Story and photo by Amy Bickel

SORGHUM IS NO LONGER SECOND RATE

Tom Willis

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2

Tom Willis calls it a Cinderella story—how an itchy, secondary crop rose to the top.

Willis, CEO of Conestoga Energy Part-ners and the keynote speaker at Sorghum U, Jan. 8, recalled when he moved to west-ern Kansas 14 years ago, he had never heard of sorghum. He even thought those calling it by its nickname—milo—were just referring to another unfamiliar crop.

Back then, most thought of sorghum as a second-rate crop, he said.

“It was kind of treated like a redhead-ed stepchild,” Willis said, adding that his employees at the time told him “sorghum doesn’t deserve bin space, put it outside.”

But it didn’t take Willis long to learn of sorghum’s water-sipping properties—both as a businessman who needs grain for his ethanol plants and from the stand-point of a father who wants his son to have a future on his farm in southern Finney County, Kansas.

The Ogallala Aquifer is the lifeblood of semiarid landscape. The economy around it—one centered on crops, cattle, pack-ing plants and fuel—couldn’t be sustained without water.

The aquifer is dropping at an alarming rate, Willis said. Wells on his farm declined from 600 gallons a minute when he bought the land a half dozen years ago to 300 gal-lons a minute.

So he did something unprecedented in southwest Kansas—he began to switch his operation from water-intensive corn to sorghum, a reliable, drought-tolerant crop that uses fewer inputs.

“I don’t know if everyone understands the impact that aquifer has, but anything

that can be done to reduce the trauma on it has to be done, because once it is dead, once it is empty, it’s too late,” he said.

Redheaded stepchildWillis sees sorghum as a tool to extend

the life of the Ogallala and to the eco-nomic success of his ethanol plants. The two plants in Liberal and Garden City use 75 million bushels of grain annually—of which 40 million bushels is sorghum.

Sorghum’s transformation occurred in the past decade. Among the boosts to the crop’s ego was demand from California, which was working to decrease its carbon footprint. Sorghum was found to have similar conversion properties to corn and produces even lower-carbon ethanol.

Willis was seeing a premium from Cali-fornia’s fuel demand. He said, at one point, he shipped up to 120 million gallons a year.

But, at first, the word wasn’t getting out to Kansas farmers.

“We would post a 30-cent premium,” he said but added that at the regional eleva-tors, “I never saw the basis move one dime. I’m trying to get more sorghum makers. I’m throwing a 30-cent premium out there and the producers aren’t seeing it.”

Today, a good share of Willis’ ethanol production is from sorghum. In fact, he said his ethanol plants are the biggest user of sorghum in the United States.

Meanwhile, with wheat allergies and sorghum being a non-genetically modified organism, food-grade sorghum sales have boomed.

Analyzing his budget model, Willis real-ized he could make as much on sorghum as corn, without as much financial risk.

On his farm south of Garden City, Willis said he could raise a 150-bushel sorghum crop on 10 inches of moisture, compared to 24 inches on corn.

Sorghum promoterWillis’ efforts are working. Willis implemented a Water Technol-

ogy Farm on his land two years ago. A collaboration between the state of Kan-sas and public and private enterprise, the farm is a model for water savings-showcasing technology like mobile drip irrigation systems and moisture sensors. Today, the state has several technology farms across the region.

By implementing a sorghum/soybean rotation and adding in forages, Willis set his farm’s water reduction goal at 30 percent. In the first two years of the program, he exceeded the target, hitting 45 percent.

“When I equalize everything out, when I take into account inputs, outputs and yields, we see no difference to what would be our bottom line,” Willis said.

He wants to farm to be there for his son and his family, who recently came back to the farm. But without the Ogal-lala, it would be harder to make a living on the semi-arid terrain.

“Without it, kiss the dairy business goodbye. Kiss the feeding business good-bye. Kiss the packing houses goodbye. Kiss agriculture goodbye and, ladies and gentle-men, if you kiss all those things goodbye, kiss your communities goodbye.

“This aquifer thing is real,” he said.Amy Bickel can be reached at 620-860-

9433 or abickel@hpj.com.

FINDING HOPE IN WATER-SIPPING SORGHUM

“I don’t know if everyone understands the impact that aquifer has, but anything that can be done to reduce the trauma on it has to be

done, because once it is dead, once it is empty, it’s too late.”

