NEW ORLEANS – To mark the 10th anniversary of Hurricane Katrina, CITGO Petroleum Corporation, through its Caring for Our Coast conservation campaign, will join Audubon Nature Institute to honor those affected by the storm and continue restoration and recovery efforts on the Gulf Coast on August 28. 

To commemorate the occasion, the organizations will join elected officials and other community leaders to plant 10 trees at Audubon Louisiana Nature Center—one tree for each year that has passed since the storm. CITGO and Audubon Nature Institute have a long-term relationship that began when CITGO volunteers joined New Orleans community members in clearing the Center’s grounds of the invasive Chinese tallow tree and continues this year with additional restoration efforts and a donation to help Audubon Nature Institute reestablish educational programming at Audubon Louisiana Nature Center.

Launched in 2014 to commemorate the anniversaries of Hurricanes Katrina and Rita, CITGO Caring for Our Coast is a series of programs and projects focused on boosting coastal restoration and wetlands conservation in the Gulf Coast region through volunteer efforts and promoting education. Caring for Our Coast was first introduced through a partnership between CITGO and Dr. Robert Ballard’s Ocean Exploration Trust (OET) to promote environmental stewardship and education working with OET’s Exploration Vessel Nautilus in an effort to give students and educators hands-on opportunities to learn about environmentalism, oceanography and engineering. Since the program began last year, CITGO has donated thousands of volunteer hours and millions of dollars to conservation, restoration and education efforts throughout the Gulf Coast region.

As a company with operations in the Gulf Coast, CITGO witnessed first-hand the destruction caused by Hurricanes Katrina and Rita through its communities, its employees and its operations. CITGO was there in the hours immediately after impact, helping the community rebuild and bringing operations back online in record time. 

Hurricane Katrina was one of the most devastating natural disasters on record and had major implications for the entire convenience and fuel retailing industry. Read more on how NACS members responded—and how NACS itself was affected—in the current issue of NACS Magazine.