The Great Lakes Tow­ing Com­pa­ny, the largest U.S.-flagged tug­boat fleet oper­at­ing on the Great Lakes, is the newest ship own­er to join the most impor­tant vol­un­tary envi­ron­men­tal pro­gram for North America’s mar­itime indus­try. The Tow­ing Com­pa­ny, as it is com­mon­ly known, has also enrolled its ship­yard facil­i­ty as a Green Marine par­tic­i­pant – mak­ing it the first U.S. ship­yard to join the program.

“We con­tin­u­ous­ly strive to improve the qual­i­ty and safe­ty of our prod­ucts and ser­vices,” Joe Star­ck, Great Lakes Towing’s pres­i­dent, said upon the com­pa­ny join­ing Green Marine. “As lead­ers in the indus­try, we believe we have an oblig­a­tion to do what we can to make cer­tain our com­mer­cial activ­i­ties are as sus­tain­able as pos­si­ble – both in our tug oper­a­tions and at our ship­yard facility.”

Based in Cleve­land, The Great Lakes Tow­ing Com­pa­ny is a sig­nif­i­cant oper­a­tional link on the U.S. side of the Great Lakes–Saint Lawrence Sea­way marine trans­porta­tion sys­tem. The Tow­ing Company’s com­mit­ment to build­ing 10 new tug­boats at its Cleve­land ship­yard over the next five years is yet anoth­er exam­ple of its com­mit­ment to sus­tain­abil­i­ty. The intro­duc­tion of each new tug’s more effi­cient design, propul­sion and auto­mat­ed equip­ment will sig­nif­i­cant­ly reduce air emis­sions and per­mit the com­pa­ny to retire two old­er tugs from service.

Green Marine is delight­ed to fur­ther expand its U.S. mem­ber­ship by wel­com­ing The Great Lakes Tow­ing Com­pa­ny into the envi­ron­men­tal cer­ti­fi­ca­tion pro­gram. “By includ­ing its fleet of more than 35 tugs and its major ship­yard in our pro­gram, Great Lakes Tow­ing is reflect­ing its strong com­mit­ment to con­tin­u­al­ly improv­ing the sus­tain­abil­i­ty of all of its oper­a­tions,” David Bolduc, Green Marine’s exec­u­tive direc­tor, said. “Great Lakes Towing’s addi­tion to Green Marine also helps us to achieve our goal of advanc­ing envi­ron­men­tal excel­lence through­out North America’s mar­itime industry.”

The Green Marine envi­ron­men­tal cer­ti­fi­ca­tion pro­gram address­es key envi­ron­men­tal issues through 12 per­for­mance indi­ca­tors that include green­house gas­es, air emis­sions, spill pre­ven­tion, waste man­age­ment, envi­ron­men­tal lead­er­ship, and com­mu­ni­ty impacts – some applic­a­ble to ship­ping activ­i­ties, oth­ers to land­side oper­a­tions. The cer­ti­fi­ca­tion process is rig­or­ous and trans­par­ent with results inde­pen­dent­ly ver­i­fied every two years and each company’s indi­vid­ual per­for­mance made pub­lic annually.

About The Great Lakes Tow­ing Company 

The Great Lakes Tow­ing Com­pa­ny, an indus­try leader since 1899, pro­vides essen­tial, com­mer­cial tug­boat ser­vices includ­ing ship assist and har­bor tow­ing, ice­break­ing and car­go trans­porta­tion, and emer­gency ser­vices in 40 U.S. ports, and in all eight U.S. Great Lakes’ states. The com­pa­ny oper­ates the largest and most expe­ri­enced U.S.-flag tug­boat fleet and is a sig­nif­i­cant marine oper­a­tions link in North America’s U.S. Great Lakes-Saint Lawrence Sea­way marine trans­porta­tion net­work –the fourth sea­coast of the Unit­ed States. Learn more at www.thegreatlakestowingcompany.com

About Great Lakes Shipyard

Great Lakes Ship­yard, a divi­sion of The Great Lakes Tow­ing Com­pa­ny, is a full-ser­vice ship­yard for new ves­sel con­struc­tion includ­ing new work­boats and barges, truck­able prod­ucts, cus­tom fab­ri­ca­tion, ship main­te­nance and repairs, in a world-class facil­i­ty that includes state-of-the-art equip­ment such as a 770-ton mobile Trav­elift and a 300-ton float­ing dry­dock. GLS facil­i­ties are locat­ed at the Company’s head­quar­ters on the Old Riv­er Chan­nel of the Cuya­hoga Riv­er in Cleve­land, Ohio. GLT’s ship­yard exper­tise includes design­ing, build­ing and main­tain­ing its own fleet, as well as an exten­sive list of com­mer­cial and gov­ern­ment tug­boats, sup­ply boats, fer­ries, barges, cruise boats, large yachts, and many oth­er types of ves­sels, includ­ing larg­er domes­tic and for­eign car­go ves­sels. The ship­yard is a major con­trac­tor for the U.S. Coast Guard, U.S. Geo­log­i­cal Sur­vey, U.S. Army Corps of Engi­neers, EPA, and many oth­er fed­er­al, state and local gov­ern­ments, attest­ing to its high-qual­i­ty work­man­ship, on-time per­for­mance, and com­pet­i­tive pric­ing. Learn more at www.greatlakesshipyard.com

About Green Marine

Green Marine is cel­e­brat­ing its 10th year! The North Amer­i­can envi­ron­men­tal cer­ti­fi­ca­tion pro­gram is the mar­itime industry’s vol­un­tary effort to sur­pass reg­u­la­to­ry require­ments. It helps par­tic­i­pants – ship own­ers, port author­i­ties, ter­mi­nal oper­a­tors and ship­yards – to reduce their envi­ron­men­tal foot­print by fos­ter­ing a cul­ture of con­tin­u­al improve­ment and by out­lin­ing the pre­cise steps they can take to achieve high­er lev­els of sus­tain­abil­i­ty. There are cur­rent­ly more than 110 com­pa­nies from coast to coast in Cana­da and the Unit­ed States par­tic­i­pat­ing in the pro­gram. The Green Marine program’s unique char­ac­ter derives from the sup­port being earned from more than 60 envi­ron­men­tal orga­ni­za­tions and gov­ern­ment agen­cies. These sup­port­ers con­tribute to shap­ing and revis­ing the pro­gram. Learn more at www.green-marine.org

For more information:

Joe Star­ck, Pres­i­dent, The Great Lakes Tow­ing Com­pa­ny & Great Lakes Shipyard
Tele­phone Num­ber: 216–621-4854
jps@thegreatlakesgroup.com

Manon Lan­thi­er, Com­mu­ni­ca­tions Man­ag­er, Green Marine
Tele­phone Num­ber: 418–649-6004 Ext. 302 | Mobile Num­ber: 418–569-5110
manon.lanthier@green-marine.org