< Previous18 K A N S A S — F R O M T H E H E A R T O F A M E R I C Amanufacturing facility. A signifi cant reason for their locating there was the availability of renewable energy, because they wanted to make it a big part of their energy consumption. I fi rmly believe the continued evolution of renewable energy in Kansas will be a signifi cant driver to large corporations and industrial entities to locate here, because it’s desirable for them to source more and more of their energy from renewable sources. And the interest and willingness of utilities to make that available to them, they’ll see as very attractive.”Policy: Breeze At Your BackHelping get the wind farms there in the fi rst place were state policies like a mandatory renewable portfolio standard (RPS) that called for utilities to get at least 20 percent of their power from renewables by 2020, and a lifetime property tax exemption for projects. Those policies since have been replaced by a voluntary RPS and 10-year tax exemption. But that hasn’t stopped the breeze from blowing.“When Kansas moved its RPS to voluntary in May 2015, we had already hit 20 percent of state power from wind, fi ve years ahead of schedule, so it was a non-issue,” says Kimberly Svaty, public policy director for the Wind Coalition, a wind industry trade association within the Electric Reliability Council of Texas (ERCOT) and Southwest Power Pool (SPP) systems. Not long thereafter, then-Gov. Sam Brownback called for the state to be 50 percent powered by wind by January 2019 — an ambitious, though not mandatory goal. “At the end of 2017 we were at 36 percent,” Svaty says, “and we’ve announced several more projects since then. If we don’t hit 50 percent by January 2019, we’ll hit it really soon thereafter. “The wind resource in Kansas continues to produce some of the country’s lowest cost power, which is a tremendous value for our customers.” — Rob Freeman, CEO of Tradewind Energy, Inc.>10.510.09.59.08.58.07.57.06.56.05.55.04.54.0<4.0102° 101° 100° 99° 98° 97° 96° 95°40°39°38°37°GoodlandGarden CityDodge CityHaysGreat BendSalinaManhattanTopekaKansas CityLawrenceHutchinsonWitchitaKansas — Annual Average Wind Speed at 80m50 0 50 100 15025 0 25 50 75 100The wind resource map shows the predicted mean annual wind speeds at an 80-meter height (the low-balled starting point for wind turbine heights). Source: AWS Truepower and NREL20 K A N S A S — F R O M T H E H E A R T O F A M E R I C AIN F R A S T R U C T U REoad Sky Rail,” says the seal of the Kansas Department of Transportation (KDOT). No mention of rivers. But a town in the middle of Kansas named after a kink in a major waterway now has a major asset for road and rail that should remove the kinks for logistics customers.Great Bend gets its moniker from the point where the course of the Arkansas River bends east then southeast. In June 2017 the town of 16,000 — with $3 million in assistance from KDOT — welcomed the opening of the $6.8-million Great Bend transload facility at Airport Industrial Park, in order to provide movers of big products the ability to move those products from rail to truck and vice versa. It was one of two transload centers partially funded by KDOT, with the other located in Garden City.Project partners in Great Bend also included WATCO Companies, Sherwood Companies, Kansas Transload Services, Fuller Properties, Great Bend Chamber of Commerce & Economic Development and the City of Great Bend, where Nobel Laureate Jack Kilby, inventor of the integrated circuit and pocket calculator, spent his formative years. Heavy-duty logistics firms — especially in the With support from the state, big transload sites support moving big products.by A DA M B R U N SK A N S A S — F R O M T H E H E A R T O F A M E R I C A 21state’s booming wind energy sector — now can easily calculate how the transload centers will help them integrate their efforts in moving goods. “Great Bend sits in a key geographic area near the center of the state,” notes the Watco website. “This geography makes it a logical staging area for wind components as it is in close proximity to several developmental sites for future projects … combined with an available concrete laydown area immediately west of the transload site, the Great Bend facility lends itself as a site that is immediately ready to receive wind components for surrounding projects.”The area, long known as a staging area for the oil and gas industry, continues to be positioned well for that sector too, as it sits between oil- and gas-rich areas in North Dakota and Montana, and the major storage hubs of Conway, Kansas (natural gas), and Cushing, Oklahoma (oil). Thus pipe itself is part of the logistics pipeline in the region — Watco has handled approximately 5,000 carloads of pipe across the Midwest in the past few years.Based in Pittsburg, Kansas, Watco is the owner of Watco Transportation Services, LLC, one of the largest short line railroad holding companies in the U.S. with 37 short line railroads Transportation Partners & Logistics (TP&L) announced in May 2018 that the site it owns and operates at a Garden City transload site partially funded by KDOT dollars is now the largest wind power component distribution center in North America.Photos courtesy of TP&L$606+The average daily value of freight moving across Kansas highways totals more than $606 million.22 K A N S A S — F R O M T H E H E A R T O F A M E R I C AKDOT Highlight ReelRecent progress involving the Kansas Department of Transportation, highlighted in its annual report, includes:“A project completed in August 2016 that was funded in part by KDOT made improvements to rail facilities at Independence. The project, which is a public-private partnership of KDOT, SKO Railroad and Beachner Grain, includes expanded capacity, new truck scales, increased truck parking and new grain bins. The facility now has access from both ends of the rail line, rather than just one end.”