Clearway Energy Inc (CWEN) 2021 Q2 法說會逐字稿

Good day, and thank you for standing by. Welcome to the Clearway Energy, Incorporated, 2Q 2021 Earnings Call. (Operator Instructions)

I would now like to hand the conference over to your speaker today, Chris Sotos, President and CEO, Clearway Energy, Incorporated. Please go ahead.

Thank you. Good morning, everyone. Let me first thank you for taking the time to join today's call. I apologize for being a little bit late. There were some technical difficulties. Joining me this morning is Akil Marsh, Investor Relations; Chad Plotkin, our Chief Financial Officer; and Craig Cornelius, President and CEO of Clearway Energy Group. Craig will be available for the Q&A portion of our presentation.

Before we begin, I'd like to quickly note that today's discussion will contain forward-looking statements, which are based on assumptions that we believe to be reasonable as of this date. Actual results may differ materially. Please review the safe harbor in today's presentation as well as the risk factors in our SEC filings.

In addition, we refer to both GAAP and non-GAAP financial measures. For information regarding our non-GAAP financial measures and reconciliations to the most directly comparable GAAP measures, please refer to today's presentation.

Turning to Page 4. Financially, Clearway is reporting second quarter CAFD of $155 million and $140 million through the first half of 2021. Due to the strong performance of our diversified portfolio, we maintain our full year CAFD guidance of $325 million, including the impact from the Texas winter weather event.

Clearway has announced an increase in its dividend by approximately 1.7% to $0.3345 per share for the third quarter of 2021. This is on track for DPS growth at the upper end of our 5% to 8% long-term target for 2021, targeting an annualized rate of $1.36 dividend per share going into 2022.

As we have discussed in our previous calls, growth in CAFD per share is visible for the next few years. So our focus in partnership with Clearway Energy Group has been the extension of this trajectory over the long term, and we are pleased with our progress. Our newest partnership with Clearway Energy Group is becoming more concrete and would comprise approximately 1.1. gigawatts of co-investment and diversified portfolio of renewable assets.

Today, we are also announcing potential new dropdown opportunities, comprising 452 megawatts of solar projects in Texas and a 133 megawatt portfolio of distributed solar projects. These investments would require funding between the second half of 2022 and 2024, providing Clearway additional visibility into its growth plan.

And looking at growth beyond these discrete opportunities, we are very pleased by the progress we are making on renewable development in our integrated Clearway enterprise as the investments Clearway group has been making and capabilities and projects have accelerated each year and are meeting growing demand from customers and expanding support from policymakers. In this regard, our integrated clean power enterprise is among the industry leaders as renewable growth expands in the U.S., with over 75% of new electricity generating capacity last year having come from renewable resources, we expect to see substantial growth in this asset class and for progress in the Clearway development pipeline to sustain dividend per share growth for years to come.

Putting numbers to that progress, Clearway Group increased its development pipeline to over 16 gigawatts during the first half of 2021 through a full spectrum of development activities that involves securing control of late-stage projects planned for completion in the next 3 years, expansion of greenfield development assets to greater nameplate capacity, substantial additions to its pipeline of paired and standalone storage assets and initiation of additional early-stage development projects that will sustain growth in the longer term. Further, the pipeline Clearway Group's developing is being tailored to further reinforce the type of resource diversification that enable us to provide in line financial results during the first half of this year. It reflects a balance across wind development regions, including sites that exhibit favorable correlation to our existing fleet, our substantial volume of solar [and storage] projects that exhibit low generation variability and potential for market and contracting positions complementary to existing ones.

Having doubled this annual development throughput to over 1 gigawatt last year, Clearway Group aims to double its development throughput to over 2 gigawatts per year by the 2024 project vintage, and 6.9 gigawatt pipeline of late-stage projects provides a strong foundation for meeting that objective. This pipeline supports a range of upcoming dropdown opportunities, including what I'll discuss on the next slide, but as importantly, an even further set of dropdown opportunities for investment by the company as the pipeline of projects planned through 2025 mature toward financing commitments.

Next, we continue to make progress on our 2023 position regarding our California gas assets. We are in active discussions around our open position and expect further progress towards contracting the assets during the third quarter.

In addition, I wanted to address a topic that we have received a number of incoming questions about; namely, the potential sale of the Thermal platform. District Energy is a highly attractive infrastructure asset class, and our Thermal platform represents one of the 3 large district energy platforms in the U.S. Due to significant interest from prospective buyers, we have decided to explore a potential sale of the Thermal platform. Let me be clear. We do not need to sell Thermal for capital formation purposes and the asset class is a strong and well-performing one for Clearway. Therefore, any decision on the sale of the Thermal platform is going to be very disciplined on price. And to the extent we move forward, we believe proceeds from such a potential transaction will exceed our current capital commitments and near-term visible growth opportunities.

