Key to this change has been the development of a business plan which:
・ Embraces commercial efficiency
・ Provides for total customer satisfaction
・ Enhances a solid, external reputation
However, the incident in Prince William Sound was over 8 years ago and time tends to allow for a certain forgetfulness and a less rigorous regulatory environment may continue to see an erosion in the national response infrastructure in the U.S. MSRC will continue to adapt to the ever-changing needs of its customers' as circumstances warrant.
Discussion
Kudo: You mentioned MSRC is in possession of the 16 dedicated oil spill response vessels. What do the crews of these dedicated vessels do when there are no spills?
Toenshoff: During the downtime for non-spill response, the crews of our vessels do several things. First, they do maintenance and repair of our vessels, and they do maintenance and repair for numerous other equipment that we have in inventory. We also spend a considerable amount of time and money training our personnel in oil spill response. Additionally, we spend a considerable amount of time training with our customers. As it is required in the United States, it is our customers who must initiate their response plan, and as an integral part of that response plan, they must train with their spill removal organization, and as such, we will train with them. So they are kept very busy.
Mearns: Could you explain a little more about what MSRC is doing in the shoreline cleanup area? You are re-entering that, and are you going to bring in traditional as well as alternative technologies?
Toenshoff: It is a requirement under the planning guidelines to contract for shoreline cleanup capability, which MSRC never provided before. As an enhanced service to our customers, we now provide that capability. Shoreline cleanup, as we've seen in the previous presentations, is very labor-intensive and often takes a very long time. What we have done is we have developed relationships with a series of subcontractors called STARS (Spill Team Area Responders) and we have under contract approximately 6,000 personnel that are trained in oil spill response, meet all the U.S. requirements for health and safety, and are oil spill response veterans. We will bring those personnel to work for our customer at our customer's direction, in concert with the U.S. Coast Guard at the direction of the U.S. Coast Guard. We do not unilaterally decide whether we should use alternative technologies or we should use a beach-cleaning medium; that is up to our customer and the Coast Guard to decide in the Unified Command as to what is the best approach. In this case, we provide the personnel, the services, and the tools, but not the direction as to how it is to proceed.
Gainsford: Do you intend to have any dispersant spraying capability, either from vessels or air?
Toenshoff: Right now, we're working with government and with industry to come up with an infrastructure in the United States. The infrastructure in the United States is much different from that in the U.K. Different cooperatives-local, smaller geographic area, oil spill cooperatives, which are all funded by industry-have got numerous contracts in place for dispersants. What we are contemplating and suggesting is a national dispersants capability where we should be able to achieve some economies of scale and provide an enhanced capability for our customers at the lowest
