Entergy Q2 2023 Earnings Report $19.83 +0.14 (+0.69%) As of 04/9/2025 01:25 PM Eastern Earnings HistoryForecast Kajima EPS ResultsActual EPS$0.92Consensus EPS $0.85Beat/MissBeat by +$0.08One Year Ago EPS$0.89Kajima Revenue ResultsActual Revenue$2.85 billionExpected Revenue$3.26 billionBeat/MissMissed by -$412.09 millionYoY Revenue GrowthN/AKajima Announcement DetailsQuarterQ2 2023Date8/2/2023TimeBefore Market OpensConference Call DateWednesday, August 2, 2023Conference Call Time11:00AM ETUpcoming EarningsEntergy's Q1 2025 earnings is scheduled for Tuesday, April 29, 2025, with a conference call scheduled at 11:00 AM ET. Check back for transcripts, audio, and key financial metrics as they become available.Q1 2025 Earnings ReportConference Call ResourcesConference Call AudioConference Call TranscriptSlide DeckPress Release (8-K)Quarterly Report (10-Q)SEC FilingEarnings HistoryETR ProfileSlide DeckFull Screen Slide DeckPowered by Entergy Q2 2023 Earnings Call TranscriptProvided by QuartrAugust 2, 2023 ShareLink copied to clipboard.There are 9 speakers on the call. Operator00:00:00Good morning. My name is Jeremy, and I will be your conference operator today. At this time, I would like to welcome everyone to Entergy's 2nd Quarter 2023 Earnings Conference Call. All lines have been placed on mute to prevent any background noise. After the speakers' remarks, there will be a question and answer session. Operator00:00:18Followed by the number 1 on your telephone keypad. Thank you. I would now like to turn the call over to Bill Abler, Vice President of Investor Relations for Entergy Corporation. Speaker 100:00:34Good morning and thank you for joining us. We will Speaker 200:00:36begin today with comments from Entergy's Chairman and CEO, Drew Marsh and then Kimberly Fontaine, our CFO, will review results. In an effort to accommodate everyone who asks questions, we request that each person ask no more than 2 questions. In today's call, management will make certain forward looking statements. Actual results could differ materially from those forward looking statements due to a number of factors, which are set forth in our earnings release, our slide presentation and our SEC filings. Entergy does not assume any obligation to update these forward looking statements. Speaker 200:01:10Management will also discuss non GAAP financial information. Reconciliations to the applicable GAAP measures are included in today's press release and slide presentation, both of which can be found on the Investor Relations section of our website. And now, I will turn the call over to Drew. Speaker 100:01:27Thank you, Bill. Thank you, Bill, and good morning, everyone. Today, we are reporting 2nd quarter adjusted earnings Per share of $1.84 Our progress through the first half of the year keeps us firmly on track to achieve 2023 results in line with our guidance, And we remain well positioned to achieve our long term 6% to 8% growth outlooks. Creating sustainable value for our customers, employees, Communities and owners is at the center of everything we do. I'll start today with our work to meet our customers' demands. Speaker 100:02:02We're investing in resilience and reliability and working to expand our clean energy footprint. This work helps our current customers Meet their goals, while also attracting new customers to Entergy's service area. To that end, Our power delivery team continues to upgrade legacy assets to new, more robust wind and flooding standards through new construction projects, Storm restoration and asset renewal. For example, in the second quarter, our new deployments included roughly 600 transmission structures, Approximately 8,000 distribution poles, more than 200 miles of new distribution conductor and 7 new substations. In addition, these improvements will support more than 120 megawatts of growth. Speaker 100:02:51Safe and effective nuclear operations are also important for our stakeholders. Our nuclear units continue to provide clean, reliable baseload power to our customers. 2 of our plants, Riverbend and A and O Unit 2, recently completed successful refueling outages, which included major projects to support long term operational excellence. Overall, our nuclear plants are running very well. Outside of refueling outages, our fleet achieved a 99% capability factor for the first half of twenty twenty three. Speaker 100:03:26While our customers demand more reliability and clean energy from us, our unique and sizable long term industrial sales growth opportunity Continues to improve. Growing businesses support our communities, provide employment opportunities and help with affordability. The inherent advantages of our geographic footprint remain solidly intact. We continue to see evidence of these advantages through recent project announcements in our service area. For example, ExxonMobil announced a transformative CCUS project that will capture, transport Store up to 800,000 metric tons of CO2 per year from a new core iron plant in Convent, Louisiana. Speaker 100:04:08The project is expected to start up in 2026. Paired with the recently announced acquisition of Denbury, ExxonMobil's actions clearly highlight the opportunities around CCUS in our region. Also, Shell Catalyst and Technologies announced its final investment decision on a $120,000,000 expansion project in Port Allen, Louisiana. The facility is already the largest refining catalyst plant in the world and the expansion will create even more manufacturing capacity. These are just a couple of projects that have the potential to increase and extend our long term growth rate. Speaker 100:04:51We are currently updating our annual industrial sales forecast and we are accounting for recent trends. As many of you have noted, There has been some weakness in national industrial output indicators like the ISM Manufacturing Index. Despite this, we are seeing strength in our Gulf region. In the quarter, our total industrial sales declined, Which had been expected due to higher cogeneration sales last year. Adjusting for cogen, our industrial sales were up about 1%. Speaker 100:05:24For some highlights, sales to small industrial customers, which are typically more exposed to broader U. S. Economic factors, Grew nearly 90 gigawatt hours over last year. Sales to large new and expanding industrial customers Grew nearly 100 gigawatt hours over last year. As we look forward, a few large industrial projects have adjusted their in service dates From 2024 to 2025, which could lower our 2024 industrial growth expectation, but not to a degree that affects our outlooks. Speaker 100:06:00Overall, our pipeline for projects continues to grow, supported by favorable commodity spreads and the IRA legislation. Early indications show demand at 2025 and beyond shaping up even stronger than our last forecast. As we typically do, We'll provide an update to our industrial growth expectations at EEI. To support this growth And to help our customers meet their sustainability needs, we are expanding our clean energy portfolio. Through 2026, We plan to add nearly 6,000 megawatts renewable capacity. Speaker 100:06:382,400 of those megawatts Are currently in construction, permitting, regulatory review or negotiations. Approximately 30% of the 2,400 megawatts will be owned by Entergy. Last quarter, I mentioned that we are continuing to work on our self build capabilities. Our recent self build submissions have been extremely competitive in the RFP process. However, we have been limited by a smaller development pipeline. Speaker 100:07:08I'm pleased to report that we are making progress on that front. And going forward, I would expect Entergy to achieve at least 50% ownership through our competitive RFPs. Moving to regulatory items, we continue to make meaningful progress on important regulatory matters, which support The credit required to meet customers' growing needs and drive improved customer outcomes. Beginning with Mississippi, The Public Service Commission approved Entergy Mississippi's formula rate plan settlement, providing for recovery of substantially all costs. Meanwhile, Entergy Louisiana, Entergy New Orleans and Entergy Arkansas each filed their annual formula rate plans. Speaker 100:07:52New rates for Louisiana and New Orleans are expected to be effective in September and Arkansas are expected to be effective at the 1st of next year. As we've discussed, Entergy Louisiana plans to file a base rate case this month, Including our request for a new 3 year formula rate plan. We like the clarity and certainty that FRP provides, which helps us make investments to benefit our customers. However, in recent years Entergy Louisiana's earned returns have materially lagged its allowed return. We are making significant investments to support customer growth and demand for greater resilience and cleaner energy in Louisiana. Speaker 100:08:35This investment is critical for the state as well as our local communities. It is important to have an opportunity for fair and timely recovery, which allows us to maintain Entergy Louisiana's credit and cost effectively source capital to meet customers' expectations. Turning