John Moreira
Executive Vice President and Chief Financial Officer at Eversource Energy
Thank you, Joe, and good morning, everyone. This morning, I will review our results for the second quarter of 2022, discuss recent regulatory developments and review our 2022 financing activity.
I will start with Slide 8. Our GAAP earnings were $0.84 per share in the second quarter of 2022 compared with earnings of $0.77 in the second quarter of 2021. Second quarter results for both years include $0.02 per share of an after-tax cost associated with acquisitions, primarily related to the assets acquired from Columbia Gas of Massachusetts. Excluding those costs, we earned $0.86 per share in the second quarter of 2022 compared with earnings of $0.79 per share in the second quarter of 2021.
For the first half of 2022, we earned $2.13 per share on a GAAP basis compared with earnings of $1.83 per share in the first half of 2021. Excluding charges related to the acquisition and a Connecticut storm penalty last year, we earned $2.16 per share for the first half of 2021 compared with earnings of $1.94 per share in the first half of 2021.
Looking at some additional details on the second quarter earnings results by segment, starting with our electric transmission segment, which earned $0.44 per share in the second quarter of 2022 compared with $0.40 per share in the second quarter of '21. Improved results were driven by a higher level of investment in our transmission facilities.
Our electric distribution segment earned $0.37 per share in the second quarter of 2022 compared with earnings of $0.35 per share in the quarter of 2021. Improved results here were driven largely by higher revenues, lower pension costs and storm restoration costs, partially offset by higher costs related to property taxes, depreciation and other employee-related expenses.
Our natural gas distribution segment earnings were $2 per share in the second quarter of 2022 compared with earnings of $0.01 in the second quarter of '21. Improved results were largely due to higher revenues and lower pension expense, partially offset by higher operating and maintenance costs, property taxes, interest expense and depreciation.
Our water distribution segment earned $0.03 per share in the second quarter of 2022, the same level as we earned in the second quarter of '21. Results for our Eversource parent and other companies improved by $1 million in the second quarter of 2022 compared with the second quarter of 2021. Excluding the acquisition and transition costs I mentioned earlier, the results include after-tax gains on clean energy investments which increased by $0.02 per share from last year's levels and were largely offset by higher interest costs on long-term and short-term debt.
Now that we have the first half of 2022 behind us from an earnings perspective, and have a bit more line of sight on the second quarter of 2022, we have narrowed our non-GAAP earnings guidance for the full year to $4.04 to $4.14 per share from our previous range of $4 to $4.17 per share.
Before moving on, I'm pleased to announce that, as of the end of June, we have fully transitioned the remainder of Eversource Gas of Massachusetts business systems off of the legacy NiSource system and onto the Eversource platform. Overall, we cannot be more proud of the conversion process.
It has gone extremely well since we closed the transaction in the fourth quarter of 2022. We have converted approximately 300 business processes over to Eversource, including the most recent move on to a new customer information system.
Feedback from both EGMA customers and employees have been very positive, and our operating and financial metrics have consistently met or exceeded our expectations. As a result, transition-related costs for this transaction will be minimal next quarter.
We are very appreciative of the great support we have received from the NiSource. NiSource team during this transition period.
Turning to longer-term earnings. As you saw in our news release, and you can see on Slide 9, we are reaffirming our long-term EPS growth rate in the upper half of 5% to 7% range.
On Slide 10, we also reaffirm our $18 billion 5-year regulated capital program that we discussed during our February earnings call, including our $3.9 billion regulated capital investment projected for this year. As Joe mentioned, we expect that by 2026, the last year of our current 5-year forecast, our incremental investments required to offset the loss of the offshore wind earnings contributions that would have been in place, we estimate that, that will be -- we required approximately $3 billion of investments. More to come on this front soon.
In both February and in May, we noted a couple of additional areas where we expect the need for incremental investment over our current 5-year forecast period to enhance reliability, customer experience and efficiently connect clean energy resources.
Turning to Slide 11. We have provided a status update on AMI for both NSTAR Electric and CL&P. At this time, regulators in both Connecticut and Massachusetts are actively working through dockets, with decisions expected later this year.
