Xcel Energy Inc.

hello and welcome to the excel energy first quarter 2023 earnings conference call my name is george i'll be a coordinator for today's event please note this conference is being recorded and for the duration of the call your lives will be in the list only mode a question answer session will follow the prepared remarks and questions will only be taken from institutional investors and analysts reporters can contact media relations with inquiries and individual investors and others can reach out to Investor Relations. To register for a question, please press star 1 on your telephone keypad. If you require assistance at any point, please press star 0 and you will be connected to an operator. And now the hat off goes to Mr. Paul Johnson, Vice President, Treasurer, and Investor Relations to begin today's conference. Please go ahead, sir.

Thank you. Good morning and welcome to Xcel Energy's 2023 first quarter earnings call. Joining me today are Bob Frenzel, Chairman, President, and Chief Executive Officer, and Brian Van Abel, Executive Vice President and Chief Financial Officer. In addition, we have other members of the management team in the room to answer questions if needed. This morning, we will review our 23 first quarter results and highlights and share recent business developments. Slides that accompany today's call are available on our website. As a reminder, some of the comments made during today's call may contain forward-looking information. Significant factors that could cause results to differ from those anticipated are described in our earnings release and our SEC filings. Today we will discuss certain metrics that are non-GAAP measures. Information on the comparable GAAP measures and reconciliations are included in our earnings release. With that, I'll turn it over to Bob.

Thanks, Paul, and good morning, everyone. Let's start with our first quarter results. We had another solid financial quarter. recording earnings of 76 cents per share for 2023 compared to 70 cents per share in 2022. The increase in earnings largely reflects new revenue to recover our investments in clean energy and grid systems for the benefit of our customers. Our business plan is on track for the year, and as a result, we are reaffirming our 2023 earnings guidance of $3.30 to $3.40 per share. This quarter, we continue to make progress on our industry-leading clean energy transition plans. We've received and reviewed a significant number of proposals in our pending solicitations for nearly 6,000 megawatts of new electric generation across multiple jurisdictions. We anticipate commission decisions on these various proceedings in the second half of 23 and remain confident in our ability to deliver a beneficial mix of both company-owned and third-party resources across those plans. We also continue to pursue the benefits and opportunities provided by the Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act and the Inflation Reduction Act to accelerate the clean energy transition. We recently submitted multiple projects to the Department of Energy for funding consideration, including the multi-party Heartland and Western Interstate Hydrogen Hub and grid resilience investments in Colorado. In addition, we recently applied for DOE and venture capital grants for our long-duration energy storage proposals in Colorado and Minnesota and believe we are well-positioned to receive some or all of our requests. Our country and our company need new technologies like long-duration storage, like hydrogen and clean fuels to commercialize in order to realize a clean energy future. And at Xcel Energy, we are actively working to do our part for the regions and the customers that we serve. And while the promise of a clean energy future is bright, we are keenly aware of the financial challenges that some of our customers experience this winter with the significant rise in gas prices that we saw in 2022, driven by macroeconomic and geopolitical issues. Xcel Energy is proud of our long track record of keeping customer bills amongst the lowest in the country and to transition to a cleaner energy future with bill increases below the rate of inflation. We believe that affordability, reliability, and sustainability can be realized concurrently through thoughtful energy policy and excellent operations. We've taken a number of steps in recent years that have saved customers money and reduced exposure to commodity volatility. In our electric business, Xcel Energy's nearly 4,500 megawatts of owned wind farms continue to be a leader in capacity factor performance. and generated $1.1 billion of fuel-related customer benefits in 2022 and more than $3 billion since 2017. Future investments in renewable generation and clean fuels will continue to reduce our reliance on fossil fuels and add further benefits to our customers. Since 2014, we've kept our operating and maintenance expenses nearly flat and well below inflation through our continuous improvement programs. which is a benefit that accrues to our customers' bills. Our numerous energy efficiency and demand management programs have saved enough energy to avoid building approximately 25 average-sized power plants. And in 2022, we dispersed a record $216 million in state and federal payment assistance funds to customers across our states, and we expect to exceed that record in 2023. Also, in partnership with the Colorado staff, the Colorado Energy Office, Energy Outreach Colorado, and the Utility Consumer Advocate, we proposed to the Commission to increase funding to support income-qualified customers burdened by high energy costs. We expect to provide those increased benefits to our customers throughout 2023 and beyond. And with recent declines in natural gas prices, we proactively lowered our gas recovery mechanism in Colorado four times reducing customers' gas costs by 58%. Our customers in our other states are seeing comparable benefits. In Colorado, we've been working with stakeholders on proposed legislation regarding customer affordability, rate stability, and the regulatory process. And finally, in addition to our energy efficiency programs, we are re-looking at potential long-term solutions to reduce price volatility that could include physical and financial hedging, additional natural gas storage, long-term natural gas supply contracts, multi-year rate plans, natural gas cost deferrals, energy decoupling, and the use of renewable energy to generate clean fuels for blending in the natural gas LDC. We are confident that if implemented, these actions can help reduce natural gas volatility in the future for our customers. As I wrap up, I'm pleased to share some of the company's recent recognitions. For the 10th year in a row, we've been honored as one of the world's most admired companies by Fortune magazine. We ranked first in social responsibility and quality of management, placing second overall amongst the most admired electric and gas companies in the country. In addition, for the fourth year in a row, Xcel Energy has been named one of the world's most ethical companies by Ethisphere, a global leader in defining and advancing the standards of ethical business practices. None of this would be possible without the commitment of our employees, contractors, and our partners. And while we're proud of our track record and our accolades, we will never rest on our mission to provide our customers with safe, clean, reliable energy services at a competitive price.

