Company Profile
Westar Energy
Company Overview
As the largest electric utility in Kansas, Westar Energy is headquartered in Topeka. The company employs about 2,400 people and serves more than 640,000 customers in much of east and east-central Kansas.
Our energy centers in eight Kansas cities generate nearly 6,000 megawatts of electricity, and we operate and coordinate about 35,000 miles of transmission and distribution lines.
Our goal is to become a preferred energy provider, both inside and outside our service territory.
As the largest producer of wind energy in Kansas, Westar Energy was the first company to introduce commercial wind applications in Kansas. Westar Energy has wind farms in the state that produce 295 megawatts of power annually. This represents 6 percent of customers' peak demand being met by wind energy alone.
Company History
Kansas Gas and Electric Company was formed in 1909 to serve 5,525 customers in Wichita, Pittsburg and Frontenac, Kansas. Increasing nearly 10-fold by 1925, KG&E was serving 48,773 customers in 50 communities in the southeastern and south-central part of the state. At that time, KG&E was also providing natural gas to Hutchinson, Newton, Pittsburg and Wichita along with electric service.
In the northeastern part of the state, the Kansas Power and Light Company was founded in Tecumseh, Kansas in 1924. KPL immediately began acquiring customers and providing electricity and natural gas to northeastern Kansas communities. The utility's transmnission lines ran west to Topeka and north to Atchison. By 1983, KPL had expanded its service area outside the state by acquiring the Gas Service Company and the rights to serve its one million natural gas customers in Kansas, Missouri, Nebraska and Oklahoma.
In 1993, the two utilities - Kansas Gas and Electric and the Kansas Power and Light Company - merged to become Western Resources, serving 570,000 electric customers and more than one million natural gas customers in three states.
In an effort to become a more purely electric utility, Western Resources traded ownership of the natural gas portion of tis business to ONEOK, Inc. a Tulsa, Oklahoma-based utility in 1995. In return, Western Resources became approximately a 45 percent owner of ONEOK. But by 2003, Western Resources sold its investment in ONEOK, and the company renewed its focus on being a pure electric utility.
Western Resources became Westar Energy in 2002 when shareholders approved a name change. Today, Westar Energy is the largest energy provider in Kansas, although it is still traded on the New York Stock Exchange under the symbol WR.
Benefits
Westar Energy realizes how important it is for our employees to have choices to meet their unique needs. We offer a comprehensive, flexible benefits package available on the first day of employment. Westar Energy pays the majority of the health care premiums; employees pay a portion of the cost, on a pre-tax or after-tax basis.