to Texas. Entergy Texas has an unopposed settlement before the commission, And we expect the decision at tomorrow's open meeting. Interim rates were implemented in June and once the commission makes its decision, Any change in revenue and depreciation expense will be retroactive to December of last year. Speaker 100:09:15In addition, The Texas legislative session wrapped up at the end of May and the Governor signed a new build into law that are important to Texas customers and communities As well as to Entergy. I'll highlight a few. The Texas Resiliency Act allows utilities to submit a storm resiliency plan to improve customer outcomes. We expect the commission to complete their initial rulemaking in 180 days, We set the deadline to establish a regulatory framework in mid December. Entergy Texas will then file its resilience plan Shortly after, the rulemaking is complete and the commission will have 180 days to review and act on the filing. Speaker 100:10:00Based on this, Entergy Texas currently expects to have clarity on its resilience plan in the middle of next year. The distribution cost recovery factor legislation allows for 2 annual filings, which provide more timely recovery of the significant distribution investments that we plan to make in Texas to support customer growth and reliability. And the expedited transmission CCM will reduce the time for commission approval by half to approximately 6 months. This Turning to federal matters. In May, we received an initial decision on the unit power sales agreement complaint against Siri. Speaker 100:10:51The ALJ ruled against the complainants on several issues, but recommended approximately $250,000,000 in refunds, which is mostly interest primarily associated with accumulated deferred tax issues going as far back as 1996. We disagree with the ALJ's conclusions on ADIT and we continue to believe that Seres' positions on the law and the facts are correct And that its actions were prudent and taken for the benefit customers. Siri filed its briefs on exception in July And the next step is a ruling from FERC. There is not a statutory deadline for FERC to issue an order. More broadly on Siri, I would note that we are still awaiting FERC's response to our compliance filing related to the December 23rd order on the sale leaseback and uncertain tax position case. Speaker 100:11:45While there is not a procedural deadline, we expect to see this clarification soon And we expect FERC to affirm that no additional refunds are due. FERC's response will provide clarity And will be an important step towards resolving the broader set of Siri litigation. Our communities are one of our key stakeholders And actively supporting them is an important part of our strategy. Pacific 50, an initiative of Points of Light named Entergy a top fifty Most community minded company and this year's leader for the utility sector. Another example of our community commitment is our Beat the Heat campaign. Speaker 100:12:27In May, we launched a series of measures to help low income and senior customers save on their utility bills during hot summer months. $4,000,000 in contributions will support thousands of vulnerable customers through bill payment assistance, weatherization events, Land Distribution and Energy Efficiency Kits. I'm also proud that Forbes Magazine has named Entergy as one of America's Best Employers for diversity. They recognize our commitment to fostering a diverse and inclusive workplace where employees feel valued and respected. Such confirmation is critical as we compete for talent from all corners of our community to best serve the diverse interest of our 3,000,000 customers. Speaker 100:13:12Together, our employees are doing a great job of living our vision statement of We Power Life by meeting today's challenges And ensuring that we will create value for our stakeholders well into the future. As you can see, we continue to make progress on our strategy to deliver for All are key stakeholders. We are laser focused on meeting our customers' demands through operational excellence, Resilience and Clean Energy Investment. Meanwhile, we continue to maintain our financial discipline and work closely with our stakeholders to ensure we have the financial Strength to drive economic development in our communities. Successfully executing across these dimensions We'll keep us on track to deliver steady predictable earnings and dividend growth and move us toward our goal to be the premier utility. Speaker 100:14:01I'll now turn the call over to Kimberly, who will review our financial results for the quarter. Speaker 300:14:08Thank you, Drew. Good morning, everyone. As Drew mentioned, our results this quarter keep us firmly on track and we are affirming our guidance and our longer term outlooks and remain focused on delivering steady, predictable results. Slide 3 shows a high level view of the quarter. Our adjusted earnings per share was $1.84, dollars 0.06 higher than last year. Speaker 300:14:35We continue to see benefits from our customer centric investments, including regulatory actions, along with higher depreciation, taxes other than income taxes and interest expense. We also saw a significant reduction in other O and M, A portion of which was for items that do not have a bottom line impact. Slide 4 details the variances by line item. Regulatory actions support our investment program to benefit customers. There were a few updates in the quarter. Speaker 300:15:11Entergy Mississippi put its latest FRP rates into effect in April. In June, Entergy Texas implemented interim rates from its rate case settlement. The settlement is credit positive and largely neutral to earnings As the rate case included new higher depreciation rates, weather was $0.17 lower than last year. While weather was warmer than normal this year, you may recall that temperatures last year were significantly above average. Excluding the effects of weather, retail sales growth for the quarter was down 0.9%. Speaker 300:15:51The residential segment had a slightly positive contribution from customer growth, partially offset by lower usage per customer. Commercial and industrial sales were lower. For industrial, lower sales to cogen customers was the primary driver as Cogen sales returned to more normal levels this year. This decline was partially offset by growth from small industrials And new and expansion large industrial customers. O and M was also a driver. Speaker 300:16:23We had lower spending for nuclear and non nuclear generation, primarily due to reduced scope of work. Other drivers included higher rebates associated with our prescription drug program, lower MISO cost and lower pension expense, which were each about $0.05 MISO costs were lower as a result of MISO changing its ancillary services market structure. Because Entergy is a lube serving entity that owns Generation, this change is largely neutral to earnings. Operating cash flow summarized on Slide 5 was $588,000,000 higher than last year. The increase was primarily due to lower payments for fuel and purchased power as natural gas prices were much higher last year. Speaker 300:17:14Moving to credit and liquidity on Slide 6. Our net liquidity remains strong at $4,700,000,000 which includes $411,000,000 of storm escrows. We expect to utilize a portion of the storm escrows of Louisiana and We remain on track for our credit outlooks, including achieving Moody's 14% FFO to debt metric by year end. During the quarter, both S and P and Moody's downgraded Seery. The ratings changes stem from Series pending litigation. Speaker 300:17:53Left unchecked, this could ultimately result in higher costs for customers. These actions also highlight the cost of Siri uncertainty and show that resolution would benefit multiple stakeholders. It is our goal to resolve all Sealy Litigation in an expeditious manner. Slide 7 summarizes our progress against our equity needs through 2024. We utilized the ATM program this quarter when market conditions were supportive, Selling forward approximately 468,000 shares, around $80,000,000 remains in our equity plan through 2024. Speaker 300:18:34As shown on Slide 8, we are affirming our guidance range and our longer term adjusted EPS outlook. We've updated a few of our key assumptions that I'd like to highlight. We saw warmer than normal temperatures in the quarter, which contributed $0.07 to EPS. Our plan included conservative assumptions in revenue, and we've now updated our estimates to account for several small Favorable items across our operating companies. We've updated our weather adjusted sales growth estimates and now Volume impacts on earnings per share to be neutral for the year. Speaker 300:19:10This is largely due to lower than expected residential sales in the back half of the year. We continue to see overall health in the residential space with increasing customer counts and declining usage per customer, both of which help affordability. We expect other O and M to be $0.85 lower than 2022 for the full year. This includes approximately $0.15 for the reduction in MISO cost that is offset by lower revenues. Excluding that, the full year O