With that, I'll turn it over to Brian. Thanks, Bob, and good morning, everyone. We had another solid quarter. reporting earnings of $0.76 per share for the first quarter of 2023, compared with $0.70 per share in 2022. The most significant earnings drivers for the quarter included the following. Higher electric and natural gas revenues increased earnings by $0.24 per share, reflecting new revenue to recover investments in our electric and natural gas systems and clean energy infrastructure. A lower effective tax rate increased earnings by $0.02 per share. But keep in mind, production tax credits lower the ETR However, PTCs are flowed back to customers through lower electric margin and are largely earnings neutral. In addition, other items combine to increase earnings by $0.01 per share. Offsetting these positive drivers were increased depreciation expense, which reduced earnings by $0.08 per share, reflecting our capital investment program, higher O&M expense, which decreased earnings by $0.06 per share, and higher interest expense and other taxes, which decreased earnings by $0.07 per share. Turning to sales, weather-adjusted electric sales increased by 0.6% for the first three months of 2023. We continue to expect annual electric sales growth of approximately 1% in 2023, driven by C&I sales, while we expect residential sales to be down slightly for the year. O&M expenses increased $48 million for the first quarter. The increase was primarily due to timing differences associated with regulatory recovery mechanisms, generation outages in emergent work, inflationary pressures, and investments in electric vehicle programs and other customer products. We continue to expect O&M to decrease approximately 2% in 2023 compared with last year. We've also made progress on a number of regulatory proceedings. The Commission recently approved our settlement in the Minnesota natural gas rate case, which reflects a rate increase of $21 million, an ROE of 9.57%, an equity ratio of 52.5%, and a decoupling mechanism and property tax tracker. In the Minnesota electric case, we received a constructive ALJ recommendation, including a 9.87% ROE and a 52.5% equity ratio. We anticipate a commission decision in June and final rates implemented in the fall. During the quarter, we filed a Texas electric rate case seeking a rate increase of $158 million based on an ROE of 10.65%, an equity ratio of 54.6%, historic test year in the early retirement of the Toll Coal plant. We anticipate a commissioned decision and implementation of final rates in the first quarter of 2024. Our electric rate case in Colorado is early in the process. Intervenor recommendations are due in May and we'll see if there's a potential to reach a settlement with parties. A commissioned decision and implementation of final rates are expected in the fall. In our New Mexico electric rate case, intervenors filed initial testimony. The staff recommended a forward test year with a rate increase of $37 million based on an ROE of 9.35% and an equity ratio of 54.7%. Other intervenors recommended equity ratios in the ranges of 45% to 54.7% and ROEs between 8.7% to 9.6%. We anticipate a decision later in the year. Finally, later this month we'll file a rate case in Wisconsin seeking an electric rate increase of approximately $40 million and a natural gas rate increase of approximately $9 million, based on a 10.25% ROE, a 52.5% equity ratio, and a 2024 future test year. We expect the Commission to decide on the case before year-end with new rates in effect in January. Details on these cases are included in our earnings release. We are reaffirming our 2023 earnings guidance range of $3.30 to $3.40 per share, which is consistent with our long-term EPS growth objective of 5% to 7%. We've updated our key assumptions to reflect the latest information, which are detailed in our earnings release. With that, I'll wrap up with a quick summary. Our customers continue to have some of the lowest bills in the country. We remain committed to keeping long-term bill growth below the rate of inflation while leading the clean energy transition and reducing customer exposure to volatility in fossil fuel prices. We continue to achieve constructive regulatory outcomes across our operating companies with progress across multiple rate cases. We have received a significant number of generation bids in response to our RFPs, with additional RFPs forthcoming. We are reaffirming our 2023 earnings guidance, and we remain confident we continue to deliver long-term earnings and dividend growth within the upper half of our 5% to 7% objective range as we lead the clean energy transition. This concludes our prepared remarks. Operator, we will now take questions.

