WV Executive

Most West Virginians agree that our state is one of the best places in the world to live, but did you know West Virginia offers more than just a pretty backyard and low crime rate? It also offers some of the best benefits in the country such as the fifth-lowest industrial electricity rate in the nation, the eighth-lowest cost-of-living rate in the United States and a lower job turnover rate than in its competitor states.

As important as all of those factors may be when companies narrow the list of available locations, costs play a major role. According to a study performed by the West Virginia Development Office, profitability is higher and overall operating costs are lower for motor vehicle parts and equipment manufacturers in West Virginia compared to the national average and competitor states.

A typical West Virginia manufacturer would enjoy an average total operating cost savings of $1,981,301 over the comparison states. Profitability in West Virginia would average 3.7 percentage points higher than in the comparison states.

Top Research in West Virginia

An amazing amount of transportation research takes place in West Virginia at technical centers, Marshall University and West Virginia University. "We've been working at this since the late 1980s and have completed over $60 million of contract research with support from the automotive industry, the heavy-duty engine manufacturers and government agencies such as the U.S. Department of Energy, the U.S. Department of Transportation and the Environmental Protection Agency," says Dr. Donald W. Lyons, co-director of the Research Center for Alternative Fuels, Engines and Emissions at WVU. "We've reduced the levels of harmful emissions from cars, trucks, buses, locomotives and ships.”

Researchers from the center can measure emissions from marine vessels while they are under way by using a Mobile Emissions Measurement System (MEMS) and a tunnel to capture the emissions. Other capabilities include evaluating such fuels as compressed or liquified natural gas; biodiesel, which is diesel fuel made from natural, renewable sources, or alcohol.

Established in 1989, the center's twofold mission is to improve the environment by reducing exhaust emissions and to increase U.S. energy security by reducing our need for imported oil. International concerns over global climate change makes these goals especially relevant, reads the center's Web site.

Its research goals have evolved to include the creation and improvement of emissions-measuring systems for heavy-duty vehicles; studying the advantages and emissions of alternative fuels; and developing better vehicles and fuels. "About 10 years ago, we studied the exhaust emissions of the first prototype fuel cell buses that were produced in this country," Lyons says. "And we have continued to study exhaust productions of fuel cell vehicles."

For a variety of reasons - hydrogen production, storage and transportation among them - fuel cells for general use in cars, trucks and buses are years, if not decades away. "There are many developments needed in the interim," Lyons says. "Our programs at WVU are working on a wide range of new developments that are applicable today as well as on long-range technologies such as fuel cells."

Researchers at CAFEE are experienced in the development and evaluation of hybrid vehicle technology. Although any vehicle becomes a hybrid when it combines two or more sources of power, people are perhaps most familiar with the gasoline-electric hybrid. "Many different technologies will be used to reduce the levels of exhaust emissions and hybrids will be one of them," Lyons says.

The Marshall Connection

The Nick J. Rahall II Appalachian Transportation Institute at Marshall University focuses research, education and tech transfer on the Appalachian region, especially southern West Virginia.

The institute's research goals include reducing costs and environmental impact while improving safety for the region's transportation system; finding best sites for and initiating industrial parks; using public transit to improve access for rural communities; and enhancing tourism with an enhanced trail/scenic byway system;

Meeting another of the institute's research goals - finding new technologies or products that improve rural transportation as well as add to the local economy - RTI researchers came up with a new product. They recently received approval for a patent for lights that reduce light pollution, conserve energy, don’t attract insects and don’t create glare in foggy or smoky situations.

The U.S. Patent and Trade Office approved the patent for a flat, steel, light-emitting ceramic-based panel that has the potential to be used in homes, businesses, along highways and on river buoys. The lights lack filaments, glass tubes, fragile components or gas, which makes them durable and maintenance-free. Light is generated through a direct energy-to-light conversion process.

Another important RTI goal is developing the workforce of the future by encouraging students to consider transportation-related careers later in life.

The Transportation Outreach on Wheels program sends graduate and undergraduate education students to schools, libraries and civic organizations throughout Appalachia. The program has introduced transportation issues to a new generation of transportation professionals: approximately 2,800 pre-kindergarten through high school students at approximately 50 schools during the 2003-2004 academic year and summer term.

Barbara Roberts, an RTI program coordinator, helped coordinate a pre-K through 12 robotics program with Linda Hamilton, an adjunct MU math professor. Depending on the grade level, students piece together huge Lego blocks; build simple machines such as gears, pulleys, wheels, levers and axles in the course of solving math problems; or perform actual robotics, using team design in an open-ended environment, Roberts says. "All of the schools wanted the program back," she says.

Established in 1999, RTI partner institutions include Bluefield State College, Mountain State University and West Virginia University Institute of Technology, Montgomery.

Strategies for Recruitment and Retention

In his report, Preparing for Innovation-Led Growth in West Virginia: Options and Choices, Richard K. Lester advises the state to place strategic bets on a few key industries. Rather than expending all its energy on recruiting new companies within those industries to West Virginia, he encourages the state to cluster related firms and competent leadership; develop specialized education, training and financing; and explore technical and market opportunities for the cluster.

The possible candidates Lester suggests include energy; biometrics; chemicals, plastics and polymers, forestry, wood and paper products and autoparts.

Hollie Hubbert is project manager for Asia-Pacific which is a part of the West Virginia Development Office. She meets with business leaders from all over the world to recruit businesses in the areas of chemicals and plastics, food products, warehousing and distribution and automotive. As a participant in the state's most recent trade mission to Japan, Hubbert knows firsthand the importance of casting the net far and wide. "Think of it as an automotive food chain," she says, referring to recruiting not only top automotive manufacturers but their suppliers - the first tier; the suppliers that supply the first tier - the second tier; and the suppliers that supply the second tier - the third tier; or below. "It might be a company that produces a chemical or a polymer that goes into the part," she says.

Developing existing companies also can increase jobs within West Virginia's established industries.

In May 2003, owners of seven after-market vehicle repair facilities in Berkeley and Jefferson counties met to discuss common concerns. Their meeting led to the establishment of the Panhandle Garage Owners Association (PGOA). The group used work force training professionals to help design and fund a customized quality training program that allows participants to use continuing education units from the course toward an associate degree.

Similar training programs could improve quality and add to the trained workforce available to the state's automotive industry.

Innovation Takes Many Forms

West Virginia is a well-established participant in the automotive industry. With 7,537 people working in transportation equipment manufacturing as a whole (that includes all types), the number of people working in motor vehicle parts manufacturing increased by 1,758 from 1995 to 2004 to 2,164.

Lester's report certainly acknowledges the decline in U.S. manufacturing jobs and the impact of outsourcing on those jobs. An increase in imports also affected manufacturing jobs, although "since the beginning of the recession in early 2001 the combined effect of continued productivity gains and weaker demand on employment was roughly three times that of the increase in imports."

Some of the lost manufacturing jobs, Lester writes, were outsourced to domestic providers, which are not necessarily counted as manufacturers. He also reports that "for every dollar of durable manufactured goods production in the United States, more than 40 cents is created by non-manufacturing firms (i.e., providers of business services of various kinds, distributors, retailers and so on.)"

In this instance, Lester asks the state to apply innovative thinking to the issue of job creation. Innovation also plays a huge role in West Virginia, especially when it comes to traditionally strong industries within the state such as plastics and chemicals. "A trend we're seeing in the automotive industry is making parts from materials that break down more easily," Hubbert says. "It's important for us to look at those types of companies because they are the ones that will last."