The year-long Wendy Schmidt Oil Cleanup X Challenge, named for the wife of Google chairman Eric Schmidt who put up the 1.4-million-dollar purse and the X Prize Foundation which is organising the competition, kicks off Sunday.
Frustrated at watching "the messy, uncoordinated" attempts to mop up oil from the massive BP leak in the Gulf of Mexico using outdated technology, the contest aims to inspire new ways to clean up future spills, Schmidt said.
"With nearly 4,000 active drilling platforms in the Gulf alone, and more than 10,000 oil platforms across the globe and millions of barrels of oil being transported every day by tankers, it's not a question of 'if' there is another spill but 'when,'" she added.
She argued that "we need to come up with better ways to respond quickly and to minimise the harm we are causing to marine life, coastal wetlands and beaches, and to our livelihoods."
Teams will submit a blueprint for spill-fighting technology online on the website of the X Prize Foundation (xprize.org).
The foundation has run other "incentive competitions" with multi-million-dollar purses, including one in 2004 which saw Burt Rutan building and flying a private vehicle into space.
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