EnLink Midstream, LLC

Greetings and welcome to the NLINK Midstream 4Q 2023 Earnings Conference Call-In Webcast. At this time, all participants are in a listen-only mode. A brief question and answer session will follow the formal presentation. If anyone should require operator assistance during the conference, please press star zero on your telephone keypad. As a reminder, this conference is being recorded. It is now my pleasure to introduce your host, Brian Brungart, Director of Investor Relations. Thank you, Brian. You may begin.

Thank you, and good morning, everyone. Welcome to NLINC's fourth quarter of 2023 earnings call. Participating on the call today are Jesse Aranivas, Chief Executive Officer, Delonka Simon, Executive Vice President and Chief Commercial Officer, and Ben Lamb, Executive Vice President and Chief Financial Officer. Walter Pinto, Executive Vice President and Chief Operating Officer, is also in the room to answer any questions during the Q&A session. We issued our earnings release and presentation after the markets closed yesterday, and those materials are on our website. A replay of today's call will also be made available on our website at investors.inlink.com. Today's discussion will include forward-looking statements including expectations and predictions within the meaning of the federal securities laws. The forward-looking statements speak only as of the date of this call, and we undertake no obligation to update or revise. Actual results may differ materially from our projections, and a discussion of factors that could cause actual results to differ can be found in our press release, presentation, and SEC files. This call also includes discussions pertaining to certain non-GAAP financial measures. Definitions of these measures, as well as reconciliation of comparable GAAP measures, are available in our press release and the appendix of our presentation. We encourage you to review the cautionary statements and other disclosures made in our press release and our SEC filings, including those under the heading risk factors. We'll start today's call with a set of brief prepared remarks by Jesse, Delanca, and Ben, and then leave the remainder of the call open for questions and answers. With that, I would now like to turn the call over to Jesse Aranivas.

Thanks, Brian. Good morning, everyone. Thank you for joining us today to discuss our fourth quarter results and full 2023 results. We'll also discuss our 2024 outlook, which looks like it will be another great year driven by solid business activity. Looking back at 23, I'm proud of the team's strong execution, driving a number of records despite the challenging and volatile commodity environment. Last night, we reported fourth quarter adjusted EBITDA of $351 million and 2023 adjusted EBITDA of $1.35 billion. This marked solid growth of approximately 5% over the prior year. These solid results drove free cash flow after distributions of nearly $250 million for 2020-2023. We continue to use our robust free cash flow after distributions to return capital to our investors. Earlier this year, we announced a 6% increase on our quarterly distributions. Additionally, we fully executed our expanded $250 million common unit repurchase program. Since we began our consistent unit repurchase program in late 2021, we have repurchased approximately 9% of the common units outstanding. Ben will provide more details later in the call, but we forecast this momentum to continue into 2024. Growth this year will be led by our largest business the Permian, followed by Louisiana, which we expect to become our second largest segment this year. The growth in those businesses will be partly offset by the impact from the non-core ORV asset sale in late 2023 and a contractual rate reset in certain legacy Oklahoma and North Texas commercial agreements. Overall, we forecast adjusted EBITDA of $1.36 billion at the midpoint of our guidance range. The continued strong cash flow generation, coupled with lower total capital expenditures, will drive significant increase in free cash flow after distributions to $290 million at the midpoint of our guidance. Earlier this year, we announced that the board authorized another $200 million common unit repurchase program for 2024, which represents a third consecutive year of at least $200 million of repurchases. Last night we released an update around our CO2 transportation solution for ExxonMobil. Following ExxonMobil's recent acquisition of Denbury, we expanded our commercial discussions to provide safe, reliable, and cost-efficient CO2 transportation to other areas across the Gulf Coast beyond the Mississippi River Corridor. In total, The industrial facilities along the Gulf Coast between Houston and New Orleans emit over 215 million metric tons of CO2 today into the atmosphere. We're excited for this opportunity to expand our commercialization efforts with Exxon, as it may represent a larger investment opportunity and an expanded reach into multiple markets. InLink and ExxonMobil continue to work closely together on CO2 transportation solutions since our initial agreement in 2022, and look forward to continuing our collaboration to help reduce carbon emissions across the Gulf Coast. In connection with the expanded evaluation, while the original transportation agreement remains in place, InLink and ExxonMobil have agreed to reassess the Pecan Island project's near-term role, with the expectation that other projects may be prioritized ahead of the Pecan Island project. Meanwhile, Enly continues to execute and gain expertise in energy transition and CO2 transportation space. During the fourth quarter, we achieved a milestone by bringing online our carbon capture and transportation project at our Bridgeport facility in North Texas. Ultimately, we expect to capture up to 210,000 metric tons of CO2 emitted by our Bridgeport facility and deliver it to a permanent sequestration site developed by our largest customer in North Texas, BKV. With that, I will turn it over to Nalanka to provide an update on our evolving Louisiana SEC.