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spk01: Good morning and welcome to the Otter Tail Corporation Quarter 1 2022 Earnings Conference Call. Today's call is being recorded and we will hold a question and answer session after the prepared remarks. I will now turn the call over to the company for their opening remarks.
spk03: Good morning everyone and welcome to our call. My name is Tyler Aikerman. I'm the Manager of Investor Relations at Otter Tail. Last night we announced our first quarter 2022 earnings results. Our complete earnings release and slides accompanying this call are available on our website at ottertail.com. A recording of the call will be available on our website later today. With me on the call today are Chuck McFarland, Otter Tail Corporation's President and CEO, and Kevin Moog, Otter Tail Corporation's Senior Vice President and Chief Financial Officer. Before we begin, I want to remind you that we will be making forward-looking statements during this call. As noted on slide two, these statements represent our current views and expectations of future events. They are subject to risks and uncertainties, which may cause actual results to differ from those presented here. So please be advised while placing undue reliance on any of these statements. Our forward-looking statements are described in more detail in our filings with the Securities and Exchange Commission, which we encourage you to review. Otter Tail Corporation disclaims any duty to update or revise our forward-looking statements due to new information, future events, developments, or otherwise. For opening remarks, I will now turn the call over to Otter Tail Corporation's President and CEO, Mr. Chuck McFarland.
spk06: Thank you, Tyler. Good morning and welcome to our first quarter 2022 earnings call. Thanks to the efforts of our employees, Otter Tail Corporation had record financial results in the first quarter of 2022. Please refer to slide four as I begin my comments on the first quarter results. We achieved earnings per share of $1.72, which is an increase of 136% over the first quarter of 2021. The increase was led by our plastic segment, which had another outstanding quarter. Kevin will provide more detailed discussion of our Q1 financial performance in his comments, but here's an overview. Our electric segment increased earnings by 1.6 million or 9.4% over Q1 2021. This was primarily due to the favorable impact of weather as well as increased commercial and industrial sales. Our manufacturing segment earnings decreased by 1.3 million from Q1 2021. The decrease was due to lower productivity and increased costs. Additionally, BTD customers have been taking less product than they have forecasted as they are experiencing supply chain constraints from other suppliers, which is impacting the demand they have for products from BTD. The plastic segment quarterly earnings increased $41.7 million over Q1 2021. The expected decline in resin and pipe prices did not materialize in the first quarter. ABC resin production and supply did improve slightly during this period. Resin prices are now expected to increase through July, driven by increased natural gas prices and a strong resin export market. We continue to grow Otter Tail Power through capital investments in generation, transmission, distribution, and technology projects. We are closely monitoring and tracking supply chain issues and inflationary pressures, which may impact all of our capital projects. As shown on slide 10, Otter Tail Power's Hoot Lake solar project is still on schedule to be completed in 2023. Construction of the 49-megawatt solar project is expected to begin in May of 2022 near and on the retired Hoot Lake coal plant property. There's been some inflationary pressure on freight and steel costs. We have contracted thin-film panels which are not subject to the current Department of Commerce circumvent review or forced labor allegations in China. The project costs are approved and to be recovered through the Minnesota Renewable Rider. Our investments in Hoot Lake Solar and those identified in our Integrated Resource Plan and other capital expenditure plans provide the opportunity to meet the carbon emission reduction and renewable energy goals and targets we have set. As shown on slide six, assuming forecast dispatch occurs, we are targeting to reduce carbon emissions from our own generation resources approximately 50% from 2005 levels by 2025 and 97% by 2050. Additionally, our owned and contracted energy generation will be more than 50% renewable by 2025. The high-performance crypto mining and related infrastructure solutions load Otter Tail Power announced last fall started to come online in the first quarter of 2022, which helped to contribute to the favorable first quarter the utility had. Otter Tail Power has established large, super large general service rates in Minnesota and North Dakota. Having these rates in place provides the sales team with another tool to attract large new load customers to our service territory. The sales team continues to work on adding new load from potential customers similar to the one announced last fall, as well as other commercial and industrial customers. Autotel Power's integrated resource plan, filed in September 2021, continues to move forward. The Minnesota Public Utilities Commission hearing on the IRP is expected to be scheduled during Q3 of 2022. As shown on slide 12, the preferred five-year plan requests authority to add dual fuel capability at Astoria Station, add 150 megawatts of solar at a yet-to-be-determined site, and to commence the