Coastal States Gas Corporation
 |
|
| Industry | Energy |
|---|---|
| Fate | Acquired by El Paso Corporation |
| Founded | 1955 |
| Defunct | 2001 |
| Headquarters |
Greenway Plaza Houston, Texas |
Coastal Corporation was a diversified energy and petroleum products company headquartered at 9 Greenway Plaza (Coastal Tower) in Greenway Plaza, Houston, Texas. The company was founded in 1955 by Oscar Wyatt and incorporated in 1955 as Coastal States Gas Producing Company. It was a major energy producer when it merged with the El Paso Corporation in 2001. As of 1999, Coastal was a Fortune 500 company with 13,300 employees and annual Revenues of $8.2 billion.
Coastal produced and marketed petroleum, natural gas, electricity, and coal. It also sold gasoline at Coastal-branded gas stations: by 1999, Coastal Refining and Marketing operated 962 gas stations across in 33 states and was supplied by four refineries, including a 150,000 bbl per day refinery in Corpus Christi, Texas, a 180,000 bbl per day refinery in Eagle Point, New Jersey, a 250,000 barrel per day refinery on Aruba, and a 25,000 bbl per day refinery geared for asphalt production in Chickasaw, Alabama. Coastal Corporation also owned and operated a fleet of oil tankers, tugs, and barges. Sales in 1991 totaled $9.549 billion. Coastal Corporation was a major supplier of marine diesel in the Caribbean, natural gas in Colorado, and heating oil in the Northeast.
Coastal was a key natural gas producer and distributor along with competitors Enron, Williams, and El Paso Energy, which Coastal later merged with. Coastal produced, gathered, processed, transported, stored and marketed natural gas throughout the United States and by the 1990s Coastal's 20,000-mile pipeline network, including the Iroquois and Great Lakes pipeline, completed in 1991, and the Empire State Pipeline, completed in 1992, transported five billion cubic feet of natural gas daily.
Coastal's operating revenues dropped considerably between 1996 and 1998, from $12.17 billion to $7.37 billion, making it a target for acquisition, and although the company rebounded from increased production of natural gas, by more than 16 percent in 1998, coupled with rising oil prices that made Coastal's Petroleum business increasingly profitability, the board of directors and founder Oscar Wyatt continued with merger negotiations that resulted in Coastal being acquired by the smaller but seemingly cash-wealthy El Paso Energy, whose primary business was in natural gas.
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