Building a brighter future
LES’ 2023 Annual Report reflects the past year’s achievements and our commitment to the community. A year full of adaptability, innovation and engagement. A year full of planning for what’s next to come.
Every day since 1966, LES employees have dedicated their time to ensuring our customers can brew their morning cup of coffee, call a long-distance friend and keep their families warm in their homes, all with the power of affordable and reliable electricity. At the same time, the LES team continuously predicts, plans, and prepares for our energy future.
LES employees work to make thoughtful decisions that benefit our community today, and for generations to come. Cyber resiliency was at the forefront of 2023, ensuring the security of our electric grid. Sustainability efforts paved the way for greener energy. Community engagement strived to connect, educate and empower our customers to feel confident in their utility.
Why is thinking ahead so important at LES? It’s so you can continue to enjoy each morning, that long-awaited laugh, that quality time with your family. Yesterday’s efforts become today’s actions and tomorrow’s triumphs.
We’re building a brighter future for our customers.
Message from CEO Kevin Wailes
LES has long pursued its vision: striving to be the world’s best energy company. LES’ values of safety, reliability, community and integrity guide us in this effort, supporting the growth and success of our service area by safely providing reliable and affordable electricity.
This annual report highlights the significant foundational work to deliver on our goal of net-zero CO2 emissions from our generation portfolio by 2040 through our integrated resource plan. We made major progress on projects that support grid reliability and enhanced our readiness. LES co-hosted Cyber Tatanka for the second year, a two-week joint cyber training program for civilian and military cyber professionals to improve their understanding and capability to respond to cyber incidents of different complexity. LES also participated in GridEx—a national grid security exercise that reflected real-world cyber and physical threats and stress-tested our crisis response and recovery plans.
LES answered the call for mutual aid, sending 20 employees to Florida to help restore power to the communities impacted by Hurricane Idalia. Our reliability continues to be among the best in the nation, with the System Average Interruption Duration Index — the average outage time per customer — excluding major events, at 19.1 minutes, well below the national averages of 123 minutes. Furthermore, LES has continued to have some of the lowest rates in the country, ranking as the lowest residential overall price and 8th lowest average “all-in” price of 87 cities nationwide.
Our employees are deeply committed to making the Lincoln area a better place to live. Through our Workplace Giving Campaign, employees personally donated $117,203 to United Way. Events like the LES EV Ride + Drive and Zoo Lights Powered by LES helped increase awareness of valuable programs and opportunities available to customers.
As I completed 47 years in public power leadership roles, I’m honored to have had the opportunity to serve LES for the last 13 years. It is truly an amazing asset to the community and our customers. The utility’s performance in 2023 is a credit to our quality workforce and the relationship we’ve developed with our customers over the years. I encourage you to learn more about LES’ accomplishments in this report.
Given its past history of meeting challenges in ways that serve the best interests of our community, I am confident Lincoln Electric System will continue to be an industry leader in the future.
Kevin G. Wailes | Chief Executive Officer
2023 at a glance
With more than 200 square miles of communities to power, LES has much to be proud of in 2023.
LES served an average of 150,322 retail customers: 133,839 residential and 18,080 commercial/industrial customers.
LES’ Customer Care department answered 119,492 calls, handled 43,132 requests and served nearly 25,000 walk-in customers who visited the Walter A. Canney Service business lobby.
LES paid $12.7 million to Lincoln Public Schools, Lancaster County and the cities of Lincoln and Waverly in LES’ annual payment in lieu of tax, or PILOT. Since 1966, those payments have totaled $350.4 million.
LES’ Meter Services team collected 36,869,380 meter reads (not including the interval reads taken from demand meters). With these readings, 1,935,844 bills were issued.
The System Average Interruption Duration Index—the average outage time per customer—was just 19.1 minutes in 2023, excluding major events.
The average LES residential customer paid an average of only $2.99 per day to power their lives.
LES powers the community with a balanced array of resources. The utility’s nameplate capacity is made up of 1/3 natural gas, 1/3 coal and 1/3 renewables.
The LES Competitive Market Study showed LES has some of the lowest-cost electric services in the nation. LES ranked 16th best for the lowest average all-in price and 3rd lowest for residential all-in price. LES ranked 8th for the most stable rates over the past 20 years.
LES provided mutual aid support in Florida after Hurricane Idalia. Two crews comprised of 20 LES employees worked for one week in the state to help restore power to the communities impacted by the Category 3 storm.
Safety & resiliency
With an ever-changing cyber landscape and other external threats, expecting the unexpected is more important than ever. 2023 saw LES take significant strides to ensure the safety of our electricity and the reliability our customers expect as we prepare for what could be next.
GridEx participation
LES participated in GridEx, a national grid security exercise organized by the North American Electric Reliability Corporation. More than 250 organizations played simultaneously in a complex and challenging scenario that reflected real-world cyber and physical threats and was designed to stress-test crisis response and recovery plans.
IT baseline health
LES completed an IT baseline health monitoring assessment to gauge the health and performance concerns within the IT environment and ensure they were escalated to appropriate staff during and outside business hours. This led to the introduction of robust IT Change Management practices.
LES & National Security
LES and the U.S. Department of Homeland Security Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency completed a weeklong training program on understanding, protecting and securing the Industrial Control System (ICS) from cyberattacks. Roughly 100 participants attended the training at the LES Operations Center.