3

Story and photo by Amy Bickel

BATTLING THE INVASIVE PIGWEED

Marshall Hay

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In a roomful of weed-weary farmers, Marshall Hay preached to the uncon-verted.

The Kansas State University agronomy graduate student told of how he walks countless fields in the spring where pro-ducers failed in their burndown because they were using only glyphosate. For a weed scientist to see farmers make the same mistakes is frustrating.

“Folks, I have a message for you,” he said. “The solution to our herbicide resis-tance issues is not going to come from a jug. Because, guess what, there are not any new jugs to be had. It’s over.”

The battle to control crop-choking weeds is being fought across almost every farm field across the nation. Fast-growing weeds like kochia and palmer amaranth—or pigweed—are defying even multiple douses of top-selling her-bicide Roundup whose primary ingredi-ent is glyphosate.

There are several other herbicides that aren’t as effective today, Hay added, including HPPD and atrazine. For now, producers must look at other options, which includes using integrated strategies to manage weeds.

Pigweed 101Pigweeds are hardy plants, Hay said,

giving the crowd a pigweed 101 lesson.• The pigweed is native to the south-

western United States. It is well adapt-ed to dry conditions.

• Pigweeds have a rapid growth rate that

peaks in the summer. “When sorghum is shutting down because it is over 100 degrees, pigweed is ramping up,” he said. Palmer amaranth doesn’t reach its maximum level of photosynthesis until 120 degrees Fahrenheit.

• Each pigweed has its own genetic makeup. “Just like we have our own DNA, the same thing goes with pig-weeds. They have different charac-teristics and different strengths,” Hay said. “I can’t think of any weeds more competitive than pigweed.”He stressed three key takeaways to

farmers: How to use cultural practices such as cover crops and row spacing to manage weeds; how herbicide resistance works; and how to develop a management plan regarding herbicide use and weed control.

Don’t believe everything you hearWhile widespread glyphosate resis-

tance is the norm, no herbicide is safe from resistance.

Herbicide resistance, Hay said, results from random genetic mutations. Thus, that weed will survive an application of glyphosate.

Do that a few times and the only ones left in the field are the resistant weeds.

But don’t believe everything you read on Twitter or hear from the neighbor—high pH, drought stress and dust aren’t causing resistance.

“A lot of producers might have a mis-nomer that herbicides create herbicide

resistance,” Hay said. “It’s actually the exact opposite. We create the herbi-cide resistance by using that herbicide inappropriately. Herbicides don’t cause mutations. Herbicide resistance is always linked to a genetic trait.”

Meanwhile, low dose selection can happen, but for most of the state’s crop-ping systems, it isn’t at the forefront of the issue.

“It is more about using that repeat-ed selection year after year—to select for those biotypes that have the genes that can confer that resistance genetically,” he said.

Finding a solutionHe said farmers should develop a her-

bicide plan that includes multiple, effec-tive sites of action.

For instance, tank mixing is better than rotating, he said. “We know it is more effective if you can put two effec-tive herbicides together,” he said, adding farmers should scout their fields rou-tinely.

Hay also researched different weed management strategies at three separate locations last year. The study included three different row spacings—30-inch, 15-inch and 7.5-inch rows. Some of the studies incorporated cover crops.

However, planting narrow rows isn’t the solution, either, he said.

“We have to have a herbicide out there to control the weeds,” he said.

Amy Bickel can be reached at 620-860-9433 or abickel@hpj.com.

IN A WORLD OF GLYPHOSATE RESISTANCE, K-STATE GRAD STUDENT SHARES A FEW

BATTLE SECRETS

“We have to think about when we are going to get off this treadmill, this cyclical thing ‘oh, this herbicide didn’t work so I’m going to spray this one.’ We keep going round and round here until we

don’t know what we are doing anymore.”

4

Story by Amy Bickel and Kylene Scott

FARMER PANEL TOUTS SORGHUM’S VALUE

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see SorghumU.com

There was a time when Earl Roemer never gave a second thought about sor-ghum.

Most considered it a second-class com-modity compared to corn and wheat—staple crops on the High Plains where he farms, the fourth-generation farmer said.

“All we did in the 1970s was feed grain sorghum to hogs,” Roemer said.

