A natural fit all around: Meet employee Phil Peak

May 13, 2024

Phil Peak is a laboratory technician at the Cane Run Generating Station in Louisville, Ky., whose work impacts all customers in our service area. While Phil has been with the company for 42 years, he also has a curious and sometimes dangerous hobby.

What is your primary responsibility?
My responsibilities include overseeing the daily operation of our various water systems. Those include the clarification of raw water entering the plant from the Ohio River, the production of ultra-pure water that supplies the plant through reverse osmosis, monitoring the chemistry of the circulating-water system and ensuring that outfall water is in compliance with environmental parameters.

Is there something about your job that people do not know but would find interesting?
The changing of the seasons and fluctuations in weather conditions and temperature greatly affect the operations of a water plant. Provisions must be made to ensure maximum performance under all these varying sets of circumstances.

Do you have any interests/hobbies outside work?
I study Kentucky’s native snakes and contribute to our knowledge and understanding of their distribution, habitat utilization and natural history in our state. I have had my research published in peer-reviewed scientific journals and have authored two books on how to search for snakes. I enjoy the satisfaction of doing what I can to contribute to the understanding and conservation of our native snakes.

Employee Phil Peak holding a snake
LG&E employee Phil Peak

I have served as an expert reviewer for the state’s Comprehensive Wildlife Conservation Strategy and was appointed as an agent of the state by the Kentucky Department of Fish and Wildlife Resources. I currently sit on the board of directors and am a charter member and former vice president of the Kentucky Herpetological Society.

What is your most memorable moment doing this activity?
Of the nearly 20,000 records I have documented for our state’s database over the years, one memorable discovery was that of a Northern Pine Snake found just outside Mammoth Cave National Park in 2006. This was the first specimen from that relict population that had been documented in decades.