Puget Sound Pilots becomes the first pilotage association to achieve Green Marine certification

Seattle, Washington, June 7, 2019 – Puget Sound Pilots is the first association of marine pilots to receive Green Marine environmental certification for their two pilot boats. The certification ceremony took place last night during the GreenTech 2019 event, in Cleveland, Ohio.

Last year, Puget Sound Pilots was the first organization of marine pilot to upgrade form a partner membership to a participant. They were already partners but wanted to increase their environmental efforts by stepping up their Green Marine membership to certify their vessels.

While partners offer products and services to help the marine industry to lower its environmental footprint, participants commit to benchmarking and continually improving their environmental performance under the Green Marine certification process.

“Green Marine’s goal of continuous improvement is fully aligned with ours,” stated Linda Styrk, Puget Sound Pilots’ executive director. “We appreciate the structure that Green Marine brings to organizations like ours to go through all the criteria and certify our special purpose pilot boats.”

Styrk is thoroughly familiar with the environmental certification program as she previously sat on Green Marine’s board of directors in her former role as the managing director of Port of Seattle’s seaport. As seaport managing director, Ms. Styrk was the catalyst for Port of Seattle becoming the first U.S. port outside the Great Lakes region to attain Green Marine certification.

David Bolduc, Green Marine’s executive director, is pleased with Puget Sound Pilots’ certification. “We’re hoping that others will follow Puget Sound Pilots lead, as the Laurentian Pilotage Authority just did”, he said.

“We’ve already made several changes to our program over the past few years to enable smaller vessels to be certified,” Bolduc added. “Puget Sound Pilots’ input, going through their first certification process, will allow us to adapt the program so it is more inclusive to a broader scope of special purpose vessels.”

The president of Puget Sound Pilots, Captain Eric vonBrandenfels, wholeheartedly agreed: “Pilots safely guide vessels in and out of harbours and waterways using their expert shiphandling skills and local knowledge. Our new Green Marine certification enhances our ability to reduce environmental impacts and pursue our efforts towards continual improvement in protecting the marine environment.”

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