But fast-forward 40 years and Roemer sees a golden age for sorghum. As a grow-ing number of consumers change their dietary habits, Roemer has capitalized on the crop’s gluten-free and non-GMO properties—starting a business venture he calls Nu Life Market. From an unas-suming complex on the outskirts of Scott City, Kansas, Roemer is operating the nation’s largest grain sorghum flour mill, selling product to big food companies like General Mills and Kellogg.

“Who knew?” said Roemer with opti-mism during a farmer panel discussion at Sorghum U. “Now (sorghum) is one of the highest products and the most demanded specialty product in the United States. Our company was a big part of that.”

Adding value to sorghum was the focus of this year’s Sorghum U, which was sponsored by High Plains Journal, and included venues in Salina and Dodge City. Topics included on-farm storage, maximizing economic yield through fer-tility and managing weeds and insects.

Speakers also discussed the crop’s water-sipping properties, along with value-add-ed marketing, which for Roemer, includes the growing food industry.

Treat sorghum like you would cornA reoccurring theme echoed by speak-

ers was don’t give up on sorghum.“The main thing is, don’t treat sor-

ghum like everyone thinks it is—the red-headed stepchild,” said Zack Rendel, a farmer from Miami, Oklahoma. “If you are going to grow sorghum, treat it how you would grow corn.”

He realized this several years ago. Ren-del, a sixth-generation farmer from an area that averages around 40 inches of rain a year, noticed his sorghum yields were staying a steady 85 to 100 bushels an acre year after year. Then, one year, he planted sorghum on a field following a poor wheat crop.

“So, we had a lot of extra fertilizer on the ground,” he said.

Sorghum yields increased to 110 to 120 bushels an acre, which made Rendel realize if he wanted to reap higher bushels with sorghum, he had to invest in it.

“Instead of treating grain sorghum like grain sorghum, I started treating grain sorghum like corn,” he said.

Changes included making sure he uses enough nitrogen. Each fall, Rendel

spreads about 2 tons of poultry litter an acre on his fields. He runs soil tests on his fields every three years.

He’s spending the same amount of money on sorghum fertility as he is corn, which is about $80 an acre. “But the returns, because seed costs are so low on sorghum versus corn, I make all the money back.”

His yields now average around 120 bushels an acre and he is still trying to push yields by applying more fertilizer on a few test fields.

“It’s not economical to do it, but I just want to see myself based on testing what that sorghum crop has in it—how far I can push it,” he said, noting he elevated one field to 162 bushels an acre.

“I think we can get it higher than that, I really do, and make it economical.”

On-farm researchRendel has a hands-on approach to

research. He won’t invest in a new product unless he knows it will make him money.

“How do I know if what the snake oil salesman is trying to sell me actually works,” he said. “The first thing I tell him is give me some free product. I’ll try it side by side. If it pays for itself and makes more bushels than what it costs, I’ll use it.”

Throughout his field he does strip tests—using a yield monitor to check the strips. He also keeps track of everything on spreadsheets—right down to the penny.

“If it costs me $5 an acre and I didn’t get the two bushels to pay for it, it is out the door,” he said, adding he gives it three years to prove its worth. “Before you make a big investment across the whole farm, make sure it works first.”

He also spends eight to 10 hours a week scouting his fields.

“The best thing you can see in your field is your shadow,” Rendel said. “You can’t really put a bushel per yield on it, but I’m sure I’ve raised yields by scout-ing. I find problems as soon as they are happening.”

“The main thing is, don’t treat sorghum like everyone thinks it is—the redheaded stepchild. If you are going to grow sorghum, treat it how you would grow corn.”

—Zack Rendel

Earl Roemer

Zack Rendel

FARMERPANEL•FARMERPANEL•FARMERPANEL•FARMERPANEL•FARMERPANEL•FARMERPANEL•FARMERPANEL

FARMERPANEL•FARMERPANEL•FARMERPANEL•FARMERPANEL•FARMERPANEL•FARMERPANEL•FARMERPANEL

5

Adding value through on-farm storage

When J.B. Stewart returned to the farm in 1970, he realized he needed to implement three ideas if he wanted to be as successful as some of his neighbors.

These farmers harvested their own crops. They had their own sprayers. They also built on-farm grain storage.

Stewart built his first bin through a Farm Service Agency loan in 1978. It held 8,000 bushels.

He filled the bin with wheat its first year and things worked out so well he was able to build another bin in 1982 and a third in 1985. They had about 50,000-bushel storage until the 2000s. But, sorghum just didn’t work well in farm storage during those times.

