thereby change the spreading behavior of immiscible liquids, such as an oil slick, floating on the surface. Oil slicks that have spread too thin to burn can be re-thickened if herders are sprayed on the water surface around a slick. Once the slick is thickened, it is amenable to in situ burning without the need for fire-resistant boom. Herders are listed as surface collecting agents on the National Contingency Product Schedule administered by the US Environmental Protection Agency (USEPA, 2019) for use in US waters. Herders are commercially available and oil spill response organizations have the capability to utilize herders. A new joint industry / government agency project was recently initiated to develop a novel herder delivery and ignition system. The initial plan is to develop a remotely operated surface vehicle (RSV) that will deliver herder from an onboard reservoir and a system to ignite herded slicks. The RSV we are developing has 10–12 hours of operation time, a range of 500 miles and can travel at speeds of up to 65 miles/hour. The RSV can be deployed from a helicopter that has a cargo hook, a boat, and potentially a fixed-wing aircraft that has an appropriately sized hatch. The vision is rapid deployed to a remote spill location using a helicopter (or a fixed-wing aircraft) and operated from this platform until a response vessel arrives on the scene. The response vessel can then take over RSV control freeing the aircraft for other duties. This paper will describe the planned development and testing of the RSV and other progress toward herder commercialization.