Briefing has been completed in Massachusetts, and we expect a decision towards the end of the year. In Connecticut, Pure held hearings earlier this month to address further questions that the [Indecipherable] imposed about an AMI rollout. We also expect Pure's AMI review to be completed by the end of the year.
Separately, as we mentioned on our first quarter earnings call, NSTAR Electric filed an application with FERC in March on an innovative recovery structure to help promote offshore wind development off Massachusetts. The application involved Park City Wind, which is an 800-megawatt Avangrid project that was selected a couple of years ago as the winner of Connecticut's most recent offshore wind RFP.
Park City will connect into the 345 kV system, where we are already planning some upgrades to meet rising electric load requirements.
By working on the 2 projects together, we were able to reduce costs for customers. In total, the incremental upgrades would be about $200 million, for which, about $150 million of it will be collected from Park City with FERC-based returns. FERC approved our application at its June meeting. We expect there will be other opportunities to emulate this type of offshore wind transmission interconnection agreement going forward.
ISO New England is already reviewing another project that expects to tie into the New England grid through Cape Cod. We have discussed previously that, including Park City, there are probably about $500 million of regulated transmission investment needs on Cape Cod to efficiently connect offshore wind that is reflected -- that is not reflected in our current $18 billion capital forecast. We expect other significant investment needs to arise in the near future in both electric distribution and transmission segments since our states view renewable power as a critical means of reducing greenhouse gas emissions related to space heating and transportation.
On the regulatory side, we have one general a rate review well underway and another one about to be filed. A summary of those cases is shown on Slide 12. Hearings in the NSTAR Electric rate review concluded just last week, and we will be entering the briefing phase soon with a decision expected December 1 of this year and with rates effective January 1, 2023.
We feel very good about the strength of our case as well as our proposals to enable the Commonwealth's clean energy goals. Briefing will take place throughout the month of September.
On July 1, Aquarion Water of Connecticut filed a letter of intent for its rate review in about 10 years. Key elements of the 3-year plan are shown on the slide. We expect to file the actual application in August. Aquarion Connecticut's regulatory ROE was about 7.8% during the 12 months ended March 31, 2022, and the company's infrastructure investments have significantly increased over the past several years to enable water service reliability for its customers.
Turning to recent financings. We issued $1.5 billion to 2-year and 5-year parent debt in late June. Proceeds were used to reduce short-term debt. The relatively short average maturity of these senior notes is due to our anticipation of a successful sale of our offshore wind interest.
In terms of the equity issuances. As you can see on Slide 13, we launched our $1.2 billion aftermarket program in the second quarter of this year, and to date, have issued nearly 1.4 million shares at a weighted average price of $91.98.
Through July, we also have issued approximately 640,000 treasury shares this year to fund our dividend reinvestment and employee pension plan. We have received a number of inquiries from investors regarding our pension obligation. Let me start with an overview of our plan's performance last year.
Our retirement plans earn approximately $1.25 billion, which amounts to a 24% return on planned investments, and we have contributed about $180 million into the plans last year. This resulted in the funded status of our pension plans increasing over the course of 2021 from about 79% to nearly 100%.
The impact of pension expense on our earnings is mitigated by the fact that we have adopted a smoothing of actuarial gains and losses over the average participant future years of service. It's further mitigated by our pension tractors in place at our 3 Massachusetts electric and gas distribution companies, and for our transmission segment.
Additionally, Much of our pension expense is capitalized into our capital projects and doesn't affect our earnings. And lastly, our qualified pension plan has been closed for new participants for well over a decade.
Less than half of our pension expense actually affects earnings. The expense is lower this year due in large part to the strong returns we realized last year and a slightly higher discount rate. At this time, it is unclear whether pension expense will be a positive or a negative factor for our 2023 earnings. While it is unlikely that in 2022, we will -- excuse me, in 2023, we will experience the same returns as we realized in 2021, the discount rate that we will use for 2023 is expected to be significantly higher than the rate we are using currently, and that could help lower pension expense next year. As a reminder, our expected long-term rate of return assumed in our pension investments is 8.25%.
Thank you very much for joining us this morning. And now I will turn the call back over to Jeff.