Eversource Energy (D/B/A)

Good day, and thank you for standing by. Welcome to the Eversource Energy Q3 2025 earnings call. At this time, all participants are in a listen-only mode. After the speaker presentation, there will be a question and answer session. To ask a question during the session, you'll need to press star 11 on your telephone. You will then hear an automated message advising that your hand is raised. To withdraw your questions, please press star 11 again. Please be advised that today's conference is being recorded. I would now like to hand the conference over to your first speaker today, Reema Hyder, Vice President of Investor Relations.

Good morning, and thank you for joining us today on the third quarter 2025 earnings call. During this call, we'll be referencing slides that we posted this morning on our website. As you can see on slide one, some of the statements made during this investor call may be forward-looking. These statements are based on management's current expectations and are subject to risk and uncertainty, which may cause the actual results to differ materially from forecasts and projections. We undertake no obligation to update or revise any of these statements. Additional information about the various factors that may cause actual results to differ and our explanation of non-GAAP measures and how they reconcile to GAAP results is contained within our news release, the slides we posted, and in our most recent 10Q and 10K. Speaking today will be Joe Nolan, our Chairman, President, and Chief Executive Officer, and John Marrera, our Executive Vice President, Chief Financial Officer, and Treasurer. Also joining us today is Jay Booth, our Vice President and Controller. I will now turn the call over to Joe.