process of withdrawing from our 35% ownership interest in the coal-fired Coyote Station generating plant. As reflected on slide 15, we are projecting a 5.9% annual rate-based growth over the 2021 to 2026 timeframe. From 2022 to 2026, Ottertail Power is forecasting capital expenditures of $978 million. Rider recovery is expected for nearly half of the forecast capital spend. As shown on slide 18, Otter Tail Power has maintained lower rates than the national average. Otter Tail Power continues to monitor fuel costs and works to provide low-cost generation for its customers through its own generation fleet, as well as market purchases. Turning to our manufacturing segment, BTD, our contract metal fabricator, was challenged to adjust production to meet the changing OEM customers' delivery requirements caused by supply chain issues they are experiencing. These adjustments resulted in reductions in production efficiencies. Steel prices peaked in the fourth quarter of 2021, and they remain high. Even though there were some price declines early in the first quarter of 2022, prices increased in March. We remain focused on receiving material on time to meet customer demand and passing through these higher steel prices to customers. Teoplastics had increased sales prices and volumes due to strong horticulture sector sales, which led to increased operating revenues. Our plastic segment continues to deliver extraordinary results. The market conditions in Q4 2021 continued into the first quarter of 2022, with demand for PVC pipe remaining strong. Sales prices continued to increase related to strong demand for PVC pipe and limited PVC pipe inventories. We continue to monitor the current inflationary environment and its impact on our business. We are focused on improving the pricing of our products, the pass-through of pricing surcharges where appropriate, managing labor, operating, and maintenance expenses, and updating capital budgets in light of increasing construction and equipment costs. I'll now turn it over to Kevin to provide additional detail on our financial performance for the first quarter.
spk08: Kevin O' Thanks, Chuck, and good morning, everyone. We had a great first quarter with consolidated revenues up 43 percent and net earnings up 137 percent, which primarily were driven by the plastic segment. Our electric segment is a well-run, fully integrated electric utility with a growing rate base that is expected to provide continued earnings growth with supportive regulatory environments and a demonstrated ability to successfully execute on large-scale capital projects. Our manufacturing and plastic segments provide additional earnings growth and are well-positioned for the future. The additional earnings and cash flows generated by the plastic segment in 2021 and expected to be generated in 2022 provide additional strength to our already strong credit metrics, liquidity, and capital structure. Our operating cash flows and the liquidity available under our credit facilities provide us additional opportunities to invest in our businesses. Examples of this are a $20 million discretionary contribution made to our pension plan in February. We acquired land in the fourth quarter of 2021 adjacent to our vinyl tech facility. This will allow us to execute on a potential facility expansion to improve plant operations and logistics and increase plant capacity. We currently expect the cost of this project to be up to $50 million for Phase I and an additional $7 million for a Phase II expansion. The Phase II expansion would be outside the current five-year CAPEX plan. Phase I would add one extrusion line, which would increase our plant capacity by 26 million pounds, and Phase II would add another extrusion line, further expanding capacity by an additional 26 million pounds. We are also exploring additional capacity expansion at our BTD Dawsonville, Georgia facility to support continued organic growth opportunities with OEM customers served from that location and eliminate our current offsite leased warehouse. We also expect to have additional transmission investment opportunities up to $250 million, a majority of which is outside the current five-year capital plan. Slide 27 reflects availability under our lines of credit as well as our credit ratings for Otter Tail Corporation and Otter Tail Power Company. Standard & Poor's did revise its outlook for Otter Tail Corporation from negative to stable during the first quarter. And as shown on slide 29, our five-year financing plan calls for the issuance of long-term debt to primarily support the electric segment's rate-based growth. and there's no need for any external equity in the financing plan. Please refer to slide 26 as I provide an overview of our first quarter 2022 segment earnings. The electric segment net earnings increased $1.6 million, or 9.4%, over the first quarter of 2021. The increase in earnings was primarily driven by the favorable impact of weather in the first quarter of 2022, as well as increased retail sales volumes from commercial and industrial customers. These items were offset by higher O&M costs related to an increase in operating costs from Maricourt and Astoria Station. Both facilities were fully operational in the first quarter of 2022 compared to 2021 when they were still ramping up from recently going into service. Increased incentive compensation costs related to current year financial and operational performance. Increased travel costs resulting from the East COVID restrictions. An increase in insurance costs and depreciation and amortization expense also increased due to a story