Duke Energy Corporation (Holding Company)

Hello, everyone. Thank you for joining us and welcome to the Duke Energy first quarter 2026 earnings conference call. After today's prepared remarks, we will host a question and answer session. If you would like to ask a question, please press star one to raise your hand. To withdraw your question, press star 1 again. I will now hand the conference over to Mike Switzer, Vice President, Corporate Development and Investor Relations. Mike, please go ahead.

Thank you, Jen, and good morning, everyone. Welcome to Duke Energy's first quarter 2026 earnings review and business update. Leading our call today is Harry Sedaris, President and CEO, along with Brian Savoy, Executive Vice President and CFO. Today's discussion will include the use of non-GAAP financial measures and forward-looking information. Actual results may differ from forward-looking statements due to factors disclosed in today's materials and in Duke Energy's SEC filings. The appendix of today's presentation includes supplemental information along with the reconciliation of non-GAAP financial measures. With that, let me turn the call over to Harry.

Thank you, Mike, and good morning, everyone. We're pleased to be with you to share our results on the continued progress we're making on our strategic priorities. Today we announced first quarter 2026 adjusted earnings per share of $1.93, which builds on our momentum from last year and marks a strong start to the year. These results are primarily driven by critical infrastructure investments to meet growing customer demand in our service territories. We are on track to achieve our 2026 guidance range of 655 to 680 and are reaffirming our 5 to 7 percent long-term EPS growth rate through 2030. And we are more confident than ever that we will deliver in the top half of the range beginning in 2028 when we expect to see accelerated growth from the economic development projects we have secured under ESAs. Our growth is strong. Economically attractive jurisdictions is underpinned by the industry's largest regulated capital plan, efficient recovery mechanisms, and a long track record of constructive regulatory outcomes. And we continue to see strong fundamentals across our business. In the first quarter, we achieved key strategic milestones in support of the growing states we serve. With every investment, we're ensuring the dollars deliver long-term value for our customers and communities. We will continue to execute this strategy with discipline and look forward to updating you throughout the year. As we invest in our system, I want to underscore that our priority has been and always will be providing customers reliable power at the lowest possible cost. As a result of this unwavering focus, our rates are below the national average and have risen below the pace of inflation. We continue to find new ways to deliver affordable energy for our customers, including leveraging our scope and scale to achieve top-tier cost management. As shown on slide five, I'm pleased to announce two major accomplishments that will provide more than $5 billion of customer benefits, further demonstrating our sustained commitment to providing customer value. First, last week we reached a multi-year agreement to monetize up to $3.1 billion of clean energy tax credits expected to be generated through 2028. The proceeds will flow back to customers to support keeping rates as low as possible. We also received all regulatory approvals, including from FERC, North Carolina, and South Carolina regulators for the proposed combination of our two Carolina utilities. Combining these utilities will enable us to meet the Carolina's growing energy needs more efficiently with estimated customer savings of $2.3 billion through 2040. With these approvals, we're working towards an effective date of January 1, 2027. Our customers remain our top priority, and we will continue to utilize every tool available to keep rates as low as possible. We had several other significant accomplishments in the first few months of 2026, which are outlined on slide six. Starting with the two strategic transactions announced last year, we closed on the first tranche of Brookfield's minority investment in Duke Energy Florida in early March, receiving $2.8 billion in cash proceeds for a 9.2% interest in our Florida utility. Several weeks later, we completed the sale of our Piedmont Natural Gas Tennessee business to Spire for $2.5 billion. The more than $5 billion in proceeds strengthened our credit profile and helped cost-effectively fund our $103 billion capital plan as we invest for the benefit of our customers. Moving to economic development, we continue to seize the growth in our attractive regions, driven by innovation in AI technologies and advanced manufacturing. Since the fourth quarter call, we've signed an additional 2.7 gigawatts of ESAs with data center customers, bringing our total executed agreements to approximately 7.6 gigawatts, nearly two-thirds of which are already under construction. We recognize that we're in a once-in-a-generation build cycle and have been collaborating with state and local officials, policymakers, and regulators to attract these investments to our communities while protecting our existing customers. We've taken