“We didn’t market our sorghum, we disposed of it. There was no excitement in it,” Stewart said. “But I always felt like there was a value in sorghum that we weren’t get-ting paid for.”

Now with a place to store a crop, he’s beginning to see the value in having the storage available.

“The No. 1 key thing to sustainability is profitability and I just feel like the addition of the farm storage adds a level of profit-ability that over my career of farming for 50 years,” Stewart said. “I’m really glad I started out with some farm storage and what it’s done for me.”

Today, he has 800,000 bushels of grain in storage on his farm near Keyes, Oklahoma, he said. Stewart estimated farmers pay about 5 cents a bushel a month to store grain at the local elevator. He figures his own storage costs at about 3 1/2 to 4 cents a bushel.

“Farm storage, it adds value to your grain every year as long as you raise it,” he said.

But it’s not as easy as simply building bins and putting grain in them. Stewart said producers must take the time to set the combine and have good samples. His sorghum is monitored with mois-ture test weight collections at harvest. He takes it one step further and gets his grain officially graded.

“You’ve got to be willing to get out there and work at it and market your grain,” he said. “We’re firm believers in using the grain brokers because you need somebody.”

It’s also made him a better farmer—from working to increase fertility to hav-ing quality and clean samples. He also can gain value on his sorghum crop by marketing it directly to end users.

“Even when grain prices are in the tank…we are gaining 15 percent going to the end user,” Stewart said.

What the consumer wantsRoemer said timing is everything in busi-

ness. And grain sorghum has two attributes that consumers are currently demanding.

It’s gluten free. It’s also a non-genetically modified organism.

“Our growth rate last year was far greater with non-GMO than it was glu-ten free,” he said. Later adding, “When I started this business, there were virtually no products on the grocery-store shelves that had grain sorghum in it.”

Last year, he counted more than 1,200 products.

The key to creating this opportunity on his farm and potentially other farms was aided by the added value of very specific grain sorghums. Nu Life Mar-

ket’s plant breeding program works with marketing and purchasing departments of the large companies to get specific traits they want and need.

“We select lines within the sorghum germplasm to develop new grains for that application,” Roemer said. “And that’s what creates massive value in those grains and building that credibility.”

Besides the seed and flour, Nu Life also pops sorghum and is the biggest “popper” in the United States.

“We can pop a semi load of popped sorghum every single day with automated equipment,” he said.

Nu Life contracts with several farmers in the region to produce Nu Life derived sorghum genetics, Roemer said. He has a strict identity-preserve program they follow that requires no contamination with other crops. There are also pesticide restrictions—no application of chemi-cals past flowering.

“If you get into some late-season chal-lenges with head worms, you can spray it, but it disqualifies the field,” Roemer said.

Roemer pays his team of farmers a pre-mium, which averages about a $1 a bushel over the local elevator price.

Moreover, he said, a consumer could trace a box of cereal with sorghum ingredi-ents back to the field.

“It’s not about us,” said Roemer. “It’s not about how I feel about GMOs on our farm. It’s about the consumer and the consumer willing to pay more for a prod-uct with that characteristic. It has been a huge opportunity for grain sorghum to be non-GMO.”

Amy Bickel can be reached at 620-860-9433 or abickel@hpj.com. Kylene Scott can be reached at 620-227-1804 or kscott@hpj.com.

Was sponsored by:

J.B. Stewart

Fertility is often on the chopping block when farmers try to scrape together the last bit of profit from a crop. Lucas Haag, assistant pro-fessor of agronomy and northwest area agronomist at the Northwest Research-

Extension Center in Colby, Kansas, said hold off before considering cutting this aspect of the budget.

“I’ve had a few people tell me, I’m going to cut fertility. Cut fertilizer 20 percent across the board to make the budgets,” Haag said. “I’m not sure that’s the best way to manage.”

Long-term, producers are having to make these kinds of decisions on whether to choose input costs over making money.

“Where’s the trade off between the input we’re purchasing and that crop we’re grow-ing,” Haag said. “Because we’re talking about things that have diminishing return. We can keep increasing nitrogen rate and eventually the cost of that next pound of nitrogen is more than that increasing grain yield.”

The threshold for all of this has a lot to do with the cost of nitrogen and the grain value.