and M change will be closer to $0.70 in line with our previous estimates. Speaker 300:19:47Our spending plans may adjust based on weather or other factors between now and the end of the year as we continue to use our flex spending to deliver steady, predictable results. You may recall that the remaining EWC ownership interest in 2 non nuclear generation is included in parent and other. Power prices have been lower than planned due to low natural gas prices, which is driving the expected margin from those operations lower. Taking all of this into consideration, We are tracking to the midpoint of our guidance range. The bottom line is that we have a solid plan with good visibility And we will continue to execute on the deliverables to achieve steady, predictable growth. Speaker 300:20:37And now the Entergy team is available to answer Operator00:21:01Our first question comes from the line of Ashar Pourreza. Please go ahead. Speaker 400:21:07Hi, good morning. It's actually Constantine here for Shar. Thanks for taking the questions. Good morning. So starting at the LPSC, with the LPSC turnover, are there any actionable changes in relationship or alignment that you've implemented? Speaker 400:21:22And do you feel that LPSC is in general comfortable with the current regulatory constructs? Or would you look to add anything beyond the new resiliency framework Speaker 500:21:34Hey, good morning. It's Rod. I think the best answer to your question This is really the proof of concept, the decisions that the LPSC has made to date. We've gotten support, As you recall, after the election at the end of 2022, we got the support for our Securitization, we got support for our Lake Charles Transmission system, we got support for our gas business rate decisions, All from the new commission. And so I don't believe that we have a relationship issue. Speaker 500:22:20And in fact, we continue to work collaboratively With this new commission, we acknowledge that the addition of the newest commissioner, Davonte Lewis, Has created an opportunity for us to engage differently in educating a new commissioner on The historic relationships between the company and its stakeholders, not just the relationship between the commissioner And the company, but also the commissioner and the customer impacts. I know that you're reacting your question Our reaction in some respects from some of the comments that have come out of individual commissioners and Our reaction has been consistent as long as we maintain our focus on ensuring positive customer outcomes, whether it's resiliency, Whether it's renewables and clean energy and certainly affordability, we expect to be a lot continue to be aligned with LPSC. And so we're moving forward, as Drew alluded to, with our regulatory calendars And to file our rate case and FRP as well as a strong renewables Our portfolio in addition to continuing to fuel the growth for the state and we expect the commission to be supportive of the company's positions. We'll have a lot of debate along the way, but we'll continue to work constructively with. Speaker 100:23:50And Constantine, as part of your question, whether there's We think there's continued support for formula rate plans within LPSC. Speaker 400:24:02Right. And I guess just anything that you feel like you need incremental to narrow some of those kind of earned ROE gaps? Speaker 500:24:12Well, from that vantage point, that's less of a change. It's Entergy's interest in ensuring That the both whatever the regulatory mechanism is, we're using both the filing of the rate case as well as the planned FRP renewal To align those recovery mechanisms with our capital plan, We're not necessarily disclosing any specific tweak at this point to the FRP Because we haven't even made the filing yet, but we expect the commission to be receptive to the case we're making for why an FRP It's in the best interest of customers long term. We're filing the rate case because it was a condition of the settlement during the last FRP renewal, but we expect to continue to make the case to the commission for why the FRP is And certain adjustments to it would be beneficial to our stakeholders long term. Speaker 400:25:22Excellent. That's great color. And maybe shifting to the other kind of regulatory item, Sari, would be operational prudence complaint kind of reaching a point of Settlement impasse in July and rehearing is still pending. Are you embedding any range of outcomes in the current financial plans just in terms of cash or financing drag? And maybe any guidance on kind of capping the potential liability in any form from the last complaint? Speaker 300:25:49Sure. Thanks for the question. As it relates to Seery and our financial plan, as you know, we recorded the reserve last year equal to the Mississippi settlement, Applied broadly across and that is reflected in our financial plan. And then We assume that we are able to continue to work with the parties to resolve the litigation and that Grand Golf is an important asset to our fleet and continues to operate and contribute to our results. Speaker 100:26:20And I'll add that in terms of capping the exposure, the ALJ Order from May regarding the UPSA is while it had as I mentioned, it had about 250,000,000 Of requested refunds, it did prude off quite a bit of additional liability. And so you do see that the Amount of liability continues to come in, as we move forward in the process, but we're still working through all that. And certainly that Yes, the amount that we believe we are at right now is what we have reflected on our books. Speaker 400:27:03Perfect. Thank you. And I'll jump back in queue. Speaker 100:27:06Thank you. Operator00:27:08All right. Perfect. And our next question comes from the line of Jeremy Tonet. Jeremy, please go ahead. Speaker 600:27:15Hi, good morning. Speaker 100:27:16Good morning. Speaker 600:27:18Just want to stick with Louisiana here a bit. I think you touched on a little bit, but wanted to see if you might be able to expand more. And how do you think that Louisiana resiliency process could unfold once The staff engineer report is filed this month. Any sense from the commission on how the commission would like to handle it? And if this could be kind of rolled together, the resiliency, the RFP, the rate case all get tied together? Speaker 500:27:45I totally understand your question and I am my hesitation is only that I don't want to get ahead of the regulatory process, but I think your instincts are aligned once we get initial feedback from the staff On the filing, I think it puts us in a position to evaluate the timing Around how we might pursue potential settlement discussions, our objective obviously is to remove as much uncertainty As we can and whenever we have the opportunity to avoid going through the expense of litigating Issues where there's an opportunity to find time and ground, part of our expectation going in is to first make the compliance filings Yes, it's expected by the commission, but the moment we do, we're trying to find a path To settlement, that isn't different. And I think your instincts about how we think about between now and the end of the year assessing the likelihood The lining around both the resiliency filing in concert with the discussions around The rate case FRP are spot on. That's our ultimate objective, but we have to make the filing and Get the feedback. We have to make the filing on the rate case, but to your point, get the feedback from the LPSC staff on the resiliency filing And take it from there. Speaker 500:29:21Great Speaker 600:29:23point. Got it. Got it. That makes sense. That's helpful. Speaker 600:29:27And sticking with Louisiana here, our stakeholder communications So let us hear about when there's recent outages, there's some system glitches in communication to consumers Was maybe not where it could be. Just wondering efforts on this side to, I guess, improve customer response And kind of address some of those local stakeholder concerns there. Speaker 100:29:55Yes, Jeremy, this is Drew. We have Folks all over that issue, we got over 100 people squirreled away in a large conference room in Texas working on this. But We feel like we have a good plan going forward from where we are. Certainly, some of the Performance of some of our systems after some upgrades that were intended to improve things last earlier or late in the spring That didn't work out as intended. And so we worked through all that. Speaker 100:30:27We have a good plan going forward and we expect to be back on track for any future storms. Speaker 600:30:35Got it. That's helpful there. And then just last one if I could. I was wondering if you might be able to unpack a little bit more FFO to debt and kind of the trajectory over the balance of the year and hitting the goals that you want to hit there, just any incremental color would be appreciated. Speaker 300:30:52Sure, Jeremy. Really two key factors there. 