Ormat Technologies, Inc.

Good morning and welcome to the ORMAD Technologies first quarter 2023 earnings conference call. All participants will be in a listen-only mode. After today's presentation, there will be an opportunity to ask questions. If you'd like to ask a question during this time, simply press star, then the number one on your telephone keypad. To withdraw your question, please press star one again. Please know that this event is being recorded. I'd now like to turn the conference over to Alex Steinberg with Alpha IR. Please go ahead.

Thank you, operator. Hosting the call today are Duran Bashar, Chief Executive Officer, Ozzie Ginsberg, Chief Financial Officer, and Smadar Lavie, Vice President of Investor Relations and ESG Planning and Reporting. Before beginning, we would like to remind you that the information provided during this call may contain forward-looking statements relating to current expectations, estimates, forecasts, and projections about future events, that are forward-looking as defined in the Private Securities Litigation Reform Act of 1995. These forward-looking statements generally relate to the company's plans, objectives, and expectations for future operations and are based on management's current estimates and projections, future results, or trends. Actual future results may differ materially from those projected as a result of certain risk and uncertainties. For a discussion of such risk and uncertainties, Please see risk factors as described in ORMAT Technologies' annual report on Form 10-K and quarterly reports on Form 10-Q that are filed with the SEC. In addition, during the call, the company will present non-GAAP financial measures, such as adjusted EBITDA. Reconciliation is the most directly comparable GAAP measures, and management's reasons for presenting such information is set forth in the press release that was issued last night, as well as in the slides posted on the website. Because these measures are not calculated in accordance with GAAP, they should not be considered in isolation from the financial statements prepared in accordance with GAAP. Before I turn the call over to management, I would like to remind everyone that a slide presentation accompanying this call may be accessed on the company's website at ormat.com under the presentation link that's found on the investor relations tab. With all that said, I would now like to turn the call over to Duran Bashar. Duran, the call is all yours.

Thank you, Alec, and good morning, everyone. Thank you for joining us today. We are pleased to report a strong start to the year, with impressive net income and adjusted EBITDA growth year over year, supported mainly by our electricity sector. Our operating income and adjusted EBITDA saw significant improvement of 17.9% and 14.5% respectively, and our net income increased 57.5% as income tax was positively impacted by the Inflation Reduction Act. We attribute this success to our strategic growth initiatives from last year, as well as our operational performance and the regulatory tailwind that allowed us to maximize shareholders' value. Our electricity segment continued to lead the way with strong performance that demonstrated the benefit of our ongoing portfolio expansion strategy. In our product segment, The stepdown in revenue compared to the first quarter last year was largely due to the timing we made in recognizing revenue throughout the year, which we expect to accelerate in the remaining of the year. Our storage segment quarterly performance was negatively impacted by an overall reduction in energy rates, which impacted our results in the PJM and Kaiser facilities. As we enter the second quarter, we completed construction and started operation of two new energy storage facilities, and we are near completion of additional two facilities with a total capacity of 64 megawatt, 64 megawatt hour. We expect the overall positive momentum we saw in Q1 to continue in the rest of 2023 with the IRA providing additional benefits through the tax credits available for geothermal and energy storage projects, which we expect will positively impact our bottom line. We remain on track with our full year guidance for 2023 and capacity expansion goals for 2025. As we look to the future, we are confident in the continued demand for renewable energy, and we expect to benefit from it in all our three segments. Now, before I provide further updates on our operations and future plans, I will turn the call over to Asi to review the financial results. Asi?