“Kansas is the lead partner in an eight-state initiative that will help implement some recommendations of the 2016 Truck Parking Study. The Truck Parking Information and Management System, or TPIMS, is made possible through a matching $25-million federal TIGER grant awarded in 2015 to the consortium of Kansas, Indiana, Iowa, Kentucky, Michigan, Minnesota, Ohio and Wisconsin. Still in the planning stages during 2016, a system of electronic message signs, trave ler information websites and smartphone apps is expected to be in service in 2018.”“The Johnson County Gateway, which opened to traffi c in late 2016, brings relief to one of the most congested, economically critical corridors in Kansas, in the state’s wealthiest county, part of the Kansas City metro area. The project improves and expands the confl uence of Interstates 35/435 and K-10 and will play a vital role in reducing crashes. supporting the economy and elevating the quality of life. In fact, over the next two decades, the economic impact of the Gateway interchange is expected to exceed $1.3 billion.” The $288-million project was part of the 10-year T-WORKS transportation program passed by the Kansas Legislature. More than 230,000 vehicles pass through the area today. That number is projected to increase to 360,000 by 2040.The east leg of the South Lawrence Traffi cway opened to traffi c in November 2016. The six-mile, $183-million freeway ($140 million in construction costs) “completes the link to a vital corridor that will serve thousands of commuters and facilitate the movement of goods between Johnson, Douglas and Shawnee counties,” said KDOT.operating on more than 5,000 miles of track, as well as 33 industrial contract switching locations. Casey Harbour, marketing manager for Watco, notes that Sherwood, which operates and manages the Great Bend site, is handling plenty of aggregate business too, as agencies from KDOT to local municipalities complete road projects.“One of our tenants is Ash Grove Cement,” he says, which brings product in from Chanute in southeastern Kansas. Watco has bid on pipeline projects, fencing materials, bentonite lumber and fertilizer projects, among others. But a look at the site via Google Earth, he says, will show you just how powerful the wind power sector is in the region.“We’re currently surrounded by wind components,” he says, “and we’ve actually moved to a new site about 12 miles down the highway where we’re offl oading them as well. The opportunity came to us as a result of the transload facility.”Harbour says the facility gives industries in the region that don’t have rail access the ability to bring in raw materials or ship out fi nished goods via Watco’s K&O Railroad, and especially makes sense for companies trucking materials long distances.“The typical ratio is three to four trucks per railcar,” he says. “Take pipe, for instance. They can move a mass quantity of pipe in a 20-car block of railcars, versus 60 to 80 trucks to move that product.”It also makes sense for an area long reliant on 909090808080154040257070703535354535752929447525500 mile radius1,000 mile radius1,250 mile radiusSeat tleLos AngelesEl PasoAlbuquerqueDallasIndianapolisNashvilleAtlantaDenverOmahaTopekaWichitaChicagoBostonTampaLaredoHoustonSan FranciscoNewYorkKansas Cit yLasVegasSalt Lake Cit yK A N S A S — F R O M T H E H E A R T O F A M E R I C A 23agriculture and oil.“Our goal was to bring in a facility that could diversify their economy,” he says, noting the leadership of Jan Peters, president and CEO of the Great Bend Chamber of Commerce & Economic Development, and of the state.“We at Watco have had a great relationship and partnership with KDOT,” Harbour says. “They’ve always been a great supporter of the rail industry, especially the short lines.”KDOT contributed $4.5 million toward the $14-million Garden City transload complex, served by BNSF. One of its biggest tenants is Transportation Partners and Logistics (TP&L), which today has grown its overall Garden City footprint to more than 630 acres from just 50 in the area back in 2011. TPL serves clients in the wind energy, solar component and other related industries, and to date has provided support to more than 75 wind farms in the U.S., Canada and Mexico via warehousing, indoor storage and logistical support for moving turbines and other wind energy generation components.“We look forward to serving this community as the demand for wind power continues to grow,” Shelli Stacey, director of rail logistics and a partner at TP&L, said in May 2018 as the company announced that the Garden City site it owns and operates is now the largest wind power component distribution center in North America. 98,000+The number of oversize/overweighttruck permits were issued in 2015 through Kansas’ online K-TRIPS system.24 K A N S A S — F R O M T H E H E A R T O F A M E R I C AA V I A T IONCleared For Takeoffichita’s largest private employer is about to get larger. If the region’s aerospace cluster were a shopping mall, Spirit AeroSystems would be one of the anchors — a magnet operation that attracts customers, suppliers and talent on a scale of its own. Textron Aviation (Cessna and Hawker Beechcraft) would be the other anchors, and dozens of other aerospace companies populate the area, including Airbus’s engineering complex. Spirit employs more than 10,000 in Wichita, where the maker of aerostructures — fuselages, pylons, nacelles and wing components — is investing $1 billion over the next fi ve years, creating 1,000 new jobs during the next two.