1 is closing the Louisiana securitization, which we did in the Q1. And as we go through the year, you'll see the debt associated with previously carrying that roll off. And the second is around The recovery of the higher deferred fuel balances that occurred last year with the higher gas prices and higher volumes we saw, You can see that the deferred fuel balances are down back to what I would consider more normal levels. Speaker 300:31:21And so as Those debt levels roll off. Those two items will significantly help us. And then just managing through our normal operations As we go through the end of the year, puts us on target to be at or above that 14%. Speaker 700:31:37That's helpful. Speaker 600:31:37I'll leave it there. Thanks. Speaker 400:31:41Thanks, Jeremy. Operator00:31:44Our next question comes from the line of David Arcaro. Speaker 800:31:55Let's see. Speaker 700:31:55I think Drew, you alluded to some initiatives that you're pursuing on the renewable development side of things to make I was just wondering if you could elaborate on what types of initiatives that you've pursued there to lower costs and build the pipeline, it sounded like? Speaker 100:32:19Yes, thanks, Dave. That's a good question. We have been working on building the capability in the development space, as I mentioned. And we have been actually successful for the projects that we have been able to put forward and competing in our RFPs. So I think we're making good progress in terms of what does it take to be competitive On the solar RFP front, the challenge we've had is we just haven't had a large pipeline of projects to support. Speaker 100:32:51So Yes. Many of the projects that are even in the 30% that I mentioned earlier are build and transfer projects where a developer is constructing it And then moving it over to us at just before the completion of COD. What I'm referring to when I say we're making progress is we are finding success in building up our portfolio. So We have somewhere in the neighborhood of about 4 gigawatts of development pipeline that we have put forward at this point. Now I wouldn't say that's all ready to go in R and D. Speaker 100:33:29We're still building out some of those projects, but It's a much larger portfolio and we are expecting to add maybe another half gigawatt to that by the end of the year. And then beyond that point, we expect it to continue to grow and that should be very strong given where we have been competitively. That should be very strong in the RFPs going forward. So that's what we've been seeing and that's What we're focused on. Speaker 500:34:02And the only thing that I'll add to Drew's comments is that part of the Sort of declogging, if you will, that pipeline, we've been securing additional sites for renewables development, including our generation sites, as well as the transmission interconnects that are all part The development process and that's adding to our improved competitiveness to Drew's point. Speaker 700:34:34Got it. Thanks. That's helpful color. And then, let's see, curious, similar topic, but in Texas, One of your peer utilities in the state has had challenges just getting a few renewables projects over the finish line there. I was just wondering how that's Affecting your strategy in the state of Texas, how that might maybe impacting the outstanding RFPs that you've got? Speaker 500:34:59Yes. And the short answer is that it's not impacting one, it's not a surprise to us because our point of view It's consistent with and has been consistent with the PUCT. We understand the significance of reliability first. We do believe because of the interest of our customers that the renewable resources should be an important part Our supply portfolio, but we recognize that the Commission's position has been rather consistent in Texas. It's notable that our position outside of ERCOT in our service territory And the success we've had in our CCNs has given in our view, given us a better vantage point to discuss the attributes of renewables with the commission perhaps in a different light because we're not having the same reliability issues in our service territory as they've expressed concerns about inside of ERCOT. Speaker 500:36:07We are paying close attention though to particularly in Texas. If the commission were to have a change And policy around renewables. We see a tremendous opportunity in both hydrogen and in CCS for other capital investment opportunities. But we think our position is strong. Our customers, particularly given all the growth we have in Texas, are requesting the attributes of renewables and or clean energy, And we're well positioned regardless of what direction the commission might take from a policy perspective in Texas to help them meet those needs. Speaker 700:36:55Okay, great. Thank you. I appreciate it. Speaker 100:36:57Thank you. Operator00:36:59All right. And our next question comes from the line of Paul Zimbardo. Paul, please go ahead. Speaker 800:37:06Hi, good morning. Thank you, team. Speaker 100:37:08Good morning, Paul. Drew, I Speaker 800:37:10think you mentioned that although some projects might be shifting around the timing a little bit, you're net seeing stronger industrial growth in that 2025 Period 25 plus. Just could you give a little more color on that and kind of what that means for the plan and if this is something Speaker 100:37:30Yes. So it would be expected to be part of the EEI refresh and We can give you some more details for sure then. I would characterize the movement from 2024 to 2025 is The normal roll around of these large industrial projects that are 1,000,000,000 of dollars and they're hard to get done. And so that's nothing that we haven't seen before. And so that is why I wouldn't say that was expected. Speaker 100:38:00I would say we're not surprised. And that is so that part is not really new news. As we look forward beyond 2024, We are continuing to see a very robust industrial sales pipeline, lots of interest from a lot of different parties. We've particularly around the clean energy. I mentioned a particular CCUS project from ExxonMobil in my remarks, But there are other projects like that out there. Speaker 100:38:32There are projects like that related to hydrogen. So we are, I think, well positioned to take advantage of all of that, and we'll give you more details whenever we get to EEI. Speaker 800:38:53Okay, great. Understood. And then just pivoting to Texas following up on a couple of questions that were asked. Is there a good way to think about kind of what the earnings Improvement opportunity is after the legislation, whether it's earned ROE basis points, additional capital spending opportunities, just If there's some way to think about that, that would be helpful. Thank you. Speaker 300:39:13Sure, Paul. Are you referencing out of the Texas legislation Specifically, was that your question? Speaker 800:39:20Correct. Yes, the legislation plural. Speaker 300:39:23Yes, there were a couple of A number of favorable things out of the legislation. Obviously, the resilience filing gives us a path to file our resilience Plan and seek recovery of that in a way that helps provide our system higher resilience standard and support our customers. The DCRF changed from an annual filing to a biannual filing, that certainly gives us an opportunity to Improve the or decrease the lag associated with an investment. But from an overall perspective, we're still We haven't changed our outlooks with regards to that, but certainly a better way to recover investments. And then the third item is around compensation. Speaker 300:40:08And that one really for us on executive compensation is around recovery in a rate case. It's not really Effective to us, but it certainly is helpful from a presidential perspective. Speaker 800:40:22Okay. Is there a way to kind of quantify like an ROE improvement or something from all of that? Speaker 300:40:28Yes. I think it's too early to do that at this point. But certainly, they are positive tailwinds from our perspective that help us when we think about our overall outlook, but nothing changes on that regard. Speaker 800:40:41Okay, great. Thanks. Operator00:40:50All right. And it looks like right now that is all of our questions. If there are no more questions, I will go ahead and turn it back over to Mr. Antler. Speaker 200:40:59Thanks, Jeremy, and thanks to everyone for participating this morning. Our quarterly report on Form 10 Q is due to the SEC on August 9 and provides more details and disclosures about our financial statements. Events that occurred prior to the date of our 10 Q filing that provide Additional evidence of conditions that existed at the date of the balance sheet would be reflected in our financial statements in accordance with generally accepted Accounting Principles. Also as a reminder, we maintain a webpage as part of Entergy's Investor Relations website called Regulatory and Other Information, which provides key updates of regulatory proceedings and important milestones on our strategic execution. While some of this And this concludes our call.Read moreRemove AdsPowered by Conference Call Audio Live Call not available Earnings Conference CallEntergy Q2 202300:00 / 00:00Speed:1x1.25x1.5x2xRemove Ads Earnings DocumentsSlide DeckPress Release(8-K)Quarterly report(10-Q) Kajima Earnings HeadlinesNo headlines for this company have been tracked by MarketBeat.com Get Earnings Announcements in your inboxWant to stay updated on the latest earnings announcements and upcoming reports for companies like Kajima? Sign up for Earnings360's daily newsletter to receive timely earnings updates on Kajima and other key companies, straight to your email. Email Address About KajimaKajima (OTCMKTS:KAJMY) engages in civil engineering, building construction, real estate development, architectural design, and other businesses worldwide. It engages in the construction of power stations, railways, roads, airports, and seaports; design and consulting; procurement and construction; sales and services; book publishing; hotel and leisure; and greening and insurance businesses. The company is also involved in the processing and sales of construction materials; leasing, buying, and selling of buildings and other ancillary facilities; manufacture and construction of construction machinery; design and construction activities; building management and maintenance works; operation and management of tolls; planning, production, sale, and construction of interiors; golf course management; hotel management; and real estate and development rental businesses. 