Thank you very much, sir. Ladies and gentlemen, if you would like to ask an audio question, please press star 1 on your telephone keypad. This first question is coming from Julian Dumoulin-Smith of Bank of America. Please go ahead. Your line is open.

Hey, good morning, team. Thank you guys for the time. Appreciate it. Look, I wanted to talk about the proposed legislation and just efforts in Colorado to address affordability. Obviously, a lot of different comments out there. Can you set a little bit of your thoughts out there as to what the key tools and mechanisms and avenues that exist out there and then ultimately how to address some of the recovery issues and some of the perception issues?

yeah hey good morning julian good to hear your voice on a thursday morning um so we've been appreciate your question look as i think about legislation in colorado that got introduced last week pretty late in the session we've been very keenly aware as i said my prepared remarks around the impacts to our customers from the volatility in natural gas prices that occurred you know largely last year and the declines that we've seen this year We've taken a lot of steps, both on the communication side and on the price mitigation side, to assist there, and obviously more to do. The legislation itself, as proposed, was introduced in the Senate, and with the idea that we look at both price and price volatility that we saw over the past year, really with the benefit of our customers in mind, requires the company and the PUC, and again, this is still in It was approved by the Senate, I believe, yesterday, and it's going to go to the House maybe today or tomorrow, but it requires the company and the PUC to look at all the mechanisms that can be helpful for our customers on price and price volatility. As I think about it, I think it provides tools on both the front end and the back end of the gas procurement cycle. So think on the front end, hedging and hedging tools, rethinking about long-term storage, physical and financial hedging and things like that on the front end of the cycle. The legislation also takes a look at the back end of the cycle. In the event that there are price volatility that exceeds a forecast, then we look at mechanisms for deferrals so that it may not be felt immediately in the pocketbooks of our customers. And I think those mechanisms, much to be determined in the regulatory process, but the legislation contemplates those mechanisms being very beneficial to mitigate the volatility that we saw over the past year. I think the third piece of the legislation looks at something we've been already working practically with the Commission on, which is an incentive mechanism that provides an incentive to the company to meet or beat gas price forecasts and manage the volatility for our customers. Again, lots of details that have to get worked through the regulatory process, but on balance, the intention is to really protect customers from the volatility we saw over the last year with regulatory mechanisms.

Yeah, I hear you on that front. And then ultimately, as you think about this, I mean, just on the electric business, I mean, does this change anything in terms of procurement? Obviously, that could feed into some of those conversations, and they're related on the gas side. Any initial thoughts as to what this could mean from a financial perspective? It may be too early.

Yeah, look, I think on the gas procurement side, it applied to procurement for both the electric and the gas business. You know, more broadly speaking, it also looks at – it asked us to do a cost causation study around gas LDC customers and, you know, how we make future long-term investments into the gas system – allows for some distributed energy resources and the ability to add those to our systems, maybe in a more expeditious manner. So there's some factors like that in the electric and gas, probably a little too early to say, you know, what the long-term implications on our capital forecasting are in the state, but I don't think it'll be necessarily material in totality.

