Coast Guard: Improved Reporting on Domestic Icebreaking Performance Could Clarify Resource Needs and Tradeoffs

The U.S. Coast Guard maintains and operates icebreaking vessels to promote safety in U.S. waters, along with its other missions. The Coast Guard breaks ice to help keep channels and harbors open to navigation and facilitate “the reasonable demands of commerce” pursuant to an executive order. This assistance includes establishing and maintaining open tracks in critical waterways, assisting and escorting vessels stuck in ice, and removing hazards created by ice, according to the Coast Guard. The Coast Guard conducts domestic icebreaking operations in three of its nine districts—the Great Lakes, New England, and the Mid-Atlantic. In the Great Lakes, 55 percent of the regional economy is dependent on key shipping channels, according to the Coast Guard. In 2020, industries shipped 100 million tons of iron ore, limestone, coal, and other commodities through the Great Lakes, according to data from the Army Corps of Engineers Waterborne Commerce Statistics Center. Some industry stakeholders who rely on these shipping channels have raised questions about whether the Coast Guard has adequate icebreaking resources available to facilitate commerce. Section 11212 of the James M. Inhofe National Defense Authorization Act for Fiscal Year 2023 includes a provision for the Government Accountability Office (GAO) to review Coast Guard icebreaking operations in the Great Lakes and examine proposed performance standards for the Coast Guard’s Great Lakes icebreaking program. This report discusses the associations between ice coverage on the Great Lakes and effects on certain economic indicators, the Coast Guard’s icebreaking resource needs, and the potential effects of the proposed standards on the Coast Guard’s icebreaking efforts.

• Record URL:
  • https://www.gao.gov/assets/d24106619.pdf
• Summary URL:
  • https://www.gao.gov/products/gao-24-106619
• Corporate Authors:

  U.S. Government Accountability Office

  441 G Street, NW
  Washington, DC  United States  20548
• Publication Date: 2024-1-16

Language

• English

Media Info

• Media Type: Digital/other
• Features: Appendices; Figures; Maps; Photos; References; Tables;
• Pagination: 18p

Subject/Index Terms

• TRT Terms: Economic impacts; Icebreakers; Icebreaking; Performance measurement; Standards
• Identifier Terms: United States Coast Guard
• Geographic Terms: Great Lakes
• Subject Areas: Economics; Marine Transportation; Planning and Forecasting; Vehicles and Equipment;

Filing Info

• Accession Number: 01905033
• Record Type: Publication
• Report/Paper Numbers: GAO-24-106619
• Files: TRIS
• Created Date: Jan 19 2024 8:53AM