Finally, as I indicated on our last call, Clearway sees its pro forma CAFD per share outlook at $1.85 per share, which supports our DPS growth objectives through 2023. This pro forma CAFD outlook does not factor in any uncommitted growth or results of capital deployment from asset sales.

Turning to Page 5, review our current pro forma CAFD outlook as well as the prospective opportunities from the Clearway development efforts. As can be seen on the slide, compared to the CAFD guidance of $325 million we entered 2021 with, we now see our pro forma cash outlook at $395 million when all of our current capital commitments are funded in line with our balance sheet objectives and are fully operational. Focusing not on the absolute CAFD number, but more importantly CAFD per share, which takes into account capital formation, we are maintaining our $1.85 outlook versus $1.61 coming into this year. This represents an increase of approximately 15% on a per share basis versus where Clearway entered 2021, driving further dividend growth.

In providing more detail on growth that is not included in these numbers, I would turn to the right side of the page. The first component of the overall investment opportunity encompasses 133 megawatts of distributed solar assets that has either recently come online or have near-term CODs. These assets comprise more than 50 projects and 133 gross megawatts, carry revenue contracts of 20 years on average and, as with our other distributed solar assets, provide high CAFD relative to their generating capacity.

The second component is approximately 450 megawatts of ERCOT solar projects, currently with 254 megawatts of these under node-settled PPAs with a duration of 18 years at a complementary location in our Texas portfolio.

Last are the 1.1 gigawatts of diversified partnership assets that are taking shape, including 2 solar plus storage projects for 463 megawatts in Western states, along with a basket of other wind and solar projects with diversified off-takers.

Before turning over to Chad, I want to reiterate that while we have significantly improved the portfolio in the past 12 months to continue our growth trajectory, the Clearway enterprise continues to relentlessly focus on continuing accretive growth through dropdowns and new projects, third-party acquisitions and capital recycling.

With that, I will hand the presentation over to Chad. Chad?

Thank you, Chris. And turning to Slide 7. Today, we are pleased to report that Clearway benefited from its mix of generation and regionally diversified renewable portfolio, as second quarter adjusted EBITDA of $365 million and cash available for distribution, or CAFD, of $155 million were in line with seasonal expectations. With these results, the company is also reporting first half 2021 adjusted EBITDA of $563 million and CAFD of $140 million.

During the quarter, and as noted in the Appendix section of today's presentation, Clearway's renewable portfolio was able to withstand weakness in generation conditions at the non-California-based wind assets where production was below median expectations. This was most prevalent in California, where the company's Alta wind project generated strong results in April and May, helping to support first half 2021 production at Alta that was 12% above our median production forecast.

Further, and in the second quarter, the company's utility scale solar portfolio performed well, with production modestly above expectations, providing further mitigation to the lower-than-average wind generation outside of California.

In addition and primarily due to favorable weather conditions as well as the initial phases of demand recovery from the COVID-19 pandemic, the company's Thermal segment had a solid quarter as thermal equivalent megawatt hours sold were up 16% versus the second quarter of last year.

Overall, and with the company results through the first half of the year in line with our sensitivity ranges, we continue to maintain 2021 CAFD guidance of $325 million. As a reminder, this guidance does continue to assume P50 median renewable expectations for the full year and is also affected by the approximate $25 million impact to CAFD in the first quarter due to the financial exposure from the February winter weather event in Texas.

As Chris discussed, Clearway continues to both execute on and position the company for new opportunities to drive CAFD and dividend per share growth. With existing capital commitments on track to close within time frame supporting our pro forma CAFD outlook, we are also focused on effectuating the financing of these transactions efficiently while maintaining our balance sheet objective.

With this in mind, we continue to focus on strategic flexibility in our approach to corporate capital formation. This flexibility is available to us with $420 million of capacity currently under our revolver to temporarily finance transactions, and $126 million unutilized in the existing ATM program, providing an efficient means of placing equity as required. While these means are effective vehicles to support our efforts, we are also mindful that success in asset dispositions can also provide even more flexibility as net proceeds on any transaction can lead to accretive recycling of capital. And this would be the case for Thermal, where potential net proceeds and a potential transaction would be expected to exceed both our existing capital commitments and new opportunities that may arise.

With that, I'll turn the call back to Chris for closing remarks.

