Marine Spill Response Corporation: Why MSRC?

MSRC recognizes that spill responses are spontaneous events and as such, no two spills are ever the same. Factors such as location of the spill, volume of oil at risk, movement of oil, weather and sea state are among the many variables that must be considered and dealt with effectively in a spill response. MSRC's approach to credible and reliable spill response is about more than simply meeting regulatory planning requirements on paper. Our experience dictates that in addition to deploying the required resources OSROs must mobilize to a spill incident, a broad portfolio with a variety of dedicated response tools and highly trained responders provide the flexibility required for an efficient and successful spill clean-up.

MSRC has never failed to respond effectively on behalf of a customer. MSRC's experience includes responding to more than 1,000 oil spill events since its founding in 1990 and was the largest single oil spill removal organization (OSRO) responding to the Deepwater Horizon event in 2010, with over 15,000 employee man days, including over 11,000-man days offshore, and overseeing in excess of 4,000 contractors.

MSRC 2025 Brochure (16x8)

Reliable Response

MSRC has never failed to mount an effective spill response in nearly three decades of operation and is often called upon by the USCG when it has been forced to take over on-water recovery operations in a spill response. This is in part because MSRC has more dedicated and owned spill response resources than any other OSRO in the U.S. and regularly runs practices and trainings with all customers.

MSRC carries out full-scale mechanical recovery deployment exercises at least monthly with all of our on-water assets. With more than 350 dedicated personnel, MSRC can cascade our vast inventory of resources to an event, while also bringing in customizable teams of experts from all three U.S. coasts. In addition, MSRC maintains and tests all equipment as part of an internal QA/QC program to ensure that it remains in excellent condition.

MSRC is also a founding member of the Global Response Network (GRN). The mission of the GRN is to maximize the knowledge and expertise that each spill response organization has individually and to share such information with other GRN members for the purposes of enabling each organization to provide a better response to their respective members or customers. MSRC plays an active role in leadership positions and participates in GRN operational teams. Visit GRN's Website

Transparent Pricing

MSRC’s “all in” pricing model and meticulous work-order system is designed to be transparent for our customers, their SMTs, P&I Clubs and third-party auditors. This pricing approach includes all the mechanical recovery equipment and crew that comes with a particular vessel, and all the ancillary equipment required for deployment of a mechanical recovery asset. Personnel are billed at a consistent daily rate inclusive of their required PPE, lodging and meals. By contrast, “a la carte” pricing itemizes all consumable and ancillary equipment costs associated with each individual resource, often with a level of detail that is easily confused after several days of billing. By contrast, MSRC invoices can easily be reconciled and vetted by our Customers and their spill management teams against work orders.

For third-party services, MSRC applies a straight 10% mark-up that does not fluctuate per contractor. We have pre-established price lists with our STARs network so that our customers are not billed at a premium “crisis price” when an event does occur. When STARs contractors are working under MSRC, our back-office finance team verifies that all third-party services invoiced were rendered against MSRC’s work order system at the pre-established rates.

Non-Profit Business Model

As a non-profit organization, our operations, readiness and preparedness programs are funded entirely by Member dues to MPA. As MSRC’s operations funding does not rely on spill events, we are incentivized to focus on efficiency and effectiveness when responding to an event rather than maximizing response revenue.