Yeah, and Julian, I would just add, you know, we're scheduled to file a clean heat plan in Colorado in August, which is really, I equate that to call it a resource planning process on the electric side. So really working through with our commissioners and stakeholders is how do we do decarbonize the LDC? You know, we have legislation with targets in 2030 and then a net zero target longer term. So we're looking forward to working with all our stakeholders about how we decarbonize our LDC and think that's a real opportunity as we put plans in place for the longer term.

excellent guys i'll leave it there appreciate it good luck thank you well thank you very much sir our next question will be coming from durgesh chopra coming from evercore isa please go ahead uh hey team good morning thanks for the update um uh i just what just wanted to i was going to ask you a question in colorado which you just answered but just maybe Can we get an update on the tax credits transferability? You have, what, $1.8 billion in the plan that is going to come from the tax credit transferability through 2027. Maybe just update us on your efforts there. And then can you remind us, I think you've disclosed this in the past, what are you assuming in terms of funds from that activity this year?

Thank you. Hey, Durgash. Thanks for the question. Something we're very focused on, not only transferability guidance, but guidance for the other aspects of the IRA. But specific to transferability, on the guidance, we expect guidance to be issued in Q2 for transferability. And for us, we're looking for fairly straightforward guidance. We're called clean, no pun intended, a clean seller of these tax credits. They're from wind farms that have already been in service. And so we're looking for documentation and the certification requirements, terms of sale, registration requirements, so pretty basic stuff. So that's really what we're looking for out of the guidance from the IRS. The other aspect is we've talked to about 20 counterparties already, and there is a significant amount of interest in the purchases of our tax credits, not only this year, but for a longer term. So we're pretty confident in terms of our ability to execute on this at a good price for our customers. And so I think about this, we get guidance in Q2, I would expect us to start executing in Q3. And this year we took a pretty conservative approach. We only expected to sell about $200 million of tax credits in our financing plan. That's about half of what we could sell this year. And then we'd assume we'd sell the remainder of it in the year after. But that's kind of our view on transferability and I think is a great mechanism as we think about the longer term

costs of renewable projects and how we can be the most tax efficient with those tax credits got it and then just how will you announce like as you sell these tax credits is that just going to be in your back half of the year earnings calls or are there going to be you know depending on how sizable these are uh other sort of 8k type announcements any

No, I think we just included in our quarterly earnings calls. Obviously, there may be, you know, depending on the counterparty, they may want to make some announcement about it. If they're thinking about how they're thinking about their supporting the clean energy transition, but other counterparties may not want to. But the expectation would be in our quarterly earnings calls.

Thank you, Brian. Much appreciated.

Thank you, sir. We'll now take questions from David Arcaro from Morgan Stanley. Please go ahead.

Hey, thanks so much for taking my question. Good morning. I was wondering if you could comment a little bit on what you're seeing in the RFPs that you've got outstanding right now, how Excel is competing, and if you're seeing costs increase or decrease just in terms of inflationary pressures or if some of these project proposals are coming in at more attractive prices.

David, thanks for the question. So still working through the RFP processes and I can comment on Colorado cause we made a, what we call a 30 day filing in Colorado that talked about the median prices that we've seen incredible amount of interest in the projects, uh, and in, in the bid process on the wind side, the median price was about $22 from an LCOE perspective. and if you think about that that's if we didn't have ira and you didn't have any tax credits i'd probably be closer closer to 50 so a really great opportunity from a customer savings perspective with the ira and what we're seeing now that's slightly above the rfp that we did five years ago as you can see in some inflationary pressures on capex on the solar side the median price is about $33. Now I'm giving you a median price. We have not disclosed the project portfolio that will happen in August when we, when we make our filing and with our recommended portfolio to the commission. But overall, you think our project portfolio will come in well below those median prices that we've stated. So overall, I think we, you know, we've set ourselves up well with the number of bids we put in from a self-built perspective. You know, we've been at this game for a long time from the wind side and, and, Now we've proven with Sherco Solar and the price point we've delivered Sherco Solar that we can be very competitive. So I think overall we're excited about getting these RFPs. I talked about Colorado because that's the one that we've at least shared some information. Minnesota, expect a filing from us here in May. on the Minnesota RFP and then on the SPS RFP, expect a filing in Q3. So we will give everyone kind of full transparency and visibility into the opportunities later in this year. But I would say overall, we're pretty excited and excited to execute on some of these wind and solar and storage projects for the benefit of our customers.