Thank you, Chad. Turning to Page 9. We are focused on our goals for 2021. Clearway continues to work to meet its 2021 financial commitments. As described earlier, our scalable and diversified portfolio, particularly our West Coast renewable portfolio and Thermal segment has performed well this year, mitigating the first quarter Texas winter weather impact, allowing us to maintain our 2021 CAFD guidance of $325 million.

In addition, we remain on track to achieve the upper end of our DPS growth rate of 5% to 8% through 2021, with a targeted annualized dividend of $1.36 by year-end. Clearway has and continues to increase its pro forma CAFD outlook per share, providing visibility to dividend per share growth of 5% to 8% through 2023, within our target payout ratios through the acquisition of accretive assets and through the optimization of capital formation.

As we move through the remainder of 2021, Clearway will look to increase [its] outlook through executing on the investment opportunity discussed earlier in this presentation as well as potential capital recycling through a possible monetization of our Thermal platform.

Finally, we are working to enhance the value of our California natural gas portfolio. We closed on our first 100-megawatt contract more than 2 years out from the current contract expiry at an attractive tenor and price point. In addition, we're in active negotiation with counterparties to secure additional contracts on the balance of the capacity we have available for offer, anticipate updating our investors on our November call on those results. Thank you.

Operator, please open the lines for questions.

(Operator Instructions) Our first question comes from the line of Julien Dumoulin-Smith of Bank of America.

Thanks for the time and the opportunity. If you don't mind, at the outset here, can we talk a little bit more on use of proceeds potentially from whether it's thermal or, frankly, any strategic shifts in California around your gas assets? Just the time line on redeploying any proceeds. I mean, obviously, you talked about an expanded set of broadly described dropdowns. Would you anticipate holding onto the liquidity? Or can you elaborate how you think about use of proceeds of that quantum?

Sure. Obviously kind of early stages here, so in terms of exact timing of when this might close, difficult to say at this point in time. I think first half of 2022 for a time frame, so it's not going to be that much sooner. I think, once again, that's a potential.

And so I think from that question, we'd obviously use it for the existing equity that kind of we haven't issued to date from our dropdown that happened in December as well as the Mt. Storm acquisition. Also, we'd probably hold onto, I don't know, about maybe a year, let's say depending on what's visible from the perspective of other dropdowns or third-party M&A that we see in front of us.

So I think depending on exactly when it closed, we obviously see the proceeds funding the equity that we haven't issued to date on Mt. Storm or dropdown 23 that was done in December, the Lighthouse transaction. But I think it really is a question of, once again, seeing what opportunities we have after that's done, and then figuring how to we redeploy capital.

But Chad, anything to add?

No. I mean, I think at the end of the day, Julien, like anything, when we think about both capital formation and the reallocation of that capital, we always take the lens of looking at our balance sheet and ensuring we're meeting our objectives, and we'll obviously deploy capital in a manner that drives the most value and accretion to our investors.

Yes, indeed. And if I can pivot here back to some of the commentary on the California gas portfolio. Obviously, we've been talking about this for a bit. Can you perhaps at least indicatively provide an update on where the aggregate or consolidated level of cash flows across this business segment is trending? Do you think about it, not specific to a contract price, but do you anticipate any kind of drop in cash flow at all? Or sort of on a net basis, net of financing that is, could you actually see a flat or even increasing profile to cash flow coming out of the California gas portfolio, given, shall we say, where you stand today on the contracting progress?

I think we could see it being flattish. But I think, Julien, I don't want to write a check before kind of everything's done. So I think for us, we want to kind of see where the contracts come in, see what open position we have and the like. I think, as we indicated on our last call, the contract level we were able to get on Marsh Landing would be, once again, if able to be pro forma-ed for the entire asset, be flat on an unlevered basis verse a levered platform today. But I think we have a little bit of wood to chop before I can say that definitively for where we sit.

Yes. I'll keep checking in. And then if we can pivot just real quickly, you talk about more Texas here. Can you talk about hedging practices? Any further expansion? How do you think about risk mitigation broadly defined on any subsequent expansion in the state?

Sure. I think as mentioned, the current asset being contemplated is node-settled, so a little bit different and less risky hedging structure. But I think for us, we like ERCOT as an overall market. And I think we really want to try to build out a portfolio there a variety of positions that help mitigate risk overall. That means taking some megawatts on a small basis merchant to help offset others for scarcity pricing. We'll kind of see as the portfolio comes together.

But I think to your direct question, Julien, the latest asset is node-settled, at least for where it sits currently for what it has hedged. And we'll have to look at creating an overall kind of macro position in ERCOT with a variety of assets to help mitigate risk in the region overall.

