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Energy Expert Insights: Why Power Is Now the First Question in Industrial Deals · Industrial Advisors

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  I think it's common for the path to economic development
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  to be kind of a crooked path.
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  At least that's what I've noticed with different colleagues in this industry.
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  Um, I actually went to school to be a science teacher and my
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  bachelor's degree is in geology.
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  Welcome to our Industrial Advisors podcast.
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  We are live from IAMC here in Indianapolis, myself and Matt McGregor.
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  We have a great guest today, Katie Pri, who is a economic development
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  manager at Duke Energy Corporation.
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  So lots going on with that role.
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  Tell us a little bit about.
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  Okay.
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  Your background, how you got into that sector and what that role entails today.
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  Yeah, so I think it's common for the path to economic development
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  to be kind of a crooked path.
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  At least that's what I've noticed with different colleagues in this industry.
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  Um, I actually went to school to be a science teacher.
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  My bachelor's degree is in geology.
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  Where'd you go to school?
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  At Ball State.
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  Okay.
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  Yeah.
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  Awesome.
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  Okay, so while I was student, I think you, I read you did your
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  master's and your undergrad there.
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  Yes.
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  Yeah, I did.
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  So I took the GIS class my senior year and I loved the spatial analysis of it.
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  It was something I had never heard of.
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  Bill's already lost, is it?
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  Yeah, that's above my pay grade.
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  Yeah.
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  The geographic application system been on lost as well.
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  That was such a fun class during student.
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  Decided to go back for my master's degree in GIS.
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  And after graduation, I wanted to get out of Indiana and like forge my own path.
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  So I moved out to California and worked at Apple on their maps using that GIS degree.
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  Awesome.
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  But I missed Indiana and my family and the cost of living here was a big difference.
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  Is a little different.
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  A little different than the Bay Area, right?
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  Yeah, right, exactly.
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  That.
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  Born and raised a Hoosier, so yeah.
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  So I am very used to it here in Indiana.
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  I wanted to get back here.
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  Um, I applied for a job at Duke Energy on their GIS team.
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  My mom wants me to say that she encouraged me to do it, so she is
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  the reason I'm in the utilities here.
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  We give mom the credit.
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  Yes, give her all the credit.
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  So I started on the GIS team at Duke Energy, then moved into an engineering
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  role, an engineering technologist role in the distribution design team.
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  And then from there I heard about economic development at a lunch and learn.
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  I had no idea what economic development was generally,
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  especially on a utility scale, what that meant or why we needed it.
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  But it seemed to be a perfect fit because I was missing that
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  piece that could like fill up my cup as far as community service.
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  So combined like my technical background with bringing in jobs
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  and investment to the communities we serve, and that's very important to me.
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  So that works.
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  Awesome.
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  Excellent.
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  Do you miss California at all?
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  Oh, the weather.
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  Yeah.
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  Especially when it starts cooling down here.
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  The weather was beautiful, but I'm an Indiana girl, so I love it here.
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  Well, tell us a little bit about the power grid for your region.
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  What's it made up of and is it competitive?
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  US wide?
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  Like would companies come here because of power rate?
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  So we're still mostly coal here.
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  We have gas, hydro, and solar.
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  But yeah, we see a lot of interest here in Indiana and in our
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  full Midwest service territory.
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  We have competitive rates.
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  We have a great team of economic developers here at Duke Energy, and
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  I hear a lot of great feedback about my teammates, so I know folks wanna
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  be here and, and work with them.
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  Excellent.
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  And before the podcast started, we were talking a little bit
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  about some of the industrial deals that you guys have landed here.
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  Can you talk to that a little bit?
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  You mentioned a bike company, you were talking about food and beverage.
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  What else did you, uh, you say there was a couple other wins?
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  Yeah, there's sk Hynek up in West Lafayette, chip manufacturer.
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  Um, there's been some food and beverage wins.
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  There's the guardian bikes down in southern Indiana, so we've had some
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  different industries and um, big wins.
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  There's some EV space wins as well.
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  So, yeah, there's plenty of folks coming here to Indiana.
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  It's a great place to be.
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  Yeah.
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  Affordable living like you were talking about earlier too, so that's good.
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  And Crossroads of America.
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  Yeah.
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  And the Colts, the, the Indianapolis Colts are dare up to a, uh, to a great start.
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  So the Indiana football is ranked two in the country, so
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  that pretty amazing as well.
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  No, no.
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  As a base.
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  There's all both on the title do almost as good as the Seattle
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  sports environment right now.
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  Interesting.
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  Hell yeah.
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  Yeah.
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  We'll see what happens tonight.
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  Tonight.
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  Well, for the listeners when they listen to this, tonight is game seven.
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  Yeah.
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  Yeah.
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  So big night for us.
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  Yes.
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  Tell us more about Duke site readiness program and how it helps prepare
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  communities for industrial development.
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  Yeah, so the site readiness program is something I feel so lucky to be able
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  to lead for our whole Midwest region.
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  So that's Indiana, Ohio, and Kentucky.
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  Our Ohio Kentucky service territories, like the Greater Cincinnati region.
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  So that process starts out early in the year.
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  It's a competitive program, so communities have to apply and be chosen.
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  So I think that kind of adds to.
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  The value and the prestige of participating in that program.
