THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT  
              Copyright (c) 1997, Landmark Communications, Inc.

DATE: Thursday, February 6, 1997            TAG: 9702060619
SECTION: BUSINESS                PAGE: D1   EDITION: FINAL  
SOURCE: BY CHRISTOPHER DINSMORE, STAFF WRITER 
                                            LENGTH:   76 lines

CORRECTION/CLARIFICATION: ***************************************************************** Clarification Elizabeth River Terminals may be for sale, but the Chesapeake dry-bulk cargo terminal won't necessarily go to the highest bidder. ``We are talking to a limited number of prospects and it is not about the best offer,'' said Cees van de Mortel, president and chief executive of the subsidiary of Van Ommeren N.V., the Dutch shipping giant. ``We are looking for an owner who will be good for the business, good for our employees and good for our reputation in the U.S. . . . We don't want to sell to some flight-by-night operator. There are many more issues than price.'' Correction published , Friday, February 7, 1997, Business section p. D3 ***************************************************************** TERMINAL SEEKS BUYER, BUT THERE'S NO HURRY<

Elizabeth River Terminals is on the market, but there's no asking price.

``We're asking people what they think it's worth,'' president and chief executive Cees van de Mortel said.

There are several potential bidders for the dry-bulk cargo terminal on the Elizabeth River in Chesapeake, but no deal is imminent, van de Mortel said.

``We're doing well,'' van de Mortel said. ``We're not just going to sell it to the first bidder.''

The port's only multi-use dry-bulk cargo terminal, Elizabeth River Terminals Inc. is owned by Dutch shipping giant Van Ommeren N.V.

The facility employs about 37 workers who unload everything from road salt to rocks used to stone-wash jeans. Its biggest commodities include fertilizers, dry chemicals and feed products.

Van Ommeren is selling the terminal because it is shifting its strategic focus to liquid-bulk operations, including marine transportation, terminals and tank farms, van de Mortel said.

The 65-acre property at Money Point in Chesapeake is one of the prime waterfront industrial sites in the region. It includes an adjoining 45-acre waterfront site, which is also for sale and is owned by the same company. The channel there is 35 feet deep and will likely be dredged to 40 feet in a few years.

Van Ommeren is also trying to sell two other East Coast dry-bulk terminals, one in Brunswick, Ga., and the other in Florida. Both are supervised from offices at the Chesapeake terminal.

Van Ommeren bought Elizabeth River Terminals in 1986 from Donald Liverman, currently an executive with Triport Terminal in Virginia Beach. The terminal was started in 1952 by a consortium of fertilizer companies.

In recent years the terminal has added a 40,000-square-foot warehouse, remodeled another and been mostly paved. It also built a settlement basin so that runoff from the terminal wouldn't be flushed directly into the river.

The terminal handles on average about three ships a month and two barges a week. Business peaks in winter as the fertilizer industry gears up for the spring season.

Most of what the terminal handles is shipped within about 200 miles of the port. That's a relatively short distance because bulk products are very expensive to haul inland via truck or rail. The terminal's competitors include similar bulk terminals in Baltimore and Wilmington, N.C.

``They're the only game in town if you want to through-put bulk material and you don't own your own facility,'' David F. Host said last year.

Host is executive vice president of the ship agency T. Parker Host Inc., which represents many bulk customers. ILLUSTRATION: Color file photo by Motoya Nakamura

Elizabeth River Terminals in Chesapeake, which handles dry-bulk

cargo, is for sale because its owner is shifting its focus.

Color photo

Cees Van De Mortel, President of Elizabeth River Terminals