“I’ve been to all the oil spill conferences around he country and all I see are booms and the latest helicopter. But I’ve never seen one machine that deals with getting the oil out. That’s me.” — Kevin Costner
Actor Kevin Costner was visibly frustrated when he testified before Congress earlier this month about the lack of ingenuity he was seeing when it comes to cleaning up the Horizon Deepwater oil spill which began on April 20. His $24 million idea uses a centrifuge to suck in polluted water and separate the oil then spit out the cleaned seawater.
And this week BP has signed on to use 32 of Costner’s devices — which can unmix oil and water at a rate of up to 200 gallons per machine per minute — to help clean up some of the oil that is polluting the Gulf of Mexico.
“It may seem an unlikely scenario that I’m the one delivering this technology at this moment in time. but from where I’m sitting it’s equally inconceivable that these machines are not already in place.” — Kevin Costner
Costner has been developing his centrifuge technology over the past 15 years, after watchingthe devastation following the Exxon Valdez spill in Alaska in 1989.
Physicist Michio Kaku talked to CBS News about Costner’s solution and other innovations in late May.