Cyber Tatanka
LES co-hosted and participated in Cyber Tatanka for the second year. Cyber Tatanka is a two-week joint cyber training program for civilian and military cyber professionals to improve their understanding and capability to respond to cyber incidents of different complexity. Participants included the Nebraska National Guard, Lincoln Electric System, Union Bank & Trust, the Army of the Czech Republic, the Ukrainian Armed Forces and several healthcare entities.
Strengthening cybersecurity
LES completed an external pen test, a penetration test performed by a contractor to help identify cybersecurity-related gaps and weaknesses LES may have in our environment. This ongoing effort continues to strengthen LES’ cybersecurity.
Safety award
LES received the 2023 Nebraska’s Safest Companies award from the National Safety Council, Nebraska Chapter. This award recognizes and celebrates companies that prioritize safety, have a commendable safety program and have impeccable safety records based on their industry and size.
Sustainability
In pursuit of our goal to achieve net-zero carbon emissions from generation by 2040, LES continued to make conscious and considerate choices throughout 2023 to create a cleaner energy future.
Sustainable energy funds
LES disbursed approximately $2 million in Sustainable Energy Program funds to incent more than 5,600 energy efficiency projects, reducing peak demand by a net of 5.9 MW and 7,800 megawatt-hours annually.
Net metering solar projects
LES coordinated 64 residential and commercial net metering solar projects, which accounted for more than 600 kWdc in newly installed capacity. With these new projects, the total systems in the LES service territory come to 437 for a total of 4.5 MWdc capacity for customer-owned renewable generation mid-year.
Peak Rewards program
More than 1,200 customers enrolled their smart thermostats in the Peak Rewards demand response program. The total cumulative enrollment in the program is 3,600 customers and 4,000 thermostats, representing 4.13 megawatts of controllable load.
A Smart Energy Provider
The American Public Power Association recognized LES as a Smart Energy Provider. This designation recognizes public power utilities for demonstrating leading practices in energy efficiency programs, environmental and sustainability initiatives and customer experience.
LES Trail Cleanup
Twenty-five employee volunteers collected 326 pounds of waste along the 27th Street bike path as part of the LES Trail Cleanup.
Tree Line USA
For the 18th consecutive year, LES earned Tree Line USA designation through the Arbor Day Foundation, a program that recognizes best practices in utility arboriculture.
Community
LES is owned and operated by our very own customers. Under the principle of “local people serving local people,” LES proved our commitment to our community in 2023 through educational experiences, engagement opportunities and public outreach, creating a lasting impact.
Energy efficient upgrades
LES collaborated with several local agencies to provide energy efficiency upgrades for 13 income-qualifying households. LES provided $74,000 in funding, which was combined with about $113,000 of state weatherization funds, to replace aged and inefficient equipment. This resulted in projected annual energy savings of more than 2,800 kilowatt-hours per household and yearly bill savings of nearly $175.
United Way Workplace Giving
LES employees raised $117,203 for United Way during the Workplace Giving Campaign. Additionally, employees donated over $5,200 and more than 2,000 items to eight local organizations throughout the year.
Zoo Lights Powered by LES
The 5th annual Zoo Lights Powered by LES set a new attendance record of 72,400 attendees. LES hosted Energy Nights at the event, where employee volunteers engaged with the public on energy-saving tips and LES programs. The event is one of the largest holiday light shows in the Midwest and features over 250,000 LED lights.
Guardians of Freedom
LES was part of the Guardians of Freedom Airshow’s STEM and Careers tent. The LES exhibit included a Ford F-150 Lightning truck, lineworker gear and stationary bikes. The bikes demonstrated the difference in energy required to light up an incandescent light bulb vs. an LED bulb. Approximately 340,000 visitors attended the airshow, breaking previous attendance records.
Solar Car Challenge
More than 150 students at Lux Middle School participated in the Solar Car Challenge, a STEM program that challenges sixth-grade students to design, build and race solar- or electric-powered cars.
EV Ride + Drive
LES held its second EV Ride + Drive, Lincoln’s largest electric vehicle ride and drive event. With the number of EVs on the market increasing, attendees were able to learn and engage with EVs through test drives, panel discussions and direct conversations with EV owners and dealers.
LES leadership
2023 LES Administrative Board
Andrew Hunzeker
David Spinar
Lucas Sabalka
Kate Bolz
Martha Durr
Carl Eskridge
Karen Griffin
Chelsea Johnson
Eric Schafer
LES Executive Team
Kevin Wailes
Shelley Sahling-Zart
Emily Koenig
David Malcom
Paul Crist
Jason Fortik
Lisa Hale
Trish Owen
Prioritizing safety & security
LES works to ensure that nothing interferes with providing our customers with safe and reliable electricity—a responsibility that we don’t take lightly. We’re also highly committed to creating a safe workplace for all employees. LES has made these efforts our top priority since our founding in 1966, and 2023 was no different.
Celebrating our surroundings
Lincoln is our home, and LES is committed to improving the environment of our community. The impacts of our environmental decisions today will still be felt by tomorrow’s LES customers, and that’s why we prioritized a greener Lincoln in 2023.
Preparing the next generation of energy users
The need for electricity isn’t likely to change, but the people we so proudly serve will. LES’ ongoing partnership with Lincoln Public Schools helps ensure that the next generation of energy users will be informed and engaged with their energy use and local electric utility.
Building a brighter future
In January 2024, Emeka Anyanwu succeeded Kevin Wailes as CEO of LES.
“I’m new to this utility but certainly not new to public power. I’ve been doing this for a couple of decades, and this is what I love to do. I’m excited to be doing it here in the Midwest, which is where I spent most of my life.”
Hear Emeka share his perspective on LES and what’s to come for 2024 and beyond.