Atlantica Sustainable Infrastructure plc

Welcome to Atlantica's first quarter 2024 financial results conference call. Just a reminder that this call is being webcast live on the internet and a replay of this call will be available on Atlantica's corporate website. Atlantica will be making forward-looking statements during this call which are based on current expectations and assumptions and are subject to risks and uncertainties. Actual results could differ materially from our forward-looking statements if any of our key assumptions are incorrect or because of other factors, including the risk factors section of the accompanying presentation and in our latest reports and filings with the Securities and Exchange Commission, all of which can be found on our website. Atlantica does not undertake any duty to update any forward-looking statements. Joining us for today's conference call are Atlantica's CEO Santiago Siege and CFO Francisco Martinez-Davis. As usual, at the end of this conference call, we will open the lines for the Q&A session. I will now pass you over to Mr. Siege. Please, sir, go ahead.

Good morning and thank you very much for joining us for our first quarter 2024 conference call. I will start with a few high-level messages. As you have seen in the first quarter and compared versus the same period last year, revenue remained stable. while adjusted EBITDA decreased by 0.9%, excluding the effect of the unscheduled outage that we discussed last quarter. Operating cash flow increased by 57% year-over-year, up to close to $66 million. In terms of growth and new projects, we recently signed a 15-year PPA for a new 100-megawatt solar plus storage project in California, and we completed, among other projects, we completed the acquisition of two operating wind assets in the UK. I will now turn the call to Francisco, who will take us through our financial results.

Thank you, Santiago, and good morning to everyone. Please turn to slide number four, where I will present our key financials for the first quarter of 2024. Revenue remains stable at $242.9 million compared with $242.5 million in the first quarter of 2023. The increase in revenue in our assets in North America was offset by the outage at Kachou that we mentioned last quarter. As a reminder, the plant restarted operations in mid-February And the damage and business interruption is covered by our insurance policy after a 60-day deductible. Adjusted EBITDA was $164.2 million, representing a 0.9% decrease compared with the same period last year, excluding the impact of the outreach at CACHU. Regarding cash available for distribution, we generated $50.9 million in the first quarter of 2024. On the following slide, number five, you could see our performance by geography and business sector. In North America, revenue increased 18% to $86.2 million in the first quarter of 2024 compared to the same period of last year. and EBITDA increased 6% to $55 million. Production increased in our solar assets in the U.S. In South America, both revenue and EBITDA increased 2% compared with the first three months of 2023, up to $44.7 million and $34.6 million, respectively, mainly due to inflation and the indexation mechanism in most of our contracts. In the Maya region, revenue decreased 11% to $112 million versus the same period of 2023, mostly due to the unscheduled outage at Kachou. Looking below at the results by business sectors, we can see similar effects. Let's now please turn to slide number six, where we will review our operational performance. Electricity produced by renewable assets reached 1,063 gigawatt hours in the first three months of 2024, a decrease of 11% versus the same period of 2023, mainly due to a decrease in CO2 and lower solar radiation in Spain. On the other hand, production in our solar assets in the U.S. increased by 16% thanks to better performance at Solana. Looking at our availability-based contracts, our efficient natural gas and heat segment, as well as our water assets and transmission lines, continue to achieve very high availability levels in the first quarter of 2024. On the next slide, number seven, we will take a look at our cash flow. In the first quarter of 2024, operating cash flow reached 65.6 million, an increase of 57% compared to the same period last year, mostly thanks to an improvement in changes in working capital. Net cash used in investing activities in the first quarter of 2024 includes 84.4 million of investments, corresponding to the acquisition of two operating wind assets in the United Kingdom, and approximately $22 million in investment in assets under construction development. I will now turn the call back over to Santiago.