South Jersey Industries, Inc.

Good morning and welcome to the South Jersey industry's second quarter 2021 earnings conference call. All participants will be in a listening mode. Should you need assistance, please signal a conference specialist by pressing the star key followed by zero. After today's presentation, there will be an opportunity to ask questions. To ask a question, you may press star then one on your telephone keypad. To withdraw your question, please press star then 2. Please note, this event is being recorded. I would now like to turn the conference over to Dan Fidel. Please go ahead.

Thank you. Good morning and welcome to SGI's second quarter 2021 earnings conference call and webcast. I'm joined today by Mike Renna, our President and Chief Executive Officer, Steve Kochi, our Chief Financial Officer, as well as additional members of our Senior Management Team. Our earnings release and the presentation slides that accompany the call were issued yesterday after the close of the market and are also available on our website at www.sjindustries.com. Let me remind you that throughout today's call, we will be making references to future expectations, plans, and opportunities for SJI. Actual results could differ materially from those projected in any forward-looking statements. For a discussion of factors that could cause actual results to differ, please refer to our SEC filings. In addition, the earnings released in the 10-Q provide an in-depth review of earnings on both the GAAP and non-GAAP basis using our non-GAAP measure of economic earnings. Reconciliations of economic earnings to the comparable GAAP measures appear in both documents. At this time, I'll now turn the call over to our CEO, Mike Brenna, We'll review our accomplishments and strategic priorities through the remainder of the year. Our CFO, Steve Kochi, will then review our second quarter and year-to-date operational performance and financial outlook. Mike will conclude by offering some closing remarks. After that, I'd be happy to take your questions. And with that introduction, let me now turn it over to Mike.

Thanks, Dan. Good morning, and thank you for joining us today. I am pleased to report that SJI, notwithstanding the challenges of COVID-19, delivered solid performance in the second quarter and through the first half of 2021. Year to date, we felt economic earnings increased by roughly 25 million, up nearly 24% over the same period in 2020, reflecting strong performance in both our utility and non-utility businesses. Consistent with our strategy, our utilities, South Jersey Gas and Elizabethtown Gas, represent the majority of our earnings. Margin growth remains strong, reflecting above-average customer growth, positive rate case outcomes, infrastructure modernization programs, and effective O&M management. Natural gas remains in strong demand across New Jersey, with our utilities adding more than 11,000 new customers in the last 12 months alone. And while we are seeing increased new construction across the state, The bulk of our growth continues to come from customers converting from heating oil and propane to clean-burning, low-cost natural gas. Our infrastructure modernization investments, critical to ensuring safe and reliable service, remain on track and have the added benefit of significantly reducing methane emissions. Non-utility operations also experience meaningful second quarter and year-to-date improvement, largely the result of new clean energy investments and restructuring of our wholesale marketing portfolio. Both our energy management and energy production segments delivered strong results. Performance in energy management reflects solid results from both our traditional wholesale marketing and our fuel management activities, while energy production reflects strong performance from our renewable investments, particularly our Staten Island fuel cell, as well as initial contributions from our equity interest in our RNG development partner, RevLNG. Throughout 2021, we've made significant progress in our efforts to reposition SGI at the forefront of a decarbonized energy future. In March, we executed several financing transactions designed to strengthen our balance sheet, improve our credit ratings, and significantly fund our capital plan. In April, the BPU approved a substantial expansion of energy efficiency programs at both our utilities. These innovative programs are a cost-effective way to reduce greenhouse gas emissions by lowering usage. The program also allows for a decoupling mechanism on Elizabethtown gas, similar to the one we have at South Jersey Gas. Also in April, we announced an industry-leading commitment to decarbonization, setting an aggressive goal to reduce our operational emissions of consumption 70% by 2030 and 100% by 2040. We also announced a commitment to deploy at least 25% of annual capital spend towards sustainability investments moving forward. These targets have passed those established under the Murphy administration's energy master plan. We were excited to see Atlantic Shores awarded a project to develop 1500 megawatts of clean, renewable wind energy for our state. Our partnership with Atlantic Shores on a green hydrogen pilot project will be essential to unlocking additional decarbonization energy sources for New Jersey and diversifying our renewable energy mix. And finally, in May, we hosted our Virtual Investor Day, which afforded us the opportunity to lay out our long-term vision and the priorities and strategies that support our mission, delivering safe, reliable, affordable, clean energy, energy that supports the economic prosperity and environmental goals of New Jersey. As we look to the balance of the year, we remain focused on delivering on our commitment to clean energy and decarbonization and on successful resolution of our pending regulatory initiatives. On the clean energy front, in June, we announced the acquisition of a five megawatt fuel cell project in the Bronx. This fuel cell, which will be our third at Catamaran, is similar to the two Staten Island fuel cells that were brought online in 2020. It's eligible under New York's VITA program, which fixes 75% of revenue. It's supported by an O&M agreement that guarantees 95% availability and long-term offtake agreements with creditworthy anchor customers. Like our previous fuel cell investments, SAI receives 92% of the ITC's cash flows and net income. Importantly, this project supports a substantial portion of our ITC goals for 2021. On the regulatory front, as you know, we have requested $742 million in Phase III infrastructure modernization investment at South Jersey Gas. This critically important program targets coated steel and vintage Adelaide plastic pipe, supporting the Murphy administration's safety and reliability, job creation, and environmental goals. Settlement discussions are progressing towards a final resolution. At this time, I'll turn it over to Steve to review our financial performance and outlook. after which I look forward to offering some closing remarks. Steve?