of station being placed in service in February of 2021. Net earnings for the manufacturing segment decreased $1.3 compared with the first quarter of 2021. The reduction in earnings resulted from a 5% decline in sales volumes at BTD as a result of our customers delaying or adjusting shipments in response to supply chain challenges they are experiencing from other suppliers. Gross profit margins were negatively impacted by lower productivity and increased costs. The unpredictable customer demand created some labor challenges, which led to lower production efficiency. We did experience an increase in operating revenues related to higher steel prices, which were passed through to our customers. Teoplastics also contributed to the growth in segment operating revenues. This was primarily due to improved product pricing and sales volumes. However, the increase in operating revenues was partially offset by lower gross margins due to the impacts of product mix and increased maintenance and freight costs. Net earnings from the plastic segment increased $41.7 million compared to the first quarter of 2021. The higher net earnings resulted from improved sales prices of PVC pipe compared with the first quarter of 2021. The increased sales prices exceeded increases in the cost of PVC resin. Continued strong demand for PVC pipe products and limited PVC pipe inventories supported the rising sales prices. These conditions were a continuation of the market dynamics experienced throughout 2021. Additionally, the industry dealt with supply constraints of additives and other ingredients used to make PVC pipe. This prevented us and competitors from being able to build inventory levels. The expected declines in the price of PVC resin in the first quarter of 2021 did not materialize, and resin prices started to increase in March due to increasing feedstock prices and stronger than expected export markets. Our corporate costs increased primarily due to higher employee benefit costs in the first quarter of 2022. Our business outlook on slide 29 reflects a 2022 earnings per share range of $5.15 to $5.45 compared to the $3.78 to $4.08 we previously issued. The midpoint of the revised guidance is $5.30 a share, which reflects a 25% growth rate from our 2021 diluted earnings per share of $4.23. We are maintaining our February 14, 2022 guidance for our electric and manufacturing segment, but we are increasing our plastic segment guidance and adjusting our corporate cost center guidance. We are now expecting our 2022 net income from the plastic segment to be higher than 2021. As mentioned, the first quarter of 2022 performed ahead of our plans, as market conditions from the fourth quarter of 2021 continued into 2022. While PVC resin supplies improved, the price of PVC resin is now increasing, driven by increased natural gas prices and the events related to the Russia-Ukraine conflict, which have resulted in increasing global resin prices. This has created an environment for US resin producers to raise domestic prices arising from strengthening export markets for PVC resin. There have been supply constraints related to additives and other ingredients used to make PVC pipe. This has prevented the PVC pipe manufacturers from being able to build inventories. The demand for PVC pipe continues to be strong, resulting in sales prices of PVC pipe continuing to increase. The updated guidance still reflects lower volume of pounds of pipes sold in 2022, driven by the extremely low levels of finished goods inventory at the beginning of the year and the inability to build inventory levels during the first quarter. We currently expect the market conditions being experienced to continue through the second quarter of 2022. Resin prices are currently expected to decrease after July. Given this and concerns over general economic conditions, we expect the last half of 2022 to see a decline in profitability as compared with the first half of the year. But we could see further upside to our current year earnings guidance should the market conditions should the current market conditions continue beyond the first half of 2022. Our corporate costs are now expected to increase in 2022, driven by higher incentive compensation costs resulting from our strong financial performance and expected contribution to our foundation of $3 million, which is consistent with the 2021 contribution. We also expect to have lower gains on our investments in 2022 as compared with 2021. Our 2021 earnings mix was 59% from our manufacturing platform and is now expected to be 65% in 2022. This changed from our long-term goal of 70% electric and 30% manufacturing platform to continues to be driven by our plastic segment and the unique market conditions in 2021 and 2022. We currently expect to see a higher level of earnings from our manufacturing platform into 2023. We then expect a higher level of earnings to be generated from our electric segment thereafter. As shown on slide 33, we expect to deliver total shareholder return of 8% to 10% over the long term consisting of a 5% to 7% compounded annual growth rate in earnings per share, using 2020 as the base year, along with our current dividend yield. Looking forward, we would expect to grow the dividend consistent with our long-term earnings per share growth rate of 5% to 7%. Our business model continues to serve us well, and we remain positioned to fund our rate-based growth opportunities at the utility with our strong balance sheet ample liquidity to support our businesses and strong investment-grade corporate credit ratings. We are now ready to take your questions.