Okay, got it. Great. Thanks. And then could you also Give any more color just related to the water leak at the Monticello plant. What was the cost of the repair? I'm curious if you see any broader or more significant issues that popped up in just in inspecting it, and then what's the status of the plant now and when it would be coming back online?

Hey, David, it's Bob. Thanks for the question. As we think about the water leak at Monticello, you know, the repair costs were not significant. We, as we said in our releases, we have, you know, contained the leak, repaired the pipe, are in the process of removing the water from the aquifer below the plants. There was no risk to people or planet in the process. We're about halfway, close to halfway through that water removal. Expect to finish it probably end of this year, early next. So not a material increase in the cost side. It's really about pumping water out of the plants. The plant's in planned shutdown for refueling. We do refueling at Monticello every two years. And I expect they probably have two more weeks before they finish loading fuel and restarting the plant. But it is ready to go.

Okay, great. Thanks so much.

Thank you very much, sir. We'll now take questions from Jeremy Tonnet of JP Morgan. Please go ahead.

Hi, good morning. Hey, Jeremy. Just wanted to pivot to Minnesota a little bit, if you could, and didn't know if you could share any other thoughts with regards to remaining priorities out of Minnesota Electric ALJ recommendation there. Are there any particular points to address in the final stages of this rate case from your perspective?

Sure. Now, look, I appreciate the question. The process really continues. Since we last got together, we filed our, the ALJ filed their recommendations at the end of March. We certainly didn't get all that we asked for in the ALJ filing, but, you know, as litigation goes, that's not atypical for the process. We'll file some exceptions and some things that, you know, the ALJ recommended we take up in a future proceeding. or have the commission take up. I wouldn't say it's terribly material on the exception side. You know, we haven't had a general rate case since 2016 prosecuted in the state on the electric side. And so we think that the recommendation from the ALJ was pretty thoughtful for all sides of the arguments and expect the commission to look at the ALJ's recommendation as well as Some of the mitigation mechanisms that we put in place as a company to mitigate the impacts to customers for having been out for a long time. Commission will take it up in probably early June, and we expect a decision by the end of the second quarter.

Got it. Thank you for that. And then just kind of pivoting towards MISO, just as far as Trunch 2 is concerned, what are you hearing there? Are there any updated thoughts from your side? What are current time expectations for initial thoughts on CAPEX potential there?

Yeah, thanks for the question, Jeremy. You know, I think we're thinking about it right now, and obviously this is a little bit of a moving target with MISO, but we're thinking of an announcement in the first part of next year. But like I said, that has the potential to shift, as we've seen. um and and we're expecting kind of the next tranche or tranche two to be as as big at least as tranche one potentially bigger and as we think about it we'd expect a similar share as we received in tranche one so that's where our thoughts are today um but obviously working with my so and the stakeholders as they move through the process got it that's helpful uh last one for me just

Didn't know if you might be able to elaborate a little bit more on the hydrogen hubs now that the applications are in. Just any incremental thoughts you could share with us would be great.

Yeah, hey, it's Bob. Thanks for the question. Look, I think as we think about the future and the future of hydrogen, I think the country really needs, as we think about decarbonization across the economy, why we need a clean molecule. for some of those harder to decarbonize sectors. And hydrogen appears to be the most versatile of the clean energy molecules that we've been looking at. Certainly the Department of Energy supports that through the Hydrogen Hub programs and in the IIJA. So we're excited about the application process. We expect decisions by end of year, where then we would go into future proposals around around the proceedings um so we have two one in the rocky mountain region one in the upper midwest region both are consortiums with our multiple states and both involve you know the goal of creating what i think about is an ecosystem of both producers and users of a clean molecule like hydrogen and whether that can then be converted into you know fertilizer for ag process heat, burning for process heat, and from our perspective, blending into the distribution system and co-firing in our existing natural gas plants. So we're excited around the versatility that the molecule provides. We appreciate what Congress and DOE are doing, and we look forward to progressing our applications at the DOE this year.

