Vestas: 108 jobs to implement technology into plant
The knowns, and unknowns, of the Pueblo expansion.
With the smell of roasted Pueblo chile hanging heavy in the air, local leaders announced at the Chile and Frijoles Festival in downtown Pueblo that wind energy manufacturer Vestas will add over 100 jobs to its Pueblo plant.
At first glance, the locale for the jobs announcement is random, perhaps a last-minute venue. But both are true Pueblo — connected by the community’s support and pride.
Unlike most jobs announcements, the audience was speckled with Vestas workers, who posed for a photo with the company’s vice president Tony Knopp.
Knopp described the jobs the company will add as diverse. The plant will hire welders, but also engineers for removing the “bottlenecks” from the plant, which sits off of I-25 on Pueblo’s south side.
Bottlenecks, Knopp told the audience Friday afternoon, are the things that slow down the plant — make production less efficient.
The technology being implemented into the plant, Knopp told PULP after the announcement, will allow a machine to fit very specific parts together. Now, as workers do the highly-technical and labor-intensive job, Knopp said there is a high chance for injury, and thus high turnover.
Even though the technology being implemented into the Vestas plant will take over human-occupied jobs, Knopp said the new technology would not result in eventual layoffs.
The 108 jobs will be “sustainable,” he added.
Vestas laid off more than 600 workers at its four Colorado plants — three in Weld County and one in Pueblo — in 2013. But Knopp said the rebounding economy has meant more growth for Vestas and does not foresee any layoffs in the near future.
It was unclear at the announcement what the median average of the 108 jobs would be. City and economic development officials stated numbers from $15 per hour to $19 per hour.
Knopp said the plant has already started hiring, and should complete expansion hiring numbers by late October.
Knopp told reporters when asked that the company doesn’t usually discuss pay, but the Pueblo plant starts at $16.50 per hour, which computes to a salary of $31,680.
The City of Pueblo’s half-cent sales tax will assist Vestas with $2.4 million with council’s approval at its next meeting.
It is expected that there will be a $18 million capital investment, with Vestas also adding a storage facility on the 500-acre property the company owns near the plant.