spk01: Thank you. Ladies and gentlemen, if you have a question, please press star then 1 on your touchtone telephone. If your question has been answered or you wish to remove yourself from the queue, please press the pound key. We have the first question comes from the line of Chris Ellinghouse of Cyberg Williams. Your line is now open. You may ask your question.
spk07: Hey guys, how are you? Chris. Chuck, can you talk about the PVC expansion that you have in the works? What goes into that first phase? What are the common elements that make that much more expensive than the second phase? Sure.
spk06: The first phase Consideration is we had to buy additional land. We're approximately doubling the acreage we have at the existing site. And a lot of the costs for a second facility and other upgrades that we're going to make at the facility, even without capacity expansion, will be included in that first So, you know, the second phase has much fewer just really the line production of a new line with all the other infrastructure being in place already.
spk07: Okay. Chuck, can you also talk about the equity build that you're getting from this extraordinary PVC profitability? Can you just sort of talk about what your thoughts are and what you might use that for?
spk06: Sure. We've made contributions to our pension plan. We're going to use it to facilitate organic growth in both the utility and the manufacturing businesses to date, and we're continuing to look at and other alternatives or options for that cash.
spk07: As far as your outlook for the second half of the year for plastics, obviously we've got some extreme inflation and energy prices at the moment, but what is it that you see on the horizon that would make you think that the world supply-demand dynamics would change very much in the second half of the year?
spk06: Well, I think we just see the increase in interest rates potentially putting some pressure on housing starts or new home construction. We haven't seen that to date. We do think that the supply chain issues that really drove the The shortages of first resin and now additives and other things are there. The global supply, the export, as you can imagine, energy costs in Europe to make resin have gone up significantly, and so the value proposition of buying it from the U.S. has moved up, and that's driving overall PVC resin costs up, depending on... how the conflict, whether it continues or how the energy balance in Europe plays out, I think could impact that going forward in the second half of the year.
spk08: In case I would add to that, Chris, this is Kevin, that the current view from chemical data, the industry source that forecasts, resin prices, that they're now forecasting that resin prices are going to start to decline after July. That usually is an indication that we'll see sales prices start to decline as well. So that's the current view. That's baked into our thinking. Obviously, in this world we're in, that could change, but that's a factor we're looking at as well.
spk07: Okay. For BTD, you know, are you looking for improvement in your OEM demand? Does their supply constraints improve throughout the year? Is that your basic outlook?
spk08: Yes. Yep.
spk07: Is there, I guess, a similar type question? What is it that gives you confidence in that throughout the year since we, you know, you have China has... significant lockdowns and there's not much shipping taking place there. So what is it that makes you think that supply constraints aren't going to continue for a while?
spk08: Well, we've started to see some improvements in the supply chain in our customers from some of their other suppliers. And so based on that, some of the conversations our folks are having with our customers, there looks to be Over the next rest of the year, some loosening up of the supply chain. In terms of current performance here, we're seeing some of that as our sales production here in the second quarter has been improving. So there's some indicators. While it's certainly a risk still for the year, we're starting to see some things that indicate that there's improvement in that piece of the supply chain.
spk07: Would you not also expect that higher interest rates, and you mentioned the rising steel prices, having some price sensitivity for customers in some of those end markets as well?
