Sovereign of the Seas was selected by Royal Caribbean International as its Environmental Ship of the Year and Monarch of the Seas was selected for the Best Environmental Innovation Of The Year. The company's 14-ship fleet was informed of the winners during a conference call with Royal Caribbean International's President and COO Jack Williams and Senior Vice President for Safety and Environment Capt. William Wright.
Judging for the awards was conducted by the independent external auditing firm of Haley and Aldrich, which audits all of Royal Caribbean's 14 ships for adherence to the company's Environmental Compliance Plan.
"I congratulate the crews of both Sovereign of the Seas and Monarch of the Seas for their outstanding achievements," Williams said. "I also thank our other ships for their continuous improvement and commitment to environmental excellence. It is impressive to see the ongoing environmental advances onboard all our ships."
The selection of the Environmental Ship Of The Year Award was based on seven criteria established by Royal Caribbean and its independent external auditors and covered all of 2001. Those criteria were audit findings related to environmental performance, effectiveness of corrective actions, completion of corrective action to clear audit findings, reports of near incidents, weekly and monthly environmental reports, performance of environmental equipment and innovative thinking.
The selection of the Best Environmental Innovation Of The Year Award was based solely on accomplishments within the innovative thinking criteria.
In their Environmental Ship of the Year Award, Sovereign of the Seas' crew was cited for having truly stretched to improve upon their environmental performance. The ship set environmental excellence as a goal, and worked diligently toward that goal throughout the year. The ship successfully developed an onboard culture where accidents or incidents represent opportunities for improvement, and did extremely well on all of the external audits conducted during the year.
During 2001, Sovereign of the Seas embarked on an aggressive campaign to drastically reduce gray water and hazardous waste generation, as well as to conserve energy aboard the ship. The ship was proactive in educating all crewmembers about their responsibility to further environmental conservation and compliance goals of the ship.
In their Best Environmental Innovation of the Year Award, won for the third straight year, Monarch of the Seas' crew was cited for educating passengers on the effects of global warming and providing them with tips to "do their part" in assisting with energy conservation measures explained in a video produced for passenger viewing. The ship also reached out to the island of Antigua, by sponsoring a "Mash the Trash" environmental clean-up campaign aimed at school children. The campaign encouraged garbage clean-up and sustained personal and public cleanliness. The ship's crew participated in planning the program and sponsored educational instruction materials and television advertisements.
The ship's crew also improved their environmental systems by developing a software program to assist them in accessing and reporting environmental information. Elements of this program will be made available fleetwide during 2002.
"All of our ships distinguished themselves as they sought higher environmental performance standards through innovation and communication," Wright said. "Our ships have again exemplified a continuous improvement philosophy that is the hallmark of Royal Caribbean. We thank them for their hard work and the impressive examples they set."
edited by Sandy Smith ([email protected])