Yeah, and I'll just add a little bit of more color on the process. No, I think overall there was about 80 concept papers that were submitted, and the Dewey encouraged 33 concept papers, and all three of ours were encouraged. Ultimately, as Bob said, we've moved forward with two because two were in the Rocky Mountain region, but we feel good about our multi-application hydrogen hubs and multi-state hubs. So looking forward to seeing this process play out, and as Bob said, awards at the end of the year, and then it's a staging process going forward after that.

Great. That's helpful. I'll leave it there. Thanks.

Thank you, sir. We'll now take a question from Sophie Karp calling from KeyBank. Please go ahead, ma'am.

Hi. Good morning. Thank you for taking my question. Just a quick follow-up on the RFP process. Could you remind us if you also have been into those and what do you expect your win rates to be, if any?

Hi, Sophie. Yeah, thanks for the follow-up question. We do... So the way we see this playing out is we have absolutely submitted our own self-build projects in all three of the RFPs, Minnesota, Colorado, and SPS. And those range from solar to wind and storage and combinations of each of those. And it depends on the RFP. Minnesota was only a solar RFP. But we've spent... probably the last 18 to 24 months working on our self-build projects. As we know, we have a massive renewable build-out over the next decade in our territories. So not only do we see potentially our own self-build projects being selected, we have a good partnership with Vestas in the Colorado, with their Colorado facility. And so we have some geographical advantages with having wind turbines being, wind blades being manufactured there. And we have a lot of opportunities around reusing the interconnection of our retiring coal plants. So we feel really good. Now, publicly, we talk about targeting 50% ownership. Obviously, we think we'll be very cost competitive and would love to demonstrate to our commissions that we could do more than 50% ownership because we think we have really good projects that will show a lot of benefit to our customers. And I think this is just, as I think about this, let me give you a little view of longer term. I really think this is the start of Steel for Field 2.0 as we think about it. And I don't think there are many utilities can do this clean energy transition at the price point that we can because of the solar and wind resources in our backyard. And we think that's a true competitive advantage over the longer term is being able to deliver 80 to 85% clean energy in 2030 at or below inflation. So we're excited to continue to work on these RFPs and following these RFPs we'll do multiple more RFPs in our jurisdiction. So I'm looking forward to giving you and everyone on this call and our stakeholders further updates as we work through the process.

Perfect. Thank you for this caller. And then as a follow-up, maybe on the O&M, I see that the O&M has been a drag about like six cents maybe in the first quarter. Just wondering if that was impacted maybe by Monticello outage and repairs to a larger degree? And how do you see the shape of the O&M for the rest of the year?

Yeah, thanks for the question. No, Monticello, no. Monticello is maybe a couple million dollars from a repair cost perspective. So pretty immaterial relative to the quarter. As we think about it, last year, if you look at our pattern of O&M last year, it was significantly higher in the latter part of the year. Part of that is due to some regulatory deferrals that were in place of Q1 last year, then unwound as we got rates in effect in Texas. And then we also had good weather last year, so we invested in our system later in the year. So as we think about it, we're still good with our year-end guidance, and we'll continue to work on that. Now, that being said, we are facing inflationary pressures, and something that we're very focused on internally is keeping those O&M expenses in. down as I think is important from a customer bill perspective long term. But overall, we feel good with where we are and expect to deliver on our year-end numbers as we've done for 18 years.

Thank you. That's all for me.

Thank you very much, Matt.

Next, we'll go to Mr. Greg Orrell of UBS. Please go ahead, sir.

Yeah, thanks for taking my question. Andy, good morning. Just a clarification around the transferability. Is it sort of the legal basis that you're looking for, you know, that getting the clarification enables you to move forward, or is there something that you're looking for in terms of the content?

Thank you. Not at all in terms of the content. I would call it we're looking for more administrative guidance. Now, there may be other parties that are involved in tax equity partnerships or ITC, But we're looking at transferring PTCs. As I said, we're very clean from a transferability perspective. So it's more like, okay, what are the registration requirements? And then just our counterparties want to see the guidance, too, so they know what they need to do. So nothing of concern beyond just getting those administrative requirements out. And that's why we're waiting, and we'll be ready to pull the trigger when we get that guidance.

Thanks. Thank you, sir.

The next question is coming from Ryan Levine, calling from Citigroup. Please go ahead.