Got it. Excellent. And just to clarify the earlier question around use of liquidity here. Effectively, this would go to normal course funding of dropdowns, right, a very linear and straightforward use of capital here, no pivot in your strategy whatsoever [in term]?

Correct. If there were dropdowns available, kind of the first use of this is to fund those dropdowns in the event anything happened.

Our next question comes from the line of Colton Bean from Tudor, Pickering, Holt.

Just a follow-up there on the Thermal comments. I understand that you're probably limited in what you can disclose, but any general parameters on what you would need to see to transact on a potential divestiture?

No. I think it's too early to tell. Like I said, we're kind of in the stages of exploring it. So not to minimize the question, but no, it's too early to say what a minimum hold price is to the thing.

Fair enough. And then maybe a question for Craig. I think in the development backlog, there was a reference to acquisitions of late stage projects to secure site control and improved internet or interconnect queue positioning.

So just, one, how important is the interconnect element? And what options do you have to improve positioning and mitigate delays there?

Where we've made those acquisitions, we did so not to mitigate risk in our pre-existing controlled pipeline, but to add assets that were in locations where we wanted to build projects or have offerings for load serving entities. So that's what that reference means.

More broadly, we've been satisfied by the way that we've been able to actively manage the progress of our late-stage pipeline through sort of the next 3-year vintage. Management of queue positions and the work of interconnecting utilities is certainly one dimension to that as is maintenance of a supply chain and development progress in an environment that certainly is challenging for some. And in that regard, as is true for some bigger enterprises like our own, we've been satisfied by what we've been able to do to keep projects on track. So I guess that's what I'd say on that front.

In terms of other acquisitions that we've undertaken, they've really been to support a full spectrum of objectives, in some cases to populate projects that would support dividend per share growth out in the 2025 and beyond time frame, in some cases, to provide complementary dropdown opportunities between now and 2024.

And I think now where we sit is we've been able to construct a pipeline that has over 1 gigawatt worth of projects in development and 5 ISOs and RTOs around the country that adds to the strength that we have in California. And those acquisitions are intended to enable us to continue to add projects into the overall CWEN fleet so that the diversification that supported us well in the second quarter is something we'd be able to continue to add on over time.

Got it. And then just one final question. The 2025 commentary is a good lead-in there. With the backlog now extending into late decade, does that present an opportunity to extend the guidance time line following resolution of conventionals recontracting?

It could. I think, once again, obviously those are assets in development. I think we've kind of wanted to make sure that we have agreement and a binding commitment between CEG and CWEN before formally expending that. But I think, to your point, hopefully, as we kind of get traction around 2023 and any volatility around the gas fleet is reduced and we kind of know where we sit, I think trying to extend guidance is something we'd definitely shoot for. But once again, we'd want binding agreements before we feel comfortable doing so.

Our next question comes from the line of Steve Fleishman of Wolfe Research.

So just, sorry to ask on a potential Thermal sale again and the like. But just I think you said that proceeds would be beyond any near-term and long-term growth needs. So that extra increment beyond that, would you be considering share buybacks for that? Or what, would you be returning that capital?

Yes. I think, Steve, to be fair, I said that we have current visibility into. So if there's any growth opportunities beyond, yes, that would obviously be used for that. But I think, yes, Steve, as always, you've worked with us for a long time, we focus on making sure the balance sheet and our ratings are kind of working and also focus on accretion. So yes, we'd look at any options if there weren't growth opportunities, but way too early to kind of speculate on that.

Okay. And you've mentioned a couple of times on this, focusing on accretion. Could you just clarify when you're looking at kind of value accretion, what is the main metric or metrics that you're looking at in making these decisions?

Sure. We look obviously for CAFD per share from a public perspective. But I think, as always, we look at IRRs and NPVs and the like as well. But I think the one that's most visible to the investor base is obviously CAFD per share.

Okay. So that could be more CAFD or less shares, I guess. Great. Okay. And then just on the California commentary, is it fair to say that the continued volatility in pricing and kind of almost emergency conditions out there in terms of power needs are helping in terms of your contracting positioning?

I would say that's fair. I think the current situation helps position the value of the assets. As I've been talking about for several years in terms of them being a [load] box and the like. So I think to your point, Steve, the current situation in California, yes, definitely shows the importance of those assets to the safety and reliability of the grid.

Our next question comes from the line of Durgesh Chopra of Evercore ISI.

Just quick clarification on the use of proceeds from the Thermal, potential Thermal portfolio asset sale. Are we going to have to pay down any debt or any tax consequences that we should also factor in? Or this is basically going towards either growth projects or share buybacks?