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  Um, we work with the National Fight Consultant, the site Selection group.
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  I don't know if you're familiar with them, but they come in
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  from out of town and help us.
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  And then we work with some local engineering firms here in
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  Indiana, banning engineering, and in Ohio, Kentucky Bayer, Becker.
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  So we start off that process with an RFI that communities fill out.
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  They come in, they being the consultants and engineering firms
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  come in for a mock site visit.
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  And some communities that's like their a hundred site visit.
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  They're very familiar.
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  Some have never done a site visit before, so it's brand new for them.
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  But either way, it feels like a really valuable experience to practice
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  presenting your community and your site for a potential investor.
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  From there, the consultants have a final presentation they put together for us
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  and for the communities to invite local stakeholders to learn more about the
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  site, the strengths and weaknesses, some potential target industries that they seek
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  that could work really well at the site.
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  Um, and then some conceptual drawings to help.
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  Visualize future industrial development, what that could look like at the site.
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  Then we end with a grant presentation to help the community implement
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  some of those recommendations.
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  And so I know we'll probably talk about this, but the fast-paced
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  environment right now is crazy.
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  Industry's moving so fast.
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  So it's a really competitive advantage for communities to be one step
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  closer to, to being ready for that.
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  On that program is power.
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  Like in a lot of the places in the United States, if you were
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  gonna do industrial development, power would be your outside dates.
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  So if it's a, you know, one year process to get all your site
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  entitlements done, it might be two, three, or four years to get the power.
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  How is that in your region?
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  So for us, it really just depends on the size of the project and where it's going.
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  You know, some of these sites are like right next to transmission
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  lines or right next to distribution lines that will of course be a lot
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  faster than if we have to build out miles and miles of the structure.
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  So it's really very site and project dependent.
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  If you only need a megawatt.
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  If there's a good chance we might have that available on our distribution
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  system, just to be able to put some transformers there for you.
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  If you need a substation filled out, that might take a few gears.
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  Okay.
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  Just for the equipment ordering For sure.
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  Let's stay on the, the power topic 'cause there's a lot of talk
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  about power, today's environment.
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  So what, in your opinion, are the biggest challenges with the power grid
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  right now and, and how that's kind of impacting the industrial sector?
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  So the biggest challenges I'm seeing and what I do day to day
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  is this feed that industry is moving and the increased demand.
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  I know the operations always wanna seem to want to be started yesterday.
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  An infrastructure build out takes plenty of time like we talked.
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  Style.
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  I wish it was just flipping off a switch.
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  Totally.
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  Taking your extension cord and plugging it into a high voltage
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  line like that would be ideal.
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  But it takes SL and permitting and construction, so it could
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  take years and cases, especially with these big complex projects.
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  But the good news is, is I, I really wanna plug our engineers because they're
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  coming up with really creative solutions.
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  To help keep us competitive in the areas we serve.
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  They wanna win and, and it's so great to see them kind of step into this
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  economic development role with us.
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  Where does the more power with the demand come from?
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  Like if you're not building a new power plant, how does it happen?
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  So we are converting one of our coal power plants to a gas power
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  plant that's, that will add about 470 megawatts to thousand by.
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  So that's one thing in our works from our integrated resource plan, our last one
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  that we submitted to the Indiana Utilities Regulatory Commission on the coal plants,
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  as it just as simply is, burn more coal.
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  Have more power.
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  That's something I wish I knew.
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  I'm not sure if you can just like shovel and how that capacity works
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  there, but no, I'm not sure on that one.
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  Okay, very good.
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  So on the companies that you're talking with and having conversations with,
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  how are they looking at power right now and infrastructure as they're looking
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  at kind of their long-term plans as they enter into a, into a market?
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  So it seems like they're pulling us into the conversation way earlier than even
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  just a few years ago that we're having really great and educated conversations.
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  They understand that that is the critical piece for their operation, for the
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  timeline and success of their project.
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  So we're able to really dive in with them early on.
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  They, they have three reasonable, uh, timeline requests.
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  I think now their companies are more understanding kind of some of the
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  problems with the cock type items.
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  And it's not just in one area.
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  Where is your fault, big type China, uh, the three, it seemed everyone, we
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  have a lot more understanding lately.
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  Yeah.
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  Yeah.
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  It's good.
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  And what do you, you've touched on some of this, but specifically the demand for
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  EV and and manufacturing and data centers.
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  What are you guys doing to compensate for that upcoming demand?
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  So that integrated resource plan is something we work on, so we have to submit
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  one of those at least every three years to the regulatory permission here permission.
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  And that just shows all of our major East Indiana have to do that.
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  But that shows how we'll fulfill customers.
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  It's with existing MQ or resources.
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  So that's how we tech out teams can make those plans.
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  We have the forecasting teams who got even some of our projects that haven't won yet.
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  If they do, what?
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  What will they add to the grid?
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  How will we be built?
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  Those demands?
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  So we have very, very smart people by behind the same Awesome up.
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  Yeah.
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  Well, that's super insightful.
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  Uh, thank you for sharing your, your insights with us.
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  We just heard the bell that the next conference session is taking place.
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  So appreciate, uh, your insight on everything and, uh,
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  spending time with us today.
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  Yeah, thank you very much.
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  It was great meeting you.
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  Awesome.
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  Thank you.