CITGO And The Alliance for the Great Lakes Adopt-a-Beach™

CHICAGO, Nov. 17, 2014 /PRNewswire/ -- On Thursday, November 6, CITGO Petroleum Corporation (CITGO), in collaboration with the Alliance for the Great Lakes, hosted a community wide Adopt-a-Beach™ cleanup project to promote preservation of the shoreline. The event is one in a series of volunteer projects under the CITGO Caring for Our Coast program, a yearlong environmental campaign that supports coastal conservation and environmental restoration efforts.

Under the expert guidance of Alliance staff, CITGO employees and local volunteers from Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. College Preparatory High School and Benito Juarez Community Academy assessed the beach's water quality and cleaned up trash along the shore. The findings were then logged into the Alliance's Adopt-a-Beach™ online system to be shared with local, state and regional beach health officials.

As the world's largest surface freshwater system, the Great Lakes make up 20 percent of the earth's surface freshwater and provide drinking water to more than 40 million people. The quality of water in the Great Lakes is regularly impacted by various factors that can affect their use as a natural resource for nearby ecosystems, habitats and communities.

"The spirit behind today's event, and the entire CITGO Caring for Our Coast program, reflects our core commitment to environmental stewardship and community service in general," said Nelson P. Martinez, CITGO President and CEO. "We are honored to be a part of this effort to improve our communities today and ultimately, secure a better tomorrow."

The Alliance for the Great Lakes' Adopt-a-Beach™ Program is only one of the environmentally focused efforts CITGO has participated in as part of a yearlong campaign as we approach the 10-year anniversary of Hurricanes Katrina and Rita. In August, CITGO launched the CITGO Caring for Our Coast program with an event to promote marine education with the Ocean Exploration Trust, followed by a volunteer effort to restore the wetlands surrounding the Audubon Louisiana Nature Center in New Orleans. The campaign continued in September, with volunteers planting more than 70,000 dune grass plugs along Holly Beach, in Southwest Louisiana. On November 1, more than 200 volunteers joined CITGO in Lemont, to conduct an extensive inventory, as the first step of a community project to rid the historical Lemont Quarries of invasive species and restore the area as a critical habitat for native species. Following the event at the Great Lakes, the program continued with a restoration project along the Nueces Delta in Corpus Christi, Texas will move next to the Oso Bay Wetlands Preserve, also in Corpus Christi, on November 22.

To learn more about the Alliance for the Great Lakes' Adopt-a-Beach™ Program, visit greatlakes.org/adoptabeach. To learn more about the CITGO Caring for Our Coast project, visit CITGOCaringforOurCoast.com.

About CITGO Petroleum Corporation

CITGO, based in Houston, is a refiner, transporter and marketer of transportation fuels, lubricants, petrochemicals and other industrial products. The company is owned by PDV America, Inc., an indirect wholly owned subsidiary of Petroleos de Venezuela, S.A., the national oil company of the Bolivarian Republic of Venezuela. For more information, visit CITGO.com.

About Alliance for the Great Lakes

The Alliance for the Great Lakes is a non-profit organization dedicated to the protection and restoration of the world's largest surface freshwater resource. Through policy, education and local efforts, the Alliance works to ensure a healthy Great Lakes and clean water for generations of people and wildlife. Each year, nearly 13,000 volunteers — including schools, businesses, individuals and families — participate in the Alliance's Adopt-a-Beach™. For more information, visit greatlakes.org.

SOURCE CITGO Petroleum Corporation