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

DATE: WEDNESDAY, April 6, 1994                   TAG: 9404060103
SECTION: BUSINESS                    PAGE: B-8   EDITION: METRO 
SOURCE: By GREG EDWARDS STAFF WRITER
DATELINE:                                 LENGTH: Short

COASTAL TO MOVE DIVISION

Coastal Corp. said Tuesday it will move its power production unit from Roanoke to Houston, where it will become a separate division of the company and be better positioned to expand into the international energy market.

The move will affect 15 employees. Ten will transfer to Houston, and the rest will be laid off, Coastal Senior Vice President James Van Lanen said.

Coastal, a Houston-based producer and distributor of energy sources, already owns 330 megawatts of power generation capacity at plants in New York, Connecticut and New Jersey.

Upgrading of power production to a division is a move by the company to put more emphasis on its power business, Van Lanen said. "Unfortunately, Roanoke is not an easy place to service an international [operation] from," he said.

The administration, accounting, personnel and tax departments for Coastal's coal, chemical and power division have been based in Roanoke and headed by Van Lanen. The staff for the coal and chemical operations, about 50 employees, will remain in Roanoke.

Coastal has mining operations in Utah, Virginia, Kentucky and West Virginia and chemical plants in Nevada and Wyoming. Its Roanoke-based division brought $700 million in revenue and $100 million in profit to Coastal last year. It employs 1,200 people.

Coastal's Virginia mines produce about 3 million tons of coal annually.

by CNB