Good morning. On New Mexico, can you give some color as to what you're seeing in that regulatory process and compare it to how the processes were with the prior commission? And is there any potential for settlement or change to the Q4 guidance given the ramp up of the new commission and stuff?

hey Ryan thanks thanks for the question as we think about it in New Mexico a wide range of intervener testimony I think some of that from large industrials is called par for the course look at the staff testimony we think it's a good starting point the staff testimony I think one of the key aspects is we follow the forward test year and I think there's support from a forward test year construct perspective which is which is different from historical standards so absolutely Um, just got the testimony in last Friday, have digested it, and then we'll see if there is an opportunity to work with the parties and reach a balance and constructive outcome, uh, from a settlement perspective. You know, if you look at the schedule, we have a, um, hearings are June 20th. And so that would be kind of from now until June 20th. And there's actually a stipulation period in there in May too. in terms of looking at settlement opportunities. But we've reached settlement in our last couple of rate cases in New Mexico and certainly look forward to working with the parties on it to get a balanced outcome for our customers. The second part of your question was around guidance. This goes into effect late in the year, so relatively small impact on 2023 guidance.

Okay, but is the fourth quarter 23 decision, do you think that there's any risk to that timeline from a regulatory timeline?

No, and from a timeline perspective, no, I do not, in terms of it getting pushed out.

I mean, Ryan, the schedule's already moved out a month, so we think it's fine the way it is.

Okay. And then on New Mexico, what are you seeing for weather normalized load for that region?

So I think overall in SPS, if you looked at our sales, is very strong sales, particularly on the C&I side. We had 7% plus C&I sales year over year for the quarter. Resi sales were up about 3%. Now that was higher than expectations. On the residential side, commercial side was pretty much in line with what we expected. So really strong growth and more of that growth is weighted towards New Mexico than Texas with what we're seeing in the oil patch region in the Delaware Basin. Now rigs are up about 10 year over year from the rig count in the two counties we serve, Eddy and Lee. And then we're also seeing a lot of electrification requests as the large oil and gas customers have their own carbon reduction targets hit, and they're obviously working with the state of New Mexico as to how they can improve their overall carbon footprint. So really good growth there, and we're doing everything we can and working with our customers to make sure that we can support them with the distribution and transmission investments that we need to make.

Great. Thanks for taking my question.

Thank you much, Mr. Levine.

Our next question is coming from Mr. Paul Patterson, calling from Glenrock Associates. Here's your answer.

Good morning. Can you hear me?

Yeah, Paul, good morning.

Hey, so just back to the Colorado bill. I apologize if I just didn't get this, but are you guys, I mean, the bill seems to be moving pretty quickly. Are you guys, I mean, with the amendments that were done on Tuesday, are you guys okay with it at this point, or do you look for additional changes in it? I apologize if you guys actually addressed this earlier.

Yeah. No, Hey Paul, it's Bob. Um, I did comment earlier, but no, no concerns there. We, um, uh, the bill as it passed the Senate, um, and the amendments that were provided, um, uh, make the bill, you know, workable, I think from our perspective, uh, we continue to watch it as it moves through the house process. Um, uh, but as it stands right now, I think it's, it's something that we can work with. We think it, you know, if there still leaves a lot at the, uh, the commission for decision-making, And we would very much work with the CPC and the staff to implement some of that legislation through the regulatory process.

Okay, great. And then given some of your management's experience in California and their sort of more novel idea of the commission, well, the company's proposal to bill at least part of the bill associated with income. I'm just wondering if that's something that you guys have thought about in any of your jurisdictions, but particularly Colorado, given the experience in California. And just if you have sort of any feedback or any thoughts you might have about that.

Yeah, thanks, Paul. I think you're talking about stratification of residential customers from an income perspective. You know, I think at this point, what we do in that regard is we direct a lot of assistance through regulatory state and federal agency programs to mitigate the income qualified customers. And that process, I think, has worked pretty well. I don't see us proposing any any changes to customer stratification at this point.

Okay. That's it. Thanks so much.

Thank you. Thank you, Mr. Patterson. As we have no further questions, at this time, we're going to call back over to Mr. Brian Van Abel for any additional or closing remarks. Thank you.

Thanks, everyone, for participating in our earnings call this morning. Please contact our investor relations team with any follow-up questions.

Thank you very much. Ladies and gentlemen, those working through today's conference, thank you for your attendance. You may now disconnect. Have a good day.