Haag said for sorghum to be profitable and for fertility to be realized, producers must understand a few things. Yield potential from planting to mid-bloom can change a bunch. There’s “huge swings in potential.”

“We’ve seen tremendous benefit espe-cially in recent years to being able to put on some nitrogen late season in corn,” Haag said. “There’s no reason not to believe we can capture similar benefits in sorghum.”

By listening to what the sensor tells the producer to do can make a difference in yield. Fertilizer does too. As more sorghum moves into irrigated and limited irrigation acres, there’s a huge opportunity with fertigation.

“(They’re) able to come back with a very cheap application cost and time some nitrogen later on in the season,” he said.

With nitrogen, there’s potential for loss-es. Haag said if farmers are putting urea on in April, May or June, conditions can be conducive to volatilization losses. He’s not fond of the top dress products though.

“But if you’re telling me you’re going out and spreading some dry urea ahead of your sorghum and it’s the middle of May, I’m thinking this is a pretty good investment,” he said.

That’ll give the farmer about 14 days before the volatilization process starts.

In the environment of western Kansas, losses are usually less.

Don’t forget phosphorus, he added.“I think it’s good to do some back of the

envelope math and look at what we’re remov-ing from the field versus what we’re putting on,” he said. “If we’re removing more than we’re applying, what are we doing to the soil test levels? We’re dropping them.”

A good rule of thumb on many Kansas soils is 18 pounds of phosphorus will change soil test 1 part per million. Raising 60-bushel wheat removes 30 pounds of phosphorus.

Starter products are available for sor-ghum and Haag is seeing some responses to them. There is more of an effect if nitro-gen and phosphorus are placed together using a surface dribble.

“Also keep in mind that when we co-apply nitrogen and phosphorus that phos-phorus moves down into the soil better when its co-applied with nitrogen,” Haag said. “That nitrogen tends to bring the phosphorus with it down into the soils. We get that added benefit.”

Chloride deficiencies are also some-thing that sorghum producers need to keep on their radar.

Chloride is mobile and can leach out of the soil and over time farmers have to replace it. Haag said growers often see a yield response to 10 pounds of chloride.

Kylene Scott can be reached at 620-227-1804 or kscott@hpj.com.

Story and photo by Kylene Scott

Story and photo by Kylene Scott

FERTILITY

FARM STORAGE

Lucas Haag

Dave Ahern

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6

STORAGE—START WITH THE END IN MIND

MANAGE NUTRIENTS FOR PEAK PROFIT

Storing grain is not simple and takes man-agement. Dave Ahern, national sales manag-er of IntelliFarms, told Sorghum U attendees about the role man-agement plays in help-ing farmers handle stored crops.

IntelliFarms pro-vides advanced management technology systems installed in grain bins. Most often systems monitor wheat, sorghum, canola, corn and soybeans.

“We monitor that moisture, the temper-

ature in the bin,” Ahern said. “We monitor the weather outside.”

By collecting the data it does, the firm is better able to advise the farmer as to when he needs to turn the fans on or to take the crop to market.

“We develop meaningful solutions,” he said. “Being a technology company we have to kind of be that kayak in a way to where we can mold our products and make sure we’re providing value.”

Ahern believes a grain storage plan starts before the farmer puts the seed into the ground.

“My storage plan should be around my market,” he said. “It should be how am I

going to feed this to get it to a specific mar-ket. I want to show you how the technology can help drive that.”

Ahern likes to help relate science to the management of the grain in the bin.

For example, equilibrium moisture con-tent. The bin has certain characteristics like the moisture level with and without grain in it.

“Put a piece of sorghum in at 10 percent and the equilibrium of the room is 13 per-cent, that sorghum is going to hydrate back up to 13 percent if left long enough,” Ahern said. “Another piece of sorghum at 16 per-cent will dry down to that 13 percent.”

See Storage, 7

The question entomologist Sarah Zukoff gets asked most often is: what is the year going to be like for insect pests?And the simple answer is it depends on the weather.

Zukoff, entomol-ogist with Kansas

State University, gave several Integrated Pest Management tips during Sorghum U in Salina and Dodge City.

Even if sorghum growers plant sug-arcane aphid-resistant varieties in the southern states, scouting regularly, spray-ing when needed and doing all the “right” things to slow the sugarcane aphid, it all still depends on weather.

