FOCUS OF NEW ADMINISTRATION TO AFFECT PROFITS OF POLLUTION-TESTING SERVICE

                         Roanoke Times
                 Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.

DATE: SUNDAY, January 24, 1993                   TAG: 9301260240
SECTION: ECONOMY                    PAGE: EC-11   EDITION: METRO  
SOURCE: MAG POFF STAFF WRITER
DATELINE:                                 LENGTH: Medium
FOCUS OF NEW ADMINISTRATION TO AFFECT PROFITS OF POLLUTION-TESTING SERVICE
Dave Tompkins wonders about the impact on his business of two contrary pressures: federal budget-cutting and preserving the environment.
Whichever has the greatest tug on the Clinton administration will affect about half of the revenues for ETS Analytical Services, which he heads.
The other half of the company's earnings come from the private sector, which Tompkins said would rebound if the economy improves this year.
ETS Analytical Services is a pollution-testing laboratory that is a subsidiary of ETS International Inc. of Roanoke. The company is located on Municipal Drive near the airport. ETS, whose stock is traded publicly, in July was selected with a group of other growing companies to be listed on the American Stock Exchange's new Emerging Company Marketplace.
Tompkins said the lab's business has grown an average of 30 percent a year since 1988, when it was acquired by ETS. In the same period, employment has risen from 15 to 35 people.
"Things are looking pretty good for the second half of the [company's fiscal] year," Tompkins said.
But he's seen the effects of the poor economy on the half of the business devoted to commercial accounts.
For those customers facing a federal mandate to clean up, he explained, business is not affected. Those customers are digging out contamination and testing to be sure when they have reached safe ground.
People who face no such mandate are tending to wait awhile before cleaning and testing.
Still, Tompkins said, "we're doing better than had been projected."
ETS has several contracts with the federal Environmental Protection Agency. The two largest are for testing in connection with cleanup of Superfund sites and for testing industrial water discharges.
The purpose of the water testing, he explained, is to help the EPA develop regulations governing industrial discharge.
Tompkins believes that "those regulations that have been developed are not going to go away."
Yet he reads about the possibility of relaxing standards under the Clean Air Act and the need to reduce federal spending. On the other hand, Vice President Al Gore is known as an advocate of the environment.
Despite what Tompkins calls the unknowns in the future, he said that the business of the environment "seems to be going fairly strong."

by Bhavesh Jinadra by CNB