“After a multi-month site selection search in several states, including Kansas, Spirit chose Wichita to expand its operations,” says Sam Sackett, Senior Manager, Government Relations & Corporate Communications, Spirit AeroSystems. “Several very aggressive WHow Wichita’s top aerospace company will staff a $1-billion, ve-year expansion.K A N S A S — F R O M T H E H E A R T O F A M E R I C A 25by M AR K AR E N Dincentive packages from more than six states were considered in making this decision.” He says the company’s growth is being driven by expanding production rates on commercial products as well as growing statements of work in defense and fabrication. President and CEO Tom Gentile intends to grow both Spirit’s defense work and fabrication operation to $1-billion-per-year businesses. In May, Spirit broke ground on its state-of-the-art Global Digital Logistics Center that will increase storage capacity and part retrieval efficiency at its Wichita site. The new 150,000-square-foot facility is being funded through a collaboration agreement between Spirit, the City of Wichita and Sedgwick County. When complete, the 70-foot-tall building will serve as a smart distribution center to better manage the rapid storage and retrieval of parts used in the assembly of large aerostructures.“The Global Digital Logistics Center supports our strategy to improve production flow time by more accurately managing inventory and Spirit Aerosystems is investing$1 billion in its Wichita facility, creating1,000 new jobs.Photo courtesy of Spirit AeroSystems26 K A N S A S — F R O M T H E H E A R T O F A M E R I C Aensuring the right parts are at the right place at the right time,” said Tom Gentile at the groundbreaking. “As we increase production rates and expand our operations in defense and fabrication, we will improve and expand our capacity to rapidly build complex aerostructures for high-rate production programs at a competitive cost.”Priming the Workforce PumpIn April, Spirit announced a collaboration agreement with Wichita State University as part of its plan to expand research and development initiatives. The agreement focused on increased cooperation with the university in three primary areas:• Spirit will establish a presence on the Innovation Campus that will further its collaboration with WSU researchers and engineers.• Spirit will leverage R&D opportunities with the National Institute for Aviation Research.• Spirit will expand its workforce training and collaboration with the National Center for Aviation Training and provide more applied learning opportunities to WSU students.“This type of university/industry collaboration is exactly the kind needed to strengthen the regional economy and prepare students for careers in the aerospace and manufacturing industries,” said Wichita State President John Bardo. “It’s also a prime example of university research labs working in concert with the workforce training capabilities of WSU Tech. Spirit’s commitment to accelerating its R&D initiatives by partnering with the university will provide long-lasting benefits for the company, the community and generations of students.”“After a multi-month site selection search in several states, including Kansas, Spirit chose Wichita to expand its operations.”— Sam Sackett, Senior Manager, Government Relations & Corporate Communications, Spirit AeroSystemsThis is just one measure Spirit AeroSystems is taking to address its staffing challenges today and in the future. Spirit may be the biggest player in southeast Kansas’s aviation cluster, but it’s not the only one. Demand for aerospace workers is strong, and unemployment rates nationally and in Kansas are low. “While this is good for those seeking jobs, it creates challenges for advanced manufacturers who are struggling to find candidates with the right skillsets needed in a highly technical manufacturing environment, says Sam Sackett. “Today’s aerospace technology requires that employees receive specialized training to ensure a high level of quality for our customers.”All Hands on DeckIn addition to the WSU collaboration agreement, he says, “we are leveraging partnerships with multiple technical and vocational institutions to develop industry-specific training programs around Spirit’s core competencies. This includes training in sheet metal assembly, fabrication and machining and composites. We have received strong support from the [Kansas Gov. Jeff] Colyer administration and the state legislature supporting initiatives that encourage more high school students to earn technical training certifications before they graduate. This helps increase the pool of qualified applicants for aerospace jobs. The state has also worked with our industry to strengthen aerospace technical training programs for those looking to change careers.”City and county leaders have also stepped up their efforts to partner with Spirit on projects that make the company more competitive, notes Sackett. Examples include infrastructure for direct access to high volumes of recycled water for industrial use to assistance building the Global Digital Logistics Center. “In every instance,” he says, “the City of Wichita and Sedgwick County have shown their willingness to be creative in working with us to help make our expansion successful.”Another initiative aimed at creating a strong pipeline of talent is Spirit’s intern and apprenticeship programs for skilled trades. In addition to college student interns, last year Spirit launched a high school intern program. “Based on its success, we doubled our high school interns in 2018,” notes Sackett, illustrating Spirit’s approach to broadening employee recruitment. “We used to focus solely on the local markets for manufacturing positions, and we are now expanding to be regional, and in some cases, national,” he relates. “Whenever possible, we try to work with community leaders and educators to reinvigorate interest in manufacturing careers. Each of these paths combined with our enhanced in-house training will be important to create the talent pipeline necessary to meet the growth in the market.” Next >