Chad, why don't you take that one?

Yes. Sure, Durgesh. I think again, there's a little hypothetical based on a potential transaction. But in any transaction we would execute, any disposition across anything, we would always look at the effect that, that would have on our credit ratios. And to the extent it would begin to change that, we would have to put consideration into how we would equitize the platform or the company. So obviously, if that entailed paying down debt or, candidly, just thinking about using more equity in subsequent transactions, that just sort of goes in the overall sort of, as I said, how we allocate capital. So nothing dispositive, but it is clearly at the lens.

As far as tax consequences go, similarly, any transaction independent of whether or not it would be a potential deal on Thermal or any other asset disposition, obviously we have to take a look at that. I'm mindful that if you look at our public disclosures, you will note that our NOL balance as of the end of 2020 was well over $1 billion on a gross basis. I think as we mentioned before, there are some state things that you have to look at as well. I'm mindful that, if you recall last year, for instance, in California, the state had to spend -- or for a company that had NOLs in California, there was a suspension in the use of NOLs. So those are type of things that we look at.

So long story short. I think all these things that you're asking all go into any calculus that we look at as we would seek to evaluate any type of disposition in the business.

Very helpful, Chad. And then can you just clarify? I think, Chris, you said first half of 2022, is that sort of where you would expect to announce something potentially, or close? Can you just clarify the first half 2022 comment?

Yes, I think that's probably more of a closing. Once again, it's early days, so I could definitely be off there. But obviously, a lot of questions on the call are when we might get proceeds. That's not a 2021 proceed type of situation for sure.

Our next question comes from the line of Colin Rusch of Oppenheimer.

Could you speak to the potential for raising the floor on your growth targets? The scale of the opportunity is so substantial and your capability within that (inaudible) renewables development seems sufficient that you could potentially raise that floor pretty significantly. What do you need to see to do that?

I think from our perspective, Colin, as we've talked about over the years, is I'm probably a little bit more interested in extending the runway versus saying, listen, from 5% to 8%, we're going to move to 6% to 8% or something like that. So to me, I think that as kind of Craig's team continues to work through development and, as we talked a little bit on this call, that development pipeline becomes a little bit more concrete and we can provide that visibility toward an extension of the runway, I think overall I'm probably a little bit more interested in saying, listen, we can now show dividend per share growth at our 5% to 8% out through, insert a date longer than 2023. That's probably the way we would go.

Okay. That's helpful. And then given what's going on in the energy storage market and the tightness and lithium-ion cells and a little bit higher value for transportation applications versus some of the power applications, can you speak to the evaluation process for some of the emerging energy storage technologies like flow batteries and how that might impact some of your development activities?

Craig, if you don't mind, take that one?

Yes, sure. I think if we're looking at deployment vintages through 2024, for the type of scale projects we're advancing lithium-ion battery technologies will be the technology that makes up what's built because of their financeability and constructability and our ability to be able to predict their operations and the essential nature of that technology, when you're looking at a resource adequacy contract in terms of the importance of its ability to perform.

As you look to the 2025 and beyond vintage, there's certainly out in California a market that's taking shape for something in that 6- to 8-hour duration where potentially alternatives to lithium-ion technology could be preferable from a cost and performance perspective.

You're certainly right, Colin, that automotive demand and the price points that automotive applications can pay will push price up for lithium-ion comparatively. I do tend to think from our own experience over these last couple decades and the way that we saw solar module technologies evolve that we'll continue to see that lithium-ion technology supply chain be pretty competitive and presenting offerings, both in terms of the volume it can deliver, but also the embedded cost and total cost of ownership that we bake into an offering of a 6- to 8-hour product offering for load serving entities.

But we're evaluating some of the same things that I think you're asking about; I certainly see promise in some of them. And what I think companies like ours and others will need to do is to support those technology providers and demonstrating their manufacturability and their deployment and their operations. At some modest pilot scale so that then we can have sufficient confidence to be able to bake that technology into offerings of scale and financing and construction.

So I still expect that you'll see companies like ours that are doing gigawatts worth of storage deployment and development for load serving entities that need to be able to call on the resource to have lithium-ion be the mainstay through the mid part of this decade. But we're going to continue to evaluate whether some of these other technologies can be built at scale and can be financed, and it would be great to see some complementary offerings out there.

(Operator Instructions) There are no further questions at this time. Presenters, please continue.

Thank you, everyone, for your time, and look forward to talking to next quarter. I appreciate it, and, once again, apologies for the technical difficulties. Take care.

This concludes today's conference call. Thank you for participating. You may now disconnect.