Westar Energy CEO announces retirement
Haines will be replaced by William Moore, Westar's president and chief operating officer, who has worked at the company during all but two of the past 29 years. "We are confident that the company will continue to succeed under Bill's leadership," Charles Q. Chandler IV, Westar's chairman, said in a statement.
"The board also thanks Jim Haines for his great leadership and unwavering commitment to Westar's succes ." Haines originally left retirement in 2002 to become CEO. At the time, Westar's stock was at $8.50 a share, the company had debt of $3.6 billion and the operation was wrapping up a year in which it would lose $793.4 million, or $11.06 cents a share.
Under Haines' leadership, Westar soon sold Protection One Inc. - a monitored-security company that later moved to Lawrence - as well as Westar's stake in ONEOK, an Oklahoma natural gas company. The moves were designed to cut debt and focus on Westar's core purpose: generating electricity. Last year, Westar reported $164.3 million in profit, good for $1.88 per share, on revenues of $1.61 billion, up $53.1 million from a year earlier.
"We are no longer focused on solving past problems," Haines said Wednesday in a letter to employees. "Now, from a solid base, we are focused on turning tomorrow's challenges into opportunities." Westar, which recently broke ground on a $318 million peaking plant at the Emporia Energy Center, is the state's largest electric utility, providing service to about 669,000 customers.
A total of 160 of its 2,200 employees work in Lawrence.
Related News
Australia's energy transition stalled by stubbornly high demand
MELBOURNE - A more than 200% increase in installed solar power generation capacity since 2018 helped Australia rank sixth globally in terms of solar capacity last year and emerge as one of the world's fastest-growing major renewable energy producers.
However, to realise its goal of becoming a net-zero carbon emitter by 2050, Australia must reverse the trajectory of its energy use, which remains on a rising path in contrast with several peers that have curbed energy use in recent years.
Australia's total electricity consumption has grown nearly 8% over the past decade, compared with contractions over the same period of more than…
