Restoring Long Point Bayou with Calcasieu Channel dredge material

Natural Resource Damage Assessment (NRDA) funds stemming from an oil spill incident will be funding a Louisiana Master Plan marsh creation and habitat project this year.

The Louisiana Oil Spill Coordinator’s Office (LOSCO) reported this today at the monthly meeting of the Coastal Protection and Restoration Authority (CPRA).

According to Louisiana CPRA, the Long Point Bayou Marsh Creation project in Cameron Parish is using $13.7 million in NRDA settlement funds resulting from environmental damages caused when two storage tanks at CITGO Petroleum Corporation’s Lake Charles Manufacturing Complex overflowed during a rainstorm in 2006.

Commenting the latest news, CPRA Executive Director, Bren Haase, said: “The restoration of this area will be a benefit to the Lake Calcasieu estuary and the fish, wildlife, and communities that depend on it.”

The project is set to restore approximately 400 acres of marsh in Long Point Bayou south of Hackberry. 

The Long Point Bayou Marsh Creation Project was designed by CPRA in collaboration with the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) with funding through the Coastal Wetlands Planning, Protection and Restoration Act (CWPPRA).

The project, located between LA Highway 27 and the Calcasieu Ship Channel, will create and nourish emergent brackish marsh using sediment dredged from the Ship Channel.

CPRA said that USACE will advertise for construction this summer in conjunction with maintenance dredging of the Ship Channel.

Construction will last approximately one year.