ISCO Corporate member, Aqua-Guard Spill Response Inc. has been named the Grand Prize winner of the Impact Canada Oil Spill Response Challenge, a competition led by Natural Resources Canada (NRCan) aimed at improving oil spill recovery technology. As the winning company, Aqua-Guard will receive a $2 million prize grant to support its ongoing innovation in environmental protection.

For the past three years, Aqua-Guard has been developing a solution to address a critical gap in oil spill response—the efficient removal of floating oil sheens. While current mechanical solutions effectively recover light to heavy viscosity oil spills, they have been unable to capture thin oil sheens, forcing responders to rely on inefficient and wasteful sorbents.

The competition’s three-stage structure facilitated in-depth research, development, and rigorous testing that would have been difficult to complete without the awarded grants and milestone funding.

Aqua-Guard worked in collaboration with industry partners, with significant support from Western Canada Marine Response Corporation (WCMRC), which provided design insight, personnel, and vessel support during field testing. Other key collaborators included Proactive Environmental, Staynor Response Services, CN Rail, Canadyne Technologies, Canflex, and Cascade Aerospace.

The result of this collaboration is a groundbreaking innovation in oil sheen recovery—CFSH (Carbon Fibre Super Hydrophobic)—the first mechanical solution capable of efficiently recovering ultra-thin oil sheens from water surfaces, a challenge previously considered “non-recoverable” in oil spill response.

The CFSH solution introduces several key advancements:

• High-efficiency mechanical recovery of ultra-thin oil sheens, from 50 microns down to less than 0.08 microns.
• Significant reduction in waste and disposal costs compared to sorbents.
• Versatility in diverse aquatic environments, including marinas, ports, lakes, rivers, refineries, offshore waters, and ice-infested regions.

Cameron Janz, Chief Executive Officer of Aqua-Guard Spill Response Inc., expressed the company’s pride in winning the Challenge: “We are incredibly proud to receive this recognition from Natural Resources Canada. This technology represents a major leap forward in environmental protection, allowing response to previously deemed non-recoverable oil sheens and extending the end points of an oil spill. By closing this critical gap in oil sheen recovery, we look forward to keeping Canada’s and the world’s waterways cleaner and safer for future generations.”

The Honourable Jonathan Wilkinson, Minister of Energy and Natural Resources, also highlighted the importance of the innovation: “Advancing innovative solutions for the detection and recovery of aquatic oil spills is vital for Canada’s ecosystems, wildlife, and communities. Aqua-Guard’s innovative solution improves our ability to respond to oil spills and expands the tools that can be used to safeguard our waters. This Challenge reinforces the federal government’s commitment to environmental protection, building on initiatives like Canada’s Oceans Protection Plan.”

Further details on the commercial development of the CFSH solution are expected in Q2 2025.

For more information on Aqua-Guard’s journey since 2022, visit: Aqua-Guard Spill Response.