Going the Extra Mile for Members

In the early days of electrification, city dwellers in Kansas had electrical power in their homes well before their country cousins did on farms. Less than 10% of rural homes in America had electricity by 1930, as electric companies believed it would be too expensive to extend their power infrastructure into rural areas. Because there were fewer electric customers per mile of power line, the fixed costs of providing power and building transmission in areas with a low population density were higher. 

Rural electric cooperatives like Victory Electric formed decades ago in order to deliver much-needed electricity to their rural communities. They knew how important it was to extend power lines into rural homes. Victory Electric still goes the extra mile today to serve our members, whether they live in a city or in the country.

Electric cooperatives like ours must still maintain more power lines per electric consumer than municipal and investor-owned electric utilities. According to America’s Electric Cooperatives, the national average for electric co-ops is about 8 customers per mile of electric line, compared to 32 customers per mile served by other types of electric utilities. Victory Electric currently serves more than 13,600 members and maintains over 3,200 miles of line throughout our service territory. 

Victory Electric has grown since our founding 80 years ago, as has our region. In the Dodge City area over the past several years, industrial expansions and more housing developments have contributed to overall growth in the community and at the cooperative. 

The fixed costs of poles, line, meters, transformers and other resources costs the same, but we get less revenue than utilities located in large cities to meet those costs. Load growth from commercial members helps all members by distributing fixed costs over more kilowatt hours. We can leverage opportunities to lower the overall cost of power for all Victory Electric members by partnering with other community agencies and promoting economic development and growth in our region. 

In recent years, the U.S. demand for energy was relatively flat because of less domestic manufacturing and more technology improvements that increased energy efficiency. But energy demand is now surging for several reasons.

Artificial intelligence, cryptocurrency mining and e-commerce have led to the rapid expansion of data centers. These technologies require significant amounts of power at a constant rate. By 2050, the electric load for data centers is projected to increase by 65%. 

In a January 2025 report, the Energy Information Administration said that U.S. electricity consumption grew by 2% in 2024 and projected that electricity demand will continue growing 2% per year in 2025 and 2026. Economic development, industrial and home heating electrification, electric vehicle adoption and manufacturing growth will also increase the demand for electricity in the coming years.

Companies have expressed interest in expanding data centers and cryptocurrency operations in Kansas. The increasing demand for energy and the need for additional transmission present both challenges and opportunities for rural electric cooperatives. We need to be proactive and focus on how these opportunities might benefit of our members and the community.

As demand fluctuates and we experience more load growth, Victory is prepared to maintain electrical loads and keep the system running efficiently. This requires extensive planning with partners like Sunflower Electric, our generation and transmission provider, to evaluate areas of growth and predict demand patterns for our local communities.

Electric cooperatives need to meet growth responsibly and carefully assess the benefits and challenges of adding loads to our system. Victory Electric will continue to go the extra mile for the benefit of our members and our community as we navigate this period of continual change in the electric industry.