Containment Foam

 is the PRT's most common incapacitant non-lethal less-lethal responses to Parahuman threats.

Traits
Containment foam is a yellow-white in colour.

It sprays as a liquid, then expands into a foam. The foam is flexible and porous, allowing people to breath while fully entrenched in it, and is extremely sticky. It's impact resistant, so heavy hitters can be contained or safely catch falling individuals. It's also resistant to high and low temperatures and insulates against electricity. Its rubbery nature makes it difficult to get leverage once trapped in it. Only the strongest villains can escape once caught.

Even flecks of foam expand into masses the size of golf balls and softballs. Attempting to wipe it off exposes more to the air, making it expand still further.

Application
The PRT has vans with turrets mounted on the top to spray containment foam. They were only authorized against certain threats.

PRT officers can equip grenade launchers with specialized loadouts, including containment foam shells. Protectorate heroes sometimes have grenades as part of their kit as well. It is not a stretch to imagine that Watchdog arm their employees similarly.

The Baumann Parahuman Containment Center has layers of dormant foam hidden in the outer walls between layers of ceramic, that will bury anyone attempting to break in. Dragon could vent it from the ceiling at will. Many of the drones in the hollowed-out portions carried containment foam, as did many of her suits.

The Parahuman Asylum had a sprinkler system that could deploy containment foam.

Dovetail had a costume with compact foam sprayers built into it.

E-type containment cells in the PRT ENE Headquarters had containment foam sprayers, among other countermeasures.

Foam Sprayers
PRT officers are often equipped with tinker-made containment foam applicators resembling flamethrowers, with tanks mounted on their back. Each tank contains about three gallons of foam. They're held on with large backpack-like straps. The hose leading from the containment foam tank is tough, but can be cut with a knife.

They use an electrical charge to prevent the foam sticking to the nozzle, which makes them vulnerable to an EMP. The PRT needed Dragon to maintain them.

As of 2001, the nozzle had a display showing foam remaining, and settings for spray volume and distribution.

Some foam sprayers had some kind of handprint recognition to prevent them being stolen, likely the same system installed on the PRT's grenade launchers, which required special PRT-issue gloves to activate.

Removal
Foam degrades over time eventually. This can be expedited with a specialized solvent.

The solvent is kept in specialized trucks to prevent it from being stolen while being used to free people. Anyone who needs to be freed must wait for it to be mixed and/or for the trucks to arrive. Dragon is the only individual allowed to make personal use of it.

Teacher successfully stole the formula for a containment-foam solvent from Dragon.

History
Dragon is said to have designed it, along with the Birdcage and much of the PRT's other gear. It's possible that she was updating an existing project. It was introduced shortly before February 2001.

It's possible that Dragon developed the foam when she was still working for Andrew Richter.

It is currently manufactured in sophisticated facilities in Austin and then sent out to other departments.

In the years since Gold Morning the foam was far more accessible on the black market then it ever had been previously.

Trivia

 * Sticky foam is a real life project that has failed to achieve what the fictional Containment foam does.