Good morning, and thank you for joining us today. Starting on slide four, over the past 10 months, our team's relentless focus on executing on our key strategic initiatives has driven strong results and consistent performance. We are well on our way to delivering against these initiatives and ending the year on a strong note. Our strong results have also greatly improved our standing among our peers. On a year-to-date basis, our share price has been a top performer among the EEI peer group. Today, I'll walk you through how we're capitalizing on our unique market position, fueling sustainable growth and strengthening the balance sheet to power our future outlook. Moving to slide five. In the last few months, we have gained more clarity on the Connecticut regulatory environment. and the impact for our ongoing and future regulatory proceedings at Pura. Additionally, each day of construction that passes yields progress on the de-risking of Revolution Wind. We're seeing a constructive shift in Connecticut's regulatory landscape. Last month, Governor Lamont appointed four new commissioners at Pura, filling out the five-member requirement under Connecticut law. With this new commission on the way, there is now a genuine opportunity to collaborate with all parties on regulatory initiatives and to achieve more balanced regulatory outcomes. This will enable us to better serve the needs of our customers in this state and to do so with a strong focus on safety, reliability, and affordability. Critical needs exist for state and regional infrastructure investments to maintain a strong, reliable, and resilient grid that can accommodate new sources of generation to meet the increasing levels of projected electric demand. A transparent and predictable regulatory process is going to benefit all stakeholders, including our customers, and we are looking forward to getting back to work on Connecticut's energy goals. For our ongoing Yankee rate case, we submitted a motion to adopt an alternative resolution with PURA. This was in response to PURA's request for parties to reach a consensus-based resolution to reestablish trust and balance in the regulatory process and avoid further legal appeals. Our proposal includes important customer affordability provisions that we believe are supportive of all stakeholders' affordability goals. We expect to see a final decision from PURA today. We remain on schedule to receive a final decision for the sale of Aquarian Water on November 19th, and we continue to expect to close the transaction by the end of this year. As you may be aware, we filed a comprehensive offer of compromise to address concerns raised by the Connecticut Office of Consumer Counsel. The commitments that were outlined in the offer of compromise provide additional assurances that the transaction will serve the interests of Connecticut and the customers served by Aquarian Water. Moving on to an update on offshore wind. We have substantially completed construction of the onshore substation for Revolution Wind Project. We expect to provide backfeed energization to the offshore facilities by the end of November, which will support testing and commissioning of those facilities. In parallel, we will complete the final testing and commissioning of the remaining onshore equipment. Overall, as Austad has stated, Revolution Wind is substantially complete and work has continued since the stop order was lifted in September. We recognized an increase to our liability to GIP in the third quarter, which was largely offset by tax benefits. We continue to support the project's owners in their completion of this important generation resource for New England. As I said at the start of the call, our execution has delivered positive results and we have made great headway on our many key strategic initiatives this year. We have continued to deliver on our operational metrics with top decile reliability performance among our peers. We have significantly improved our FFO to debt ratio through constructive regulatory outcomes and managed our balance sheet to support solid credit ratings, and we know we are not done yet. We have continued to invest in transmission and distribution infrastructure across our service territories. We are on track to invest nearly $5 billion this year. We have installed over 40,000 AMI meters in Massachusetts and completed the communication network deployment in the western portion of our service territory. These achievements are just a few that underscore the strength of our execution engine and the depth of our operational rigor. As you can see on slide six, we have many growth opportunities ahead of us. Our service area is truly the crown jewel of the country. This area is home to cutting-edge biotech and research and the best universities in healthcare in the world. As these industries expand, they turn to us for a reliable, resilient grid. making us an indispensable partner in their success. We're seeing robust low growth driven primarily by electrification of transportation and heating, decarbonization initiatives from both the public and private sectors, and economic expansion across manufacturing and commercial sectors. These factors help to ensure that our growth is broad-based durable, and aligned with state sustainability goals. Year to date, we have seen weather normalized load growth of 2%. And this summer, we experienced a peak of over 12 gigawatts, the highest record since 2013, as load growth in our service territory has started outpacing the impacts of distributed generation, such as rooftop solar. The evolving electric demand landscape presents a need for numerous transmission projects, such as upgrades linking onshore and offshore wind to load centers, interconnections improving regional reliability, and addressing congestion as the generation mix for our region evolves. Some of the projects we are pursuing to get ahead of this continued low growth include the Cambridge Underground substation, which will be the largest in the nation in one of 14 substations currently on the drafting table that we expect to build in Massachusetts alone to support future growth. Being opportunistic about land acquisitions in our service territory to support this growth, such as the mystic land acquisition we did last year with more in the pipeline. Responding to requests for proposals from ISO New England to address longer-term transmission solutions, such as the most recent one to bring power from northern Maine to southern New England. These opportunities, some being outside of our five-year forecast period, could add billions of dollars to our future investment plans. Each project that we are considering not only supports our growth trajectory, but also deepens our value proposition as a grid innovator. We also recognize that as demand increases, affordability must remain top of mind. We are working closely with our regulators to offer our customers various options to address affordability as shown on slide seven. We collaborate with large and small customers to design rate structures that incent efficiency. For example, earlier this year, We work constructively with our regulators in Massachusetts to offer a 10% discount to our gas customers during the winter peak months and recover that in the summer months to smooth the impact of high bills. Similarly, starting this month, we are offering a seasonal heat pump rate in Massachusetts. Eversource Electric customers who use a heat pump to heat their homes can take advantage of a seasonal heat pump rate, which is a reduced rate during the winter months. We are expanding energy efficiency programs to provide incentives for residential and low-income customers who choose to adopt energy-efficient technologies. These programs coupled with AMI give customers greater transparency and control over their energy pocketbook. Our nation-leading energy efficiency programs have already generated $1.4 billion in savings for our customers. We have also implemented low income discount rates for our most vulnerable customers, and we are recognized for our leadership in advocacy for state utility partnerships and hardship programs. We are excited about new energy supply coming into our region, which should alleviate supply cost pressure on customer bills. Over the next 12 months, Eversource is directly supporting new generation coming into the region, totaling over 2,500 megawatts. We aim to deliver reliable, sustainable energy while keeping costs manageable in partnering with customers to ensure affordability through cost-effective investments, efficient operations, and equitable rate design. Before I hand the call over to John, I want to thank our 10,000 plus employees for their dedication, our regulators for their collaborative spirit, and our shareholders for their trust. We're executing against a clear strategy, serving an extraordinary customer base, and working to build the grid for tomorrow, responsibly and sustainably. I look forward to your questions and sharing more details on our path forward. With that, I'll turn the call over to John Marrera.