“If we have a really nice, cold spring and a nice cold start to winter these will be less likely to move up north,” Zukoff said of the sugarcane aphid. “If we have a nice warm spring and the summer ends up nice and hot, we have no cold snaps, then they’ll continue to move forward from here.”

Most of the SCA overwinter in Texas, and are on sorghum, which is a perennial crop. They reproduce at a prolific rate, then ride the wind to northern states. It

gets too cold in northern states for the SCA to survive over the winter.

On www.myfields.info, under the sugarcane aphid section, there’s a map that’s updated daily, tracking the aphid’s progress north.

What makes the SCA such a problem in sorghum? Mostly it’s because of the rate at which the aphids reproduce and the amount of honeydew they’re able to produce. Honeydew is the aphid’s excre-ment and it makes harvest troublesome and gums up the machines. The SCA reproduces quickly when it’s hot and because of the aphid feeding on the plant many producers have seen their sor-ghum plants lodge as well as problems with filling the seed.

“Imagine they come in here at milk stage and you don’t treat them and they stay heavy. On top of the honeydew prob-lems you’ll also have berry fill problems,” she said. “If they come in really late and you have your grain already filled at hard dough then you don’t have problems with berry problems you’ll just maybe have problems with honeydew.”

The moral of the story is plant as early as possible in hopes the sorghum is mature by the time aphids come in to prevent grain fill problems, Zukoff said.

Spraying for the aphids is “kind of the elephant in the room,” Zukoff said.

“When they come late in the season, do we spray or do we not spray?” she said. “So it comes down to really money and it also comes down to what varieties we’re using and maybe how many beneficials are in the field.”

She suggests if the crop is near the hard dough stage, late in the season and the aphids come in heavy—harvest might not be an option if the SCA are above threshold.

“Your plants are looking pretty sus-ceptible, and you think you have a pretty susceptible variety, you’re going to think about treating with the lowest recom-mended rate of Transform or Sivanto,” she said.

When aphids are coming into an area —whether producers are checking the map or hearing it from their neighbors—start checking fields a little more often.

“If you can do it every three to four days when they’re near you that’s the best,” Zukoff said. “It really is hard to get out there and check sorghum that often, espe-cially when you can have really thick hot spots in the center of the field.”

Kylene Scott can be reached at 620-227-1804 or kscott@hpj.com.

7

Story and photo by Kylene Scott

INSECTS

Sarah Zukoff

For more information on this topic

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SUGARCANE APHIDS MORE MANAGEABLE IN 2017

The farmer is able to take specifics of the humidity and target temperatures and dial it down to not only certain commodities, but specific varieties and help to manage them accordingly while they are being stored.

“Storage should be thought about all the way from seed down to the field, what we do in the field, how we nurture that plant,” he said. “What we store and have a market-ing plan behind that as well.”

The tools Ahern has available allows users to check fields, check varieties and on-farm storage systems. Farmers can also research test plots/field trials in their area to help find the best varieties and apply the data to their own operations.

“We’re not biased to any of these differ-ent varieties, but we know how it stores,” he

said. “So that’s where we start when we’re thinking about storage.”

To make decisions about storage, Ahern reiterates the importance of having a plan. Ask the following questions:• What is your purpose?• What are you growing for?• Are you growing for the highest yield

potential?“We can get it into the bin and we want

to deliver it,” he said. “We want it to be a predictable product. Not grow necessarily just a commodity, grow a product.”

Technology can help predict harvest date, yield, moisture and when it should go into the bin. These combine to help create a more predictable situation on the farm, including the required airflow, which can enable the crop to maintain quality during its time in storage.

“When you’re talking about shelf life of a commodity—all commodities, all varieties

of commodities have a different shelf life,” he said. “They’re a biodegradable substance.”

The technology inside the bins helps keep the crop consistent all the way through. It’s kind of “like x-ray vision.”

“The system can react to it and it can run fans more aggressively where you can make decisions based on that,” Ahern said.

He wants to “promote” having an on-farm storage plan.

“I’m also going to plug how do you cre-ate that plan around your storage, whether you have a bin already or you’re planning to build one,” he said.

IntelliFarm staff spends time on the farm and evaluates data to make the system operate the best it can.

“Get the modeling done so you can have a better plan,” Ahern said. “I can’t plug that enough.”

Kylene Scott can be reached at 620-227-1804 or kscott@hpj.com.

Continued from 6

Storage

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