a leading role in developing contract structures that establish greater certainty for planning and ensure that new large customers pay their fair share of the overall system costs. Contracts include minimum demand provisions, credit support, refundable capital advances, and termination charges. Importantly, these incremental volumes will benefit all customers over the life of the contract as system costs are spread over a larger base. For decades, our teammates have had the privilege of living and working alongside the customers we serve, and that experience has made community engagement a core competency in our planning and delivery. When projects are built with communities and not around them, we are able to support growth in a way that both protects and benefits customers. And finally, I want to touch on several regulatory updates, beginning with North Carolina. The rate cases for both Duke Energy Carolinas and Duke Energy Progress are proceeding on schedule. The next step will be intervener testimony, which is due for DEC at the end of May. We look forward to continuing constructive engagement with stakeholders as we advocate for the critical investments needed to reliably serve our growing communities and provide value for our customers. And in mid-March, we filed our initial electric rate stabilization adjustment in South Carolina under legislation that was signed into law last May. This efficient process allows for annual true-ups that reduce rate volatility for customers. The investments we're making in our system support critical upgrades to improve reliability, harden the grid, and support growth. Whether it's a blue sky day or responding to winter storms like we experienced earlier this year, we continue to provide value by keeping the lights on and restoring power safely and quickly. Moving to slide seven, we continue to advance our all of the above strategy, adding 14 gigawatts of generation over the next five years. We're also maximizing existing generation by extending the lives of our nuclear fleet. In April, the NRC approved the subsequent license renewal for Robinson Nuclear Plant, marking our second nuclear plant to reach this important milestone. As the operator of the largest regulated fleet in the nation, nuclear is foundational to our strategy, and we intend to seek similar extensions for all our remaining reactors. Our gas generation program, which is a critical component of our strategy, is well underway with five gigawatts under construction and an additional two and a half gigawatts in development. In March, the South Carolina Commission approved our application for a 1.4 gigawatt combined cycle plant in Anderson County. The plan is the first to be approved after the enactment of the Energy Security Act last May and is our first new baseload generation asset in the Palmetto State in a decade. Construction is expected to begin in 2027. And last month, we implemented a CWIP rider in Indiana for our Cayuga combined cycle plant. This recovery mechanism supports the state's focus on affordability by reducing overall costs to customers while maintaining balance sheet strength. We have agreements in place to secure the long lead time equipment and workforce needed for this dispatchable generation. which reduce risk and leverage our size and scale to complete these projects efficiently, maximizing the value for our customers. The first turbines secured under our framework agreement with GE Vernova are being built, with the turbines for the first person county combined cycle project expected to be delivered in the second half of this year. Our gas generation build will create thousands of construction jobs, and we have a solid plan to ensure we have the skilled labor needed to meet our construction milestones on time and on budget. In the Carolinas, we have signed EPC contracts for the first three new gas generation facilities, a programmatic approach that gives our EPC providers accurate line of sight to an order book of projects. We have deliberately laid out the construction timelines for Person County and Marshall plants to create a roadmap for Zachary to stage the regional workforce. This will support developing and retaining a local craft pool for years into the future. We're building on the success we've had supporting talent pipelines to address needed skills in our service territories, like we've done with line worker training programs. And we're sharing these best practices with our EPC partners. To bring all this together, our project management and construction team has a robust construction monitoring process in place. We are working closely with our equipment suppliers and EPC providers, including conducting quality assurance checks of equipment and manufacturing and leveraging AI technologies to track milestones. This includes monitoring construction at a granular level down to the cubic yard of dirt excavated and concrete being poured. Overall, our scope and scale, as well as our extensive experience in infrastructure development, uniquely position us to lead this record generation build. And we've been actively preparing for this next build cycle for more than three years, giving us full confidence in our ability to execute the work ahead. With that, let me turn the call over to Brian.