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There are 9 speakers on the call. Operator00:00:00Good morning. My name is Jeremy, and I will be your conference operator today. At this time, I would like to welcome everyone to Entergy's 2nd Quarter 2023 Earnings Conference Call. All lines have been placed on mute to prevent any background noise. After the speakers' remarks, there will be a question and answer session. Operator00:00:18Followed by the number 1 on your telephone keypad. Thank you. I would now like to turn the call over to Bill Abler, Vice President of Investor Relations for Entergy Corporation. Speaker 100:00:34Good morning and thank you for joining us. We will Speaker 200:00:36begin today with comments from Entergy's Chairman and CEO, Drew Marsh and then Kimberly Fontaine, our CFO, will review results. In an effort to accommodate everyone who asks questions, we request that each person ask no more than 2 questions. In today's call, management will make certain forward looking statements. Actual results could differ materially from those forward looking statements due to a number of factors, which are set forth in our earnings release, our slide presentation and our SEC filings. Entergy does not assume any obligation to update these forward looking statements. Speaker 200:01:10Management will also discuss non GAAP financial information. Reconciliations to the applicable GAAP measures are included in today's press release and slide presentation, both of which can be found on the Investor Relations section of our website. And now, I will turn the call over to Drew. Speaker 100:01:27Thank you, Bill. Thank you, Bill, and good morning, everyone. Today, we are reporting 2nd quarter adjusted earnings Per share of $1.84 Our progress through the first half of the year keeps us firmly on track to achieve 2023 results in line with our guidance, And we remain well positioned to achieve our long term 6% to 8% growth outlooks. Creating sustainable value for our customers, employees, Communities and owners is at the center of everything we do. I'll start today with our work to meet our customers' demands. Speaker 100:02:02We're investing in resilience and reliability and working to expand our clean energy footprint. This work helps our current customers Meet their goals, while also attracting new customers to Entergy's service area. To that end, Our power delivery team continues to upgrade legacy assets to new, more robust wind and flooding standards through new construction projects, Storm restoration and asset renewal. For example, in the second quarter, our new deployments included roughly 600 transmission structures, Approximately 8,000 distribution poles, more than 200 miles of new distribution conductor and 7 new substations. In addition, these improvements will support more than 120 megawatts of growth. Speaker 100:02:51Safe and effective nuclear operations are also important for our stakeholders. Our nuclear units continue to provide clean, reliable baseload power to our customers. 2 of our plants, Riverbend and A and O Unit 2, recently completed successful refueling outages, which included major projects to support long term operational excellence. Overall, our nuclear plants are running very well. Outside of refueling outages, our fleet achieved a 99% capability factor for the first half of twenty twenty three. Speaker 100:03:26While our customers demand more reliability and clean energy from us, our unique and sizable long term industrial sales growth opportunity Continues to improve. Growing businesses support our communities, provide employment opportunities and help with affordability. The inherent advantages of our geographic footprint remain solidly intact. We continue to see evidence of these advantages through recent project announcements in our service area. For example, ExxonMobil announced a transformative CCUS project that will capture, transport Store up to 800,000 metric tons of CO2 per year from a new core iron plant in Convent, Louisiana. Speaker 100:04:08The project is expected to start up in 2026. Paired with the recently announced acquisition of Denbury, ExxonMobil's actions clearly highlight the opportunities around CCUS in our region. Also, Shell Catalyst and Technologies announced its final investment decision on a $120,000,000 expansion project in Port Allen, Louisiana. The facility is already the largest refining catalyst plant in the world and the expansion will create even more manufacturing capacity. These are just a couple of projects that have the potential to increase and extend our long term growth rate. Speaker 100:04:51We are currently updating our annual industrial sales forecast and we are accounting for recent trends. As many of you have noted, There has been some weakness in national industrial output indicators like the ISM Manufacturing Index. Despite this, we are seeing strength in our Gulf region. In the quarter, our total industrial sales declined, Which had been expected due to higher cogeneration sales last year. Adjusting for cogen, our industrial sales were up about 1%. Speaker 100:05:24For some highlights, sales to small industrial customers, which are typically more exposed to broader U. S. Economic factors, Grew nearly 90 gigawatt hours over last year. Sales to large new and expanding industrial customers Grew nearly 100 gigawatt hours over last year. As we look forward, a few large industrial projects have adjusted their in service dates From 2024 to 2025, which could lower our 2024 industrial growth expectation, but not to a degree that affects our outlooks. Speaker 100:06:00Overall, our pipeline for projects continues to grow, supported by favorable commodity spreads and the IRA legislation. Early indications show demand at 2025 and beyond shaping up even stronger than our last forecast. As we typically do, We'll provide an update to our industrial growth expectations at EEI. To support this growth And to help our customers meet their sustainability needs, we are expanding our clean energy portfolio. Through 2026, We plan to add nearly 6,000 megawatts renewable capacity. Speaker 100:06:382,400 of those megawatts Are currently in construction, permitting, regulatory review or negotiations. Approximately 30% of the 2,400 megawatts will be owned by Entergy. Last quarter, I mentioned that we are continuing to work on our self build capabilities. Our recent self build submissions have been extremely competitive in the RFP process. However, we have been limited by a smaller development pipeline. Speaker 100:07:08I'm pleased to report that we are making progress on that front. And going forward, I would expect Entergy to achieve at least 50% ownership through our competitive RFPs. Moving to regulatory items, we continue to make meaningful progress on important regulatory matters, which support The credit required to meet customers' growing needs and drive improved customer outcomes. Beginning with Mississippi, The Public Service Commission approved Entergy Mississippi's formula rate plan settlement, providing for recovery of substantially all costs. Meanwhile, Entergy Louisiana, Entergy New Orleans and Entergy Arkansas each filed their annual formula rate plans. Speaker 100:07:52New rates for Louisiana and New Orleans are expected to be effective in September and Arkansas are expected to be effective at the 1st of next year. As we've discussed, Entergy Louisiana plans to file a base rate case this month, Including our request for a new 3 year formula rate plan. We like the clarity and certainty that FRP provides, which helps us make investments to benefit our customers. However, in recent years Entergy Louisiana's earned returns have materially lagged its allowed return. We are making significant investments to support customer growth and demand for greater resilience and cleaner energy in Louisiana. Speaker 100:08:35This investment is critical for the