Wheat, Water, and a Win

What can you do with 1.8 million pounds of flour? You could put the flour in a pipeline and send it to the manufacturing facility next door for pancake and muffin mix! West Kentucky is home to large farms for wheat, a mill to turn the wheat into flour, and Krusteaz Products. And yes, one of the mills has a pipeline that sends flour daily to Krusteaz which proudly calls itself the “batter capitol of the world.”

What’s one of the key ingredients in this food chain? Water.

The products, places and people that make Kentucky unique were part of the conversation at the Collaboration Conference in April for the Kentucky Association of Economic Development (KAED). More than 200 professionals from west to eastern Kentucky were in Paducah to look at strategies to grow Kentucky’s economy. Louisville Water was part of the conversation as the only drinking water provider represented. As the water provider to nearly 20% of the Kentucky’s population including 24,000 businesses, Louisville Water is part of some of the state’s largest economic development projects with batteries for electric vehicles, technology, and bourbon.

“Giving water a seat at the table when communities want to grow their economy can make the opportunity happen,” said Kelley Dearing Smith, Louisville Water’s Vice President of Communications and Marketing and an active member of KAED. “With utilities, site selectors often first look to power, but without collaboration on the water side, a community can quickly miss out on an opportunity.”

Louisville Water works closely with partners at the local, regional, and state level to promote economic development and identify infrastructure improvements to support projects. And many notice the involvement. One national site selector at the conference commented that aside from Louisville Water, “there needs to be stronger leadership on the water side similar to what we see on power.”

Kentucky’s economy is a blend of national brands and locally owned businesses, but manufacturing dominates. More than 250,000 people work in this industry and Kentucky is the national leader for electric vehicle battery production