spk08: Yeah, I mean, we're looking at, you know, clearly rising interest rates, you know, and the inflation certainly are, you would think wouldn't bode well for the consumer. The consumer's balance sheets, however, are still pretty healthy. Their savings rates are strong. There is a fair amount of backlog built up at the OEMs, particularly at Polaris for recreational vehicle equipment, and that pull-through or customers continue to to buy that product when it becomes available to them. So, yeah, it's a risk. We're certainly watching it and considering it in our kind of forecasts. But as we look today, you know, based on affirming the guidance, you know, reaffirming the guidance for the segment, we think that, you know, there's going to continue to be that kind of pull through as supply chains improve. The consumer is still pretty healthy, but we're watching it. It's a risk that we watch and monitor, but we're thinking for 2022, we're still seeing pretty good customer purchase of product when that product becomes available at our customers.
spk07: Do they still, I assume, also have some limited inventories as well that they need to replenish?
spk08: Yes.
spk07: Okay. And one last thing, the tax benefit, three cents, what was that about?
spk08: Well, the tax benefit for corporate is what you're referring to?
spk07: Yeah, yeah.
spk08: Yeah, so when we look at our budgeted or forecasted effective tax rates, What happened was we were asking the utility to, you know, kind of based on their level of earnings, book an effective tax rate. Our manufacturing companies are booking it as if they're on a standalone basis, the effective tax rate. And then when we prepared our consolidated tax return or, sorry, consolidated tax provision here at the first quarter, of course, we had a much higher level of earnings than across the organization, which then resulted in a larger benefit on a consolidated basis coming through on the effective tax rate.
spk07: Gotcha. Okay. Thank you very much. Appreciate the color, guys.
spk01: Yep. Thank you. We have the next question comes from the line of Tim Winter of Gabelli. Your line is now open. You may ask a question.
spk05: Congratulations, guys, on another extraordinary quarter. I guess I'm going to have to learn a little bit more about the PVC business. And on that note, can you maybe talk a little bit about the landscape of the PVC business? Where does Vinyl Tech and Northern Pipe fit into the overall size and scale of that market? And then more importantly, what are some of the opportunities that this environment is presenting for your company, meaning can they consolidate smaller companies, or are there larger companies that are interested in Northern Pipe or vinyl tech?
spk08: Yeah, Tim, thanks for the comments, and this is Kevin. There are, certainly as we look across the landscape of competitors, we're probably in the upper half of the competition, in terms of capacity size. There's a number of smaller players out there. We certainly look at those competitors in terms of size and capabilities. There hasn't been much of a fit for us just because of the geographic locations that don't necessarily make sense for us to look at and what we know about those parts of the country and kind of the business those competitors would play. And there is larger competitors out there that certainly probably are seeing our performance and looking at that and potentially could have interest in it, nothing that we're certainly aware of today. But that's always certainly a possibility that could be out there, because there are a couple of larger publicly traded businesses in the space that have expressed interest in growing their business, and certainly that could be, at some point in time, there could be a knock on the door, but nothing that we could certainly have seen to date.
spk06: Maybe from a, you started with a question on the overall size, and we break it into rigid pipe area for the U.S., which includes electrical conduit, and it's PVC. But in that space, we're probably 8% to 10% of the market of total pounds of PVC. PVC pipe, which again includes this component of electric conduit in addition to water and wastewater and home PVC vent piping and those types of things.
spk05: Okay. Thanks for that.
spk08: Yeah, Tim, this is a little bit of a repeat of my earning script comments, but in terms of an opportunity that we're looking at is just the expansion, the organic expansion of vinyl tech in Phoenix. We did buy that land in the fourth quarter of 21 adjacent to the facility, and now we're looking at further expansion of the property through an upgrade to our existing office space and facilities as well as an additional extrusion line so that That's an organic opportunity for us here that we're working on.
spk05: Okay. And just two follow-up questions to that. One is, is the potential capital for the expansion, is that in the table on slide 31, or is it not included yet?
spk08: No, Tim, that would be in there. The phase two piece, of course, wouldn't be in there because that's outside the the five-year plan, but the phase one is predominantly covered in the current five-year plan.
spk05: Okay. Okay, and then can you just remind me how you guys consider your portfolio of businesses? I believe you have an annual review process, or is there something more frequent than that?
spk06: No. Tim, this is Chuck. We have an annual review process, which we are in in balled in now it will occur over the next several months and we look at we look at our business mix we look at our portfolio criteria we look at you know some of the parts and evaluate the value of each independent business at that time so
spk05: Okay, great. Well, again, congratulations. Extraordinary numbers. Thanks. Thank you.