state as well as our local communities. It is important to have an opportunity for fair and timely recovery, which allows us to maintain Entergy Louisiana's credit and cost effectively source capital to meet customers' expectations. Turning to Texas. Entergy Texas has an unopposed settlement before the commission, And we expect the decision at tomorrow's open meeting. Interim rates were implemented in June and once the commission makes its decision, Any change in revenue and depreciation expense will be retroactive to December of last year. Speaker 100:09:15In addition, The Texas legislative session wrapped up at the end of May and the Governor signed a new build into law that are important to Texas customers and communities As well as to Entergy. I'll highlight a few. The Texas Resiliency Act allows utilities to submit a storm resiliency plan to improve customer outcomes. We expect the commission to complete their initial rulemaking in 180 days, We set the deadline to establish a regulatory framework in mid December. Entergy Texas will then file its resilience plan Shortly after, the rulemaking is complete and the commission will have 180 days to review and act on the filing. Speaker 100:10:00Based on this, Entergy Texas currently expects to have clarity on its resilience plan in the middle of next year. The distribution cost recovery factor legislation allows for 2 annual filings, which provide more timely recovery of the significant distribution investments that we plan to make in Texas to support customer growth and reliability. And the expedited transmission CCM will reduce the time for commission approval by half to approximately 6 months. This Turning to federal matters. In May, we received an initial decision on the unit power sales agreement complaint against Siri. Speaker 100:10:51The ALJ ruled against the complainants on several issues, but recommended approximately $250,000,000 in refunds, which is mostly interest primarily associated with accumulated deferred tax issues going as far back as 1996. We disagree with the ALJ's conclusions on ADIT and we continue to believe that Seres' positions on the law and the facts are correct And that its actions were prudent and taken for the benefit customers. Siri filed its briefs on exception in July And the next step is a ruling from FERC. There is not a statutory deadline for FERC to issue an order. More broadly on Siri, I would note that we are still awaiting FERC's response to our compliance filing related to the December 23rd order on the sale leaseback and uncertain tax position case. Speaker 100:11:45While there is not a procedural deadline, we expect to see this clarification soon And we expect FERC to affirm that no additional refunds are due. FERC's response will provide clarity And will be an important step towards resolving the broader set of Siri litigation. Our communities are one of our key stakeholders And actively supporting them is an important part of our strategy. Pacific 50, an initiative of Points of Light named Entergy a top fifty Most community minded company and this year's leader for the utility sector. Another example of our community commitment is our Beat the Heat campaign. Speaker 100:12:27In May, we launched a series of measures to help low income and senior customers save on their utility bills during hot summer months. $4,000,000 in contributions will support thousands of vulnerable customers through bill payment assistance, weatherization events, Land Distribution and Energy Efficiency Kits. I'm also proud that Forbes Magazine has named Entergy as one of America's Best Employers for diversity. They recognize our commitment to fostering a diverse and inclusive workplace where employees feel valued and respected. Such confirmation is critical as we compete for talent from all corners of our community to best serve the diverse interest of our 3,000,000 customers. Speaker 100:13:12Together, our employees are doing a great job of living our vision statement of We Power Life by meeting today's challenges And ensuring that we will create value for our stakeholders well into the future. As you can see, we continue to make progress on our strategy to deliver for All are key stakeholders. We are laser focused on meeting our customers' demands through operational excellence, Resilience and Clean Energy Investment. Meanwhile, we continue to maintain our financial discipline and work closely with our stakeholders to ensure we have the financial Strength to drive economic development in our communities. Successfully executing across these dimensions We'll keep us on track to deliver steady predictable earnings and dividend growth and move us toward our goal to be the premier utility. Speaker 100:14:01I'll now turn the call over to Kimberly, who will review our financial results for the quarter. Speaker 300:14:08Thank you, Drew. Good morning, everyone. As Drew mentioned, our results this quarter keep us firmly on track and we are affirming our guidance and our longer term outlooks and remain focused on delivering steady, predictable results. Slide 3 shows a high level view of the quarter. Our adjusted earnings per share was $1.84, dollars 0.06 higher than last year. Speaker 300:14:35We continue to see benefits from our customer centric investments, including regulatory actions, along with higher depreciation, taxes other than income taxes and interest expense. We also saw a significant reduction in other O and M, A portion of which was for items that do not have a bottom line impact. Slide 4 details the variances by line item. Regulatory actions support our investment program to benefit customers. There were a few updates in the quarter. Speaker 300:15:11Entergy Mississippi put its latest FRP rates into effect in April. In June, Entergy Texas implemented interim rates from its rate case settlement. The settlement is credit positive and largely neutral to earnings As the rate case included new higher depreciation rates, weather was $0.17 lower than last year. While weather was warmer than normal this year, you may recall that temperatures last year were significantly above average. Excluding the effects of weather, retail sales growth for the quarter was down 0.9%. Speaker 300:15:51The residential segment had a slightly positive contribution from customer growth, partially offset by lower usage per customer. Commercial and industrial sales were lower. For industrial, lower sales to cogen customers was the primary driver as Cogen sales returned to more normal levels this year. This decline was partially offset by growth from small industrials And new and expansion large industrial customers. O and M was also a driver. Speaker 300:16:23We had lower spending for nuclear and non nuclear generation, primarily due to reduced scope of work. Other drivers included higher rebates associated with our prescription drug program, lower MISO cost and lower pension expense, which were each about $0.05 MISO costs were lower as a result of MISO changing its ancillary services market structure. Because Entergy is a lube serving entity that owns Generation, this change is largely neutral to earnings. Operating cash flow summarized on Slide 5 was $588,000,000 higher than last year. The increase was primarily due to lower payments for fuel and purchased power as natural gas prices were much higher last year. Speaker 300:17:14Moving to credit and liquidity on Slide 6. Our net liquidity remains strong at $4,700,000,000 which includes $411,000,000 of storm escrows. We expect to utilize a portion of the storm escrows of Louisiana and We remain on track for our credit outlooks, including achieving Moody's 14% FFO to debt metric by year end. During the quarter, both S and P and Moody's downgraded Seery. The ratings changes stem from Series pending litigation. Speaker 300:17:53Left unchecked, this could ultimately result in higher costs for customers. These actions also highlight the cost of Siri uncertainty and show that resolution would benefit multiple stakeholders. It is our goal to resolve all Sealy Litigation in an expeditious manner. Slide 7 summarizes our progress against our equity needs through 2024. We utilized the ATM program this quarter when market conditions were supportive, Selling forward approximately 468,000 shares, around $80,000,000 remains in our equity plan through 2024. Speaker 300:18:34As shown on Slide 8, we are affirming our guidance range and our longer term adjusted EPS outlook. We've updated a few of our key assumptions that I'd like to highlight. We saw warmer than normal temperatures in the quarter, which contributed $0.07 to EPS. Our plan included conservative assumptions in revenue, and we've now updated our estimates to account for several small Favorable items across our operating companies. We've updated our weather adjusted sales growth estimates and now Volume impacts on earnings per share to be neutral for the year. Speaker 300:19:10This is largely due to lower than expected residential sales in the back half of the year. We continue to see overall health in the residential space with increasing customer counts and declining usage per