Contacts: USA : Hunter Daniel Email: hunter@sumsome.info Phone: +1 901.550.7667 New Orleans, Louisiana, Wednesday March 30th 2011 FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE >> INTERNATIONAL TEAM USES KICKSTARTER TO FUND DEVELOPMENT OF AUTONOMOUS SAILING ROBOTS FOR OIL SPILL CLEANUP An international team led by Senior TED Fellow and New Orleans resident Cesar Harada is developing an unmanned low-cost technology to clean oil spills. They have launched a Kickstarter project to raise funds for "Protei" – a fleet of autonomous sailing robots created in response to the BP Deepwater Horizon oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico. "Oil spill cleanup relies on expensive, inefficient technologies that put the health of human beings at risk," says former MIT Project Leader Cesar Harada. In contrast, Protei are unmanned, ready-made robotic sailboats capable of covering great distances, operating day and night in even the most inclement weather conditions. Gathering locomotive energy by its innovative design, Protei sails upwind, capturing oil that moves down the wind with a long, oil-absorbent trail. The self-righting soft design allows it to operate far from the coast safely. Capable of sailing autonomously or remotely controlled by online gamers, Protei introduces ground-breaking sailing techniques with its articulated hull. Funding is needed for the production and launch of Protei, which will take place at World Port Day in Rotterdam where 400'000 visitor will meet Protei. A Kickstarter project has been launched to crowd-source the required funds. Currently, nearly $18,000 has been pledged, but more support is needed for the project to meet its goal by the April 11th deadline. If funded, Protei will be made available as Open Source Hardware, so anyone can use, modify and distribute the technology for free. http://protei.org http://media.protei.org : Our media material : http://kickstarter.protei.org : Please join the 100+ supporters of the Protei Kickstarter page. For more information, contact : English Hunter Daniel at hunter@sumsome.info (+1 901 550 7667) Dutch: Joris van Ballegooijen Espanol: Carla Colet Castano Portuguese: Bianca Cheng Costanzo , French: Cesar Harada Chinese: Li Yu Korean : Sey Min Japanese : Yoko Kasai . Turkish : Pinar temiz -end-