Kansas City Board of Public Utilities

Conservation in the Heartland┬áThe Kansas City Board of Public Utilities operates both electricity and water systems for the Kansas community. Keith Regan learns how water and electricity go together surprisingly well. ┬áThe Kansas City Board of Public Utilities (BPU) marks its 100th anniversary as a vastly different company than the one founded to help foster the growth of the Midwestern city a century ago.  Begun as a water utility in 1909, the BPU today provides both water and electricity to some 127.5 square miles in the Kansas City, Kansas, area, with 65,000 electricity customers and more than 50,000 residential commercial and industrial customersÔÇöincluding local manufacturing plants run by General Motors, Owens Corning, CertainTeed and othersÔÇöreceiving water from the company. The public utility is one example of when electricity and water actually do mix well, says Jim Epp, manager of water operations and acting chief administrative officer at the utility. ÔÇ£IÔÇÖve always said there are a lot of strengths in water and electricity being part of the same company. The water side needs electricity to process and pump water to the homes we serve, and the electric side needs water to make electricity, especially when surface water is not available. I think itÔÇÖs an ideal mix in some ways.ÔÇØThe overall utility is smaller than it was just a few years ago, having downsized from around 1,000 employees to about 630, a shift made without any layoffs. More work is being outsourced, and technology has helped make each worker more efficient. For instance, the utilityÔÇÖs water treatment plant that was built in 2000ÔÇöreplacing a nearly 100-year-old facilityÔÇöis staffed by a handful of workers during the day but can be run by a single person during off-hours and overnight. ÔÇ£The plant is highly automated, and we made that investment to set ourselves up in terms of capacity and treatment for the foreseeable future,ÔÇØ says Epp. That plant was built above the floodplain of the Missouri River with overhead utilities well above the risk of being reached by even a 500-year flood of the river. The utility doesnÔÇÖt draw water directly from the river but instead has two underground collector wells, each one capable of yielding 40 million gallons of water. Because the wells draw from the aquifer beneath the river, the water has been naturally screened, with fewer sediments. Another advantage is that if a spill of oil or other contaminants occurs in the river above, those pollutants would not enter the aquifer but instead be carried past by the riverÔÇÖs current. Most of the year, the utility sees an average demand of about 30 million gallons per day, meaning it can keep one well closed for service or cleaning in all but the driest summer months, when demand spikes above 50 million gallons and both wells are put into active service. While it has embraced automation in some areas, the Kansas City BPU has maintained an old-fashioned approach when it comes to customer service. The utilityÔÇÖs customer base has a relatively low per-capita income level, and many of its customers still prefer to pay bills in person. ÔÇ£A lot of our customers walk into our facility to pay bills, and many come in with paychecks and cash them. They use us as a bank of sorts. Very few utilities around here have maintained that level of customer service staffing, and weÔÇÖve looked at going down a more automated route. There could be some savings, but weÔÇÖve got to keep in mind the customers that we serve and the demographics of our area.ÔÇØLooking forward, the utility is weighing an investment in an automated meter-reading system, with the potential payback even greater because both electric and water meters could be read at the same time. ÔÇ£There are more drivers on the power side of the industry toward automated meter reading, but the water side could piggyback on a system like that, and we could do it at a lower cost to each company,ÔÇØ Epp says. BPU was one of seven drinking water systems in the US to earn a Gold Award for Competitiveness Achievement from the Association of Metropolitan Water Agencies (AMWA), a sign of the commitment of employees to continually improving their customer service and operations, says Epp. ÔÇ£WeÔÇÖre always looking for ways to be more efficient and effective while continuing to serve our customers at the highest level possible.ÔÇØ  ÔÇô Editorial research by Jason Moore