customer, both of which help affordability. We expect other O and M to be $0.85 lower than 2022 for the full year. This includes approximately $0.15 for the reduction in MISO cost that is offset by lower revenues. Excluding that, the full year O and M change will be closer to $0.70 in line with our previous estimates. Speaker 300:19:47Our spending plans may adjust based on weather or other factors between now and the end of the year as we continue to use our flex spending to deliver steady, predictable results. You may recall that the remaining EWC ownership interest in 2 non nuclear generation is included in parent and other. Power prices have been lower than planned due to low natural gas prices, which is driving the expected margin from those operations lower. Taking all of this into consideration, We are tracking to the midpoint of our guidance range. The bottom line is that we have a solid plan with good visibility And we will continue to execute on the deliverables to achieve steady, predictable growth. Speaker 300:20:37And now the Entergy team is available to answer Operator00:21:01Our first question comes from the line of Ashar Pourreza. Please go ahead. Speaker 400:21:07Hi, good morning. It's actually Constantine here for Shar. Thanks for taking the questions. Good morning. So starting at the LPSC, with the LPSC turnover, are there any actionable changes in relationship or alignment that you've implemented? Speaker 400:21:22And do you feel that LPSC is in general comfortable with the current regulatory constructs? Or would you look to add anything beyond the new resiliency framework Speaker 500:21:34Hey, good morning. It's Rod. I think the best answer to your question This is really the proof of concept, the decisions that the LPSC has made to date. We've gotten support, As you recall, after the election at the end of 2022, we got the support for our Securitization, we got support for our Lake Charles Transmission system, we got support for our gas business rate decisions, All from the new commission. And so I don't believe that we have a relationship issue. Speaker 500:22:20And in fact, we continue to work collaboratively With this new commission, we acknowledge that the addition of the newest commissioner, Davonte Lewis, Has created an opportunity for us to engage differently in educating a new commissioner on The historic relationships between the company and its stakeholders, not just the relationship between the commissioner And the company, but also the commissioner and the customer impacts. I know that you're reacting your question Our reaction in some respects from some of the comments that have come out of individual commissioners and Our reaction has been consistent as long as we maintain our focus on ensuring positive customer outcomes, whether it's resiliency, Whether it's renewables and clean energy and certainly affordability, we expect to be a lot continue to be aligned with LPSC. And so we're moving forward, as Drew alluded to, with our regulatory calendars And to file our rate case and FRP as well as a strong renewables Our portfolio in addition to continuing to fuel the growth for the state and we expect the commission to be supportive of the company's positions. We'll have a lot of debate along the way, but we'll continue to work constructively with. Speaker 100:23:50And Constantine, as part of your question, whether there's We think there's continued support for formula rate plans within LPSC. Speaker 400:24:02Right. And I guess just anything that you feel like you need incremental to narrow some of those kind of earned ROE gaps? Speaker 500:24:12Well, from that vantage point, that's less of a change. It's Entergy's interest in ensuring That the both whatever the regulatory mechanism is, we're using both the filing of the rate case as well as the planned FRP renewal To align those recovery mechanisms with our capital plan, We're not necessarily disclosing any specific tweak at this point to the FRP Because we haven't even made the filing yet, but we expect the commission to be receptive to the case we're making for why an FRP It's in the best interest of customers long term. We're filing the rate case because it was a condition of the settlement during the last FRP renewal, but we expect to continue to make the case to the commission for why the FRP is And certain adjustments to it would be beneficial to our stakeholders long term. Speaker 400:25:22Excellent. That's great color. And maybe shifting to the other kind of regulatory item, Sari, would be operational prudence complaint kind of reaching a point of Settlement impasse in July and rehearing is still pending. Are you embedding any range of outcomes in the current financial plans just in terms of cash or financing drag? And maybe any guidance on kind of capping the potential liability in any form from the last complaint? Speaker 300:25:49Sure. Thanks for the question. As it relates to Seery and our financial plan, as you know, we recorded the reserve last year equal to the Mississippi settlement, Applied broadly across and that is reflected in our financial plan. And then We assume that we are able to continue to work with the parties to resolve the litigation and that Grand Golf is an important asset to our fleet and continues to operate and contribute to our results. Speaker 100:26:20And I'll add that in terms of capping the exposure, the ALJ Order from May regarding the UPSA is while it had as I mentioned, it had about 250,000,000 Of requested refunds, it did prude off quite a bit of additional liability. And so you do see that the Amount of liability continues to come in, as we move forward in the process, but we're still working through all that. And certainly that Yes, the amount that we believe we are at right now is what we have reflected on our books. Speaker 400:27:03Perfect. Thank you. And I'll jump back in queue. Speaker 100:27:06Thank you. Operator00:27:08All right. Perfect. And our next question comes from the line of Jeremy Tonet. Jeremy, please go ahead. Speaker 600:27:15Hi, good morning. Speaker 100:27:16Good morning. Speaker 600:27:18Just want to stick with Louisiana here a bit. I think you touched on a little bit, but wanted to see if you might be able to expand more. And how do you think that Louisiana resiliency process could unfold once The staff engineer report is filed this month. Any sense from the commission on how the commission would like to handle it? And if this could be kind of rolled together, the resiliency, the RFP, the rate case all get tied together? Speaker 500:27:45I totally understand your question and I am my hesitation is only that I don't want to get ahead of the regulatory process, but I think your instincts are aligned once we get initial feedback from the staff On the filing, I think it puts us in a position to evaluate the timing Around how we might pursue potential settlement discussions, our objective obviously is to remove as much uncertainty As we can and whenever we have the opportunity to avoid going through the expense of litigating Issues where there's an opportunity to find time and ground, part of our expectation going in is to first make the compliance filings Yes, it's expected by the commission, but the moment we do, we're trying to find a path To settlement, that isn't different. And I think your instincts about how we think about between now and the end of the year assessing the likelihood The lining around both the resiliency filing in concert with the discussions around The rate case FRP are spot on. That's our ultimate objective, but we have to make the filing and Get the feedback. We have to make the filing on the rate case, but to your point, get the feedback from the LPSC staff on the resiliency filing And take it from there. Speaker 500:29:21Great Speaker 600:29:23point. Got it. Got it. That makes sense. That's helpful. Speaker 600:29:27And sticking with Louisiana here, our stakeholder communications So let us hear about when there's recent outages, there's some system glitches in communication to consumers Was maybe not where it could be. Just wondering efforts on this side to, I guess, improve customer response And kind of address some of those local stakeholder concerns there. Speaker 100:29:55Yes, Jeremy, this is Drew. We have Folks all over that issue, we got over 100 people squirreled away in a large conference room in Texas working on this. But We feel like we have a good plan going forward from where we are. Certainly, some of the Performance of some of our systems after some upgrades that were intended to improve things last earlier or late in the spring That didn't work out as intended. And so we worked through all that. Speaker 100:30:27We have a good plan going forward and we expect to be back on track for any future storms. Speaker 600:30:35Got it. That's helpful there. And then just last one if I could. I was wondering if you might be able to unpack a little bit more FFO to debt and kind of the trajectory over the balance of the year and hitting the goals that you want to hit there, just any incremental color would be appreciated. Speaker 300:30:52Sure, Jeremy. Really two key factors there. 