spk01: Thank you. Next question, we have the line of Sophie Karp of KeyBank. Your line is now open. You may ask your question.
spk02: Hi, guys.
spk01: Good morning.
spk02: Congrats on the quarter. Thanks, Sophie.
spk08: Thanks, Sophie.
spk02: So on this PVC situation, I guess for those of us not in the chemical space, could you provide a little bit more color on what's causing particularly the spread expanding, right? So I think we kind of get the commodity situation, like gas and such, right? But specifically the spread. So the resin price can go up and down, but you've seen this extraordinary expansion of spread to PVC price. So What kind of dynamic in the value chain is driving that, and why do you expect that to change when commodity pricing comes down? I guess that's my first question.
spk08: Sophie, Kevin, I'll start with that. I think what we're seeing in terms of this extraordinary increase in sales prices is it's the demand that has been driving it. If you look back to when these resin shortages started back in February of February of 21 when we had the severe cold weather snap in the country and the resin manufacturers declared force majeure and put constraints on resin supply. Well, the demand never went away and that started to drive sales prices for the PVC pipe up and it just continued throughout and was even further exacerbated by the Hurricane Ida, which kind of restarted another concern over supply. And while us and PVC pipe competitors were certainly getting resin, the demand was so strong that sales prices just continued to move up. and that just continued through 21. We expected those conditions to continue into the first quarter of 22. A new piece of supply chain challenges popped up in the first quarter with these additives, particularly tin stabilizer. which is used in the manufacturing process, and it helps to prevent the pipe from discoloring. There was a shortage of tin stabilizer in the first quarter, and then that caused, you know, couldn't really make as much PVC pipe with the tin stabilizer shortage. Still, demand is strong. Sales prices continue to move up. PVC pipe converters like ourselves were able to find an alternative product in replacement of the tin stabilizer. That product is accepted to make PVC pipe in terms of specifications. It does slow the production capacity of the lines down somewhat based on the nature of the product, and so it continued to prevent converters from building more inventories and the end users continue to have a strong demand for the product to continue to build their projects that they're working on, and that has just continued to drive up the sales prices here through the first quarter and our visibility into the second quarter. The reason we expect that with starting to see a forecasted decline in resin prices after July is historically as resin prices start to decline, so do sales prices because the end users, the distributors, and then the construction contractors that are using the pipe recognize that there's a decline in raw material prices and would expect to see then sales prices decline as well. And so history, that has proven to be true throughout and that's what we're expecting based on the information we have today, could happen in the last half of the year.
spk02: I think it's very helpful, Collar. I appreciate it. So basically what you're saying is that there's a lot of pent-up demand for a final product plus additional material supply challenges that kind of drive in this shortage of the end product when the commodity resin is basically more available right now. So if we entertain this thought, right, I'm just kind of curious if you've given any thought to the situation where maybe this dislocation becomes somewhat sticky, right, to the upside, and the relative size of your manufacturing platform business is therefore exceeds your target 30% for a longer period of time. How comfortable are you with that situation? And what are your thoughts around that?
spk08: As Sophie and Kevin again, we are, Chuck mentioned the portfolio review process we're going through. We're in the midst of our strategic planning process today and expect to continue that over the next couple months. We have our two-day planning session with our board in June. And we're looking at, as we're looking at our updated financial plans, there's certainly new market information that has recently come out from independent sources that follow the PVC pipe industry that starts to show that over the longer term we could expect to see stronger prices both on the resin side and on the sales side and kind of new information to us and we're taking all that into account in our updated financial plans to see what that looks like in terms of earnings mix going forward, and I think we'll be able to have a better view for you as a part of our second quarter earnings call once we get a chance to complete the strategic planning process, review that with the board, and see what this new industry information that's recently come out, how we think that affects us over the long term.
spk02: Good.
spk01: Thank you. That's all for me. Thank you. Again, if anyone would like to ask a question, please press star then 1 on your touchtone telephone. Again, that will be star 1 on your telephone keypad. We have the next question. It comes from the line of Brian Russo of Sidoti. Your line is now open. You may ask your question.
