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Septagon Construction is the design-build general contractor for ProEnergy Services in Sedalia, Missouri, completing office, manufacturing, and warehouse space for the company.

Even founder and CEO Jeff Canon admits to being surprised about the rapid expansion of the company he started in 2002.

“Growth is one of those challenges we’re happy to address,” he says.

One way ProEnergy has addressed growth is through almost continuous construction on an 80-acre campus in Sedalia, Missouri. Since 2007, Butler Builder® Septagon Construction has erected more than 10 structures for the company—including a turbine controls facility, fabrication facility, aeroderivative turbine repair facility, painting facility, a packaging facility and warehouse.

“We have taken on numerous building projects in the last six years,” Canon explains. “That takes a lot of attention to detail in scheduling, and Septagon has been a solid partner throughout each one. We respect their integrity and willingness to work closely with us each step of the way.”

“Our depth and flexibility to design and execute the various types of projects they need has helped us forge a valuable relationship,” adds Stace Anderson, president of Septagon Construction’s Sedalia office. Septagon also has offices in Osage Beach, Jefferson City and Columbia, Missouri, as well as Cedar Rapids and Grimes, Iowa.

In 2005, Canon wanted to relocate and expand ProEnergy’s Atlanta headquarters. As native Missourians, he and his wife looked back to their home state for possible sites. They chose the city of Sedalia.

“Sedalia is centrally located,” Canon says. “The state of Missouri and the local economic development group offered great incentives to relocate and keep growing the company here. We have found a great workforce here and it is a great community to raise our families.”

The company plays a significant role in the economic health of both the state and the community. With employment now at more than 1,000 worldwide, ProEnergy also works with the local community college to develop training programs and provides engineering scholarships. Most recently, ProEnergy became a partner in developing the Missouri Center for Waste to Energy, a project that plans to harvest methane gas from Sedalia to generate electricity.

In 2009, ProEnergy received the Governor’s Project of the Year Award in recognition of what was termed “phenomenal impact” on the economy of west central Missouri. In addition to employment, the company’s success has provided a boost for other industries, including local trades, retail operations and other services.

The company also supports the community in many ways, and ProEnergy and its employees have contributed record amounts to United Way. The Canon name graces the local hospital’s new center for cancer and cardiovascular care.

“It’s a commitment to the area, a commitment to our beliefs in the workforce and their abilities which help us to succeed in the world market,” Canon says.

ProEnergy initially purchased about 30 acres in a Sedalia industrial park, then added 50 more acres in 2008. Energy Parts Solutions, a 5,000-square-foot office and 5,600-square-foot warehouse, was the first facility to be constructed. After a six-month break, the construction on the 6,400-square-foot expansion to EPS and the new ProSteel facility began.

Construction for ProSteel’s expansion and the headquarters soon followed. Using Butler® structural systems such as the Widespan™ system and Landmark™ 2000 system, Septagon has been able to accommodate all of ProEnergy’s various needs.

“Designing with Septagon and Butler has been great,”
observes Rod Smothers, ProEnergy project manager. “We have some needs for wide open bays and their engineering department takes care of that. We’ve had no problems.”

Septagon has covered all of the buildings at the site with the MR-24® weathertight standing seam roof system.

“We strongly believe in the performance of the MR-24 roof system—especially for such large facilities. It is the best system out there and we have had no problems with it,” explains Anderson.

“Butler has a reputation for great roofs and they take pride in their roofs not leaking,” Smothers says. “We love the standing seam roof system. In our business, you just can’t afford the down time caused by a roof leak. If it happened in a manufacturing area, we would lose time and money shutting down.”

Canon notes that all of the buildings on campus have an attractive, cohesive appearance. “When we built the first building, we didn’t know how many other buildings we would construct. Now, they are all so consistent, it looks like we planned for them all to be here just as they are.”

“Our in-house architect, Jim Fischer, was able to create a similar look from building to building with color schemes and Butler systems,” adds Stace Anderson.

Septagon has just completed two major facilities for ProEnergy—a “packaging solutions” building and a warehouse. The 150,000-square-foot packaging building houses a service center for gas turbine engines and a manufacturing operation dedicated to the assembly of turbine engine-driven packages. The facility has a custom Widespan structural system, engineered to accommodate its many cranes.

Septagon designed the building to include two 100-ton cranes, two cranes with dual 50-ton hoists on one bridge, two 20-ton cranes and 15 5-ton jib cranes. It also includes a two story office building for nearly 200 people.

The 225,000-square-foot warehouse handles the storage of engines, turbines and component parts, and was built with the Landmark 2000 system using a 50- by 50-foot structural layout.

“We worked closely with the Septagon team and Butler’s designers to get all the clearances and sizes worked out for the crane building,” Anderson says. “The structure had to support so many cranes of different sizes the engineering design and layout were a challenge. The building was designed to hold 240,000-pound turbine packages. Just moving those around meant they needed versatile space and a lot of structural capacity, which we were able to give them.”

Perhaps the more difficult task came with designing the area for the trucks delivering turbine packages. “They come in on trucks with 20 to 30 axles and multiple trailers, and they need a lot of room to manuever. Getting them in and out was a real challenge,” he recalls.

Septagon was awarded the contract over three other applicants for ProEnergy’s first building. Smothers says it’s Septagon’s commitment to quality that has kept them on the job at ProEnergy ever since.

“From the very first building, Septagon built to our quality standards—which are very high. That’s why we use them,” he says. “We consider everything we produce to be high quality and we want our buildings to be high quality as well. When customers come to our headquarters, they are immediately
impressed with the quality ProEnergy offers.”

“We’ve developed a very close relationship with ProEnergy over the years. We started with them when they had five employees and now they have over 1,000. We’ve just grown with them,” Anderson comments. “We’ve even gone to other countries for them. We’ve tried to work with them on whatever they need.”

Canon expects the expansion in Sedalia to continue with plans to add a controls building and a business complex, though no start date has been determined.

When the time comes, ProEnergy will again look to Septagon. “They have great leadership and a great reputation. We found a capable contractor right here and it has worked well for everyone,” Canon concludes. “We get comments all of the time about how beautiful our campus is, and we agree!”