1 is closing the Louisiana securitization, which we did in the Q1. And as we go through the year, you'll see the debt associated with previously carrying that roll off. And the second is around The recovery of the higher deferred fuel balances that occurred last year with the higher gas prices and higher volumes we saw, You can see that the deferred fuel balances are down back to what I would consider more normal levels. Speaker 300:31:21And so as Those debt levels roll off. Those two items will significantly help us. And then just managing through our normal operations As we go through the end of the year, puts us on target to be at or above that 14%. Speaker 700:31:37That's helpful. Speaker 600:31:37I'll leave it there. Thanks. Speaker 400:31:41Thanks, Jeremy. Operator00:31:44Our next question comes from the line of David Arcaro. Speaker 800:31:55Let's see. Speaker 700:31:55I think Drew, you alluded to some initiatives that you're pursuing on the renewable development side of things to make I was just wondering if you could elaborate on what types of initiatives that you've pursued there to lower costs and build the pipeline, it sounded like? Speaker 100:32:19Yes, thanks, Dave. That's a good question. We have been working on building the capability in the development space, as I mentioned. And we have been actually successful for the projects that we have been able to put forward and competing in our RFPs. So I think we're making good progress in terms of what does it take to be competitive On the solar RFP front, the challenge we've had is we just haven't had a large pipeline of projects to support. Speaker 100:32:51So Yes. Many of the projects that are even in the 30% that I mentioned earlier are build and transfer projects where a developer is constructing it And then moving it over to us at just before the completion of COD. What I'm referring to when I say we're making progress is we are finding success in building up our portfolio. So We have somewhere in the neighborhood of about 4 gigawatts of development pipeline that we have put forward at this point. Now I wouldn't say that's all ready to go in R and D. Speaker 100:33:29We're still building out some of those projects, but It's a much larger portfolio and we are expecting to add maybe another half gigawatt to that by the end of the year. And then beyond that point, we expect it to continue to grow and that should be very strong given where we have been competitively. That should be very strong in the RFPs going forward. So that's what we've been seeing and that's What we're focused on. Speaker 500:34:02And the only thing that I'll add to Drew's comments is that part of the Sort of declogging, if you will, that pipeline, we've been securing additional sites for renewables development, including our generation sites, as well as the transmission interconnects that are all part The development process and that's adding to our improved competitiveness to Drew's point. Speaker 700:34:34Got it. Thanks. That's helpful color. And then, let's see, curious, similar topic, but in Texas, One of your peer utilities in the state has had challenges just getting a few renewables projects over the finish line there. I was just wondering how that's Affecting your strategy in the state of Texas, how that might maybe impacting the outstanding RFPs that you've got? Speaker 500:34:59Yes. And the short answer is that it's not impacting one, it's not a surprise to us because our point of view It's consistent with and has been consistent with the PUCT. We understand the significance of reliability first. We do believe because of the interest of our customers that the renewable resources should be an important part Our supply portfolio, but we recognize that the Commission's position has been rather consistent in Texas. It's notable that our position outside of ERCOT in our service territory And the success we've had in our CCNs has given in our view, given us a better vantage point to discuss the attributes of renewables with the commission perhaps in a different light because we're not having the same reliability issues in our service territory as they've expressed concerns about inside of ERCOT. Speaker 500:36:07We are paying close attention though to particularly in Texas. If the commission were to have a change And policy around renewables. We see a tremendous opportunity in both hydrogen and in CCS for other capital investment opportunities. But we think our position is strong. Our customers, particularly given all the growth we have in Texas, are requesting the attributes of renewables and or clean energy, And we're well positioned regardless of what direction the commission might take from a policy perspective in Texas to help them meet those needs. Speaker 700:36:55Okay, great. Thank you. I appreciate it. Speaker 100:36:57Thank you. Operator00:36:59All right. And our next question comes from the line of Paul Zimbardo. Paul, please go ahead. Speaker 800:37:06Hi, good morning. Thank you, team. Speaker 100:37:08Good morning, Paul. Drew, I Speaker 800:37:10think you mentioned that although some projects might be shifting around the timing a little bit, you're net seeing stronger industrial growth in that 2025 Period 25 plus. Just could you give a little more color on that and kind of what that means for the plan and if this is something Speaker 100:37:30Yes. So it would be expected to be part of the EEI refresh and We can give you some more details for sure then. I would characterize the movement from 2024 to 2025 is The normal roll around of these large industrial projects that are 1,000,000,000 of dollars and they're hard to get done. And so that's nothing that we haven't seen before. And so that is why I wouldn't say that was expected. Speaker 100:38:00I would say we're not surprised. And that is so that part is not really new news. As we look forward beyond 2024, We are continuing to see a very robust industrial sales pipeline, lots of interest from a lot of different parties. We've particularly around the clean energy. I mentioned a particular CCUS project from ExxonMobil in my remarks, But there are other projects like that out there. Speaker 100:38:32There are projects like that related to hydrogen. So we are, I think, well positioned to take advantage of all of that, and we'll give you more details whenever we get to EEI. Speaker 800:38:53Okay, great. Understood. And then just pivoting to Texas following up on a couple of questions that were asked. Is there a good way to think about kind of what the earnings Improvement opportunity is after the legislation, whether it's earned ROE basis points, additional capital spending opportunities, just If there's some way to think about that, that would be helpful. Thank you. Speaker 300:39:13Sure, Paul. Are you referencing out of the Texas legislation Specifically, was that your question? Speaker 800:39:20Correct. Yes, the legislation plural. Speaker 300:39:23Yes, there were a couple of A number of favorable things out of the legislation. Obviously, the resilience filing gives us a path to file our resilience Plan and seek recovery of that in a way that helps provide our system higher resilience standard and support our customers. The DCRF changed from an annual filing to a biannual filing, that certainly gives us an opportunity to Improve the or decrease the lag associated with an investment. But from an overall perspective, we're still We haven't changed our outlooks with regards to that, but certainly a better way to recover investments. And then the third item is around compensation. Speaker 300:40:08And that one really for us on executive compensation is around recovery in a rate case. It's not really Effective to us, but it certainly is helpful from a presidential perspective. Speaker 800:40:22Okay. Is there a way to kind of quantify like an ROE improvement or something from all of that? Speaker 300:40:28Yes. I think it's too early to do that at this point. But certainly, they are positive tailwinds from our perspective that help us when we think about our overall outlook, but nothing changes on that regard. Speaker 800:40:41Okay, great. Thanks. Operator00:40:50All right. And it looks like right now that is all of our questions. If there are no more questions, I will go ahead and turn it back over to Mr. Antler. Speaker 200:40:59Thanks, Jeremy, and thanks to everyone for participating this morning. Our quarterly report on Form 10 Q is due to the SEC on August 9 and provides more details and disclosures about our financial statements. Events that occurred prior to the date of our 10 Q filing that provide Additional evidence of conditions that existed at the date of the balance sheet would be reflected in our financial statements in accordance with generally accepted Accounting Principles. Also as a reminder, we maintain a webpage as part of Entergy's Investor Relations website called Regulatory and Other Information, which provides key updates of regulatory proceedings and important milestones on our strategic execution. While some of this And this concludes our call.Read moreRemove AdsPowered by