spk04: Yeah, hi. Good morning.
spk00: Good morning.
spk04: Hey, so when we look at, obviously, the meaningful outperformance of the plastics in the first quarter in your comments, Regarding the second half of 22 versus the first half of 22, just from, you know, a quarterly dispersion, should we kind of assume that the second quarter earnings and margins in plastics will match, you know, what you reported in the first quarter?
spk08: Yeah, Brian, this is Kevin. That's a fair assumption.
spk04: Mm-hmm. Okay, so then, you know, we could almost back in to what the second half of 2022 would look like, which would be maybe $40-plus million in earnings. And I'm trying to kind of triangulate, you know, what normalized, you know, full-year earnings might look like in plastics. And I think in 2020, the net income in plastics was $27 million. Are you kind of revisiting the $27 million of kind of a normalized, you know, market and, you know, in spreads for that business going forward? Or is that still, you know, something we should be mindful of when looking past the significant outperformance and unique market dynamics of 2022?
spk08: Yeah, Brian, Kevin, again, we are relooking at that. kind of longer-term view. Like I mentioned, we've started recently to see some new industry information coming out about views of where resin prices are kind of headed over the next five years, what impact that has on margins and sales prices. So we're starting to look at that, understand it, and as we're updating our kind of five-year financial plans here, how do we think that affects the earnings mix of the organization and what is that longer-term view of kind of what normalized earnings for plastics could be. So, yeah, we're telling you, I guess, I think we'll have more information for you sometime. We would expect to hopefully have a better update at the second quarter earnings call once we get a chance to put all this information together, get through our strategic planning process, review that with the Board, and expect to have further updates for you.
spk04: David Chambers- Okay. I guess this longer-term view has been contemplated in respects to your planned vinyl tech facility expansions, right? So, you clearly have a bullish view on the plastics market.
spk08: Yeah, that's, you know, we clearly have opportunity, you know, the southwest part of the country is a very, you know, extremely populated, extremely growing, lots of construction activity that happens in that part of the country, and we just think that there's, you know, some good opportunities, one, to just improve the plant operations and logistics and make that facility more efficient than it is today, but then we also have the opportunity to expand, you know, that With one extrusion line in the first phase, that's, you know, that 26 million pound extrusion line I referred to.
spk04: Okay. And then the reference to the 70-30 utility manufacturing mix, correct me if I'm wrong, but did you say that you won't return to that level in 2023, but that's the longer-term mix?
spk08: Well, what we said is we expect 2023 to continue to be stronger earnings mix towards the manufacturing platform, and that after that, we would expect to see the electric segment earnings return to a higher level of the percentage of total earnings, but we didn't give a specific percentage. Brian, and that's, again, what we're working through with this updated strategic plan and how that affects the financial performance plan and earnings mix going forward.
spk04: Understood. And then just lastly, on the regulated utility and the IRP, is there upward pressure on the dollar amount of investments you've included in your CapEx, you know, just based on, you know, supply chain issues and inflationary pressures?
spk06: Hi, Brian. This is Chuck. Yeah, we have put some, but we have not put in new numbers on potential increases in inflation on transmission or the solar installation in the out years. And so we've sort of locked up the numbers on The Hoot Lake Solar, which is the near-term projection. We've got all the major contracts in place, and we do have the inflation worked into those.
spk04: Okay, great. Thank you very much.
spk06: Thank you.
spk01: Thank you. I am showing no further questions at this time. I would now like to turn the conference back to Mr. Chuck Farlane, Autotails Corporation. President and CEO, sir.
spk06: Thank you for joining our call and for your interest in Otter Tail Corporation. With continued execution on our rate-based growth and efficiency improvement opportunities at the utility, an emphasis on operational and commercial performance at our manufacturing platform, we remain confident in our ability to deliver long-term shareholder value. Based on our strong first quarter performance and our updated view for the remainder of the year, We are raising our 2022 diluted earnings per share guidance to $5.15 to $5.45 from our previous guidance of $3.78 to $4.08. We appreciate your interest in Autotill Corporation, and we look forward to speaking with you next quarter.
spk01: Thank you, ladies and gentlemen. This concludes today's conference call. Thank you all for participating. You may now disconnect.
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