Spire Inc.

Good day and welcome to the SPIRE, Inc. third quarter earnings conference call. All participants will be in listen-only 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 touch-tone phone. To withdraw your question, please press star, then two. Please note this event is being recorded. I would now like to turn the conference over to Scott Dudley, Managing Director of Investor Relations. Please go ahead.

Good morning and welcome to SPIRE's fiscal 2021 third quarter earnings call. We issued an earnings news release this morning and you may access it on our website at spireenergy.com under newsroom. There's a slide presentation that accompanies our webcast and you may download it from either the webcast site or from our website under investors and then events and presentations. Before we begin, let me cover our safe harbor statement and use of non-GAAP earnings measures. Today's call, including responses to questions, may contain forward looking statements within the meaning of the Private Securities Litigation Reform Act of 1995. Although our forward looking statements are based on reasonable assumptions, there are various uncertainties and risk factors that may cause future performance or results to be different than those anticipated. These risks and uncertainties are outlined in our quarterly and annual filings with the SEC. In our comments, we will be discussing net economic earnings and contribution margin, which are both non-GAAP measures used by management when evaluating our performance and results of operations. Explanations and reconciliations of these measures to their GAAP counterparts are contained in both our news release and slide presentation. With that, I'll turn the call over to SPIRE's President and CEO, Suzanne Sitherwood. Suzanne?

Thank you, Scott, and good morning, everyone. We appreciate you joining us for our third quarter earnings call. Today, Steve Lindsey, Steve Rasche, and I are joined for the first time by Adam Hoiter. Adam aspires treasurer and CFO of our gas utilities. Welcome, Adam. As the year progresses, we continue stepping forward to deliver on our mission to answer every challenge, advance every community, and enrich every life through the strength of our energy. And no matter how complicated the challenge, our 3,600 employees continue to deliver for our shareholders while building on our performance record of delivering safe, reliable, and affordable natural gas for our customers and communities. The ability to successfully execute reflects FIRE's culture and the hard work and dedication of our team. And while I'm proud of what the team consistently does day in and day out, I'm always heartened when I see how our employees lean into challenges like the coronavirus and winter storm Uri. Doing everything possible to ensure the continued operation of the STL pipeline is no exception. More on that in a moment. Stepping forward always means we're helping lead the conversation about natural gas. As we look ahead, we know that natural gas is key to America's reliable, affordable, and sustainable energy future. In that spirit, we continue to advance our commitment to be a carbon neutral company by mid-century, including consistently reducing methane emissions and exploring sustainable operations like RNG. Turning to our third quarter results, this morning we reported solid quarterly net economic earnings of $0.06 per share and delivered continued strong operating performance. Before turning to our operations report, I'd like to share our thoughts on the situation surrounding the STL pipeline. Make no mistake, the STL pipeline is critical to hundreds of thousands of homes and businesses and several million people in eastern Missouri. That's why we built it. The past year's extreme winter weather proved the importance of this critical infrastructure as the STL pipeline delivered reliable and affordable energy when other parts of the continent were gripped with supply disruptions and skyrocketing costs. So, the question is, why is the STL pipeline in jeopardy today? As you know by now, the Environmental Defense Fund challenged the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission's 2018 authorization for the construction and operation of the SPIRE STL pipeline in the Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit Court. A pipeline that's been fully operational since 2019. On June 22nd, the DC Circuit Court issued its judgment against FERC, remanding the matter back to the agency for further consideration. And in a highly unusual action negatively impacting Missouri customers in our industry, vacating the FERC's 2018 authorization of the STL pipeline. I've been in the natural gas business for more than 40 years, and I've never seen another situation in which a fully operational, safe, and environmentally sound pipeline had its FERC certificate revoked. It's important to remember that we constructed the pipeline based on approval obtained from the FERC after a thorough and rigorous two-year regulatory review process, a process that has been in place for decades. The number one job in any utility or pipeline is to deliver safe and reliable energy to customers. 24 by 7, 365 days a year. We've done that here at SPIRE for more than 160 years, and we take that job very seriously. That is why we emphatically are pursuing all legal and regulatory avenues to secure the uninterrupted operations of the pipeline, particularly on the eve of this winter, but also for the long term. So far, we've taken two big steps to protect the health and safety, property, and economic prosperity of the St. Louis region. First, last week, we asked the FERC to take an emergency action to grant a temporary certificate for STL Pipeline. That gives the FERC an opportunity to allow the pipeline to continue operating this winter so that natural gas customers in the St. Louis region would not be left without reliable gas service when they need it the most. It also gives the FERC an opportunity to more thoroughly evaluate the issues on remand without being rushed by the immediate needs of the winter heating season. Second, today we will be asking the D.C. Circuit Court to reconsider its decision to vacate the FERC's order authorizing the pipeline. To be clear, if neither the D.C. Court nor the FERC act on our request, the result would be an unprecedented forced shutdown of an operating natural gas pipeline, particularly one that is operating safely and consistent with all environmental considerations. The SDL pipeline is a project that, one, has proved its purpose of supply and operational diversity to the St. Louis region during extreme weather events such as winter storm Uri. Two, demonstrated its worth by saving St. Louis homes and businesses hundreds of millions in gas costs during URI. And three, was built with fire's environmental commitment in mind. It's important to understand how the St. Louis region was spared the devastation that occurred during URI. When gas supply from Texas and Oklahoma was disrupted, the competition for the remaining gas supply was in temp. Cities and communities throughout the mid-continent suffered from contrailments. and the devastation was well documented. But the St. Louis region did not suffer from those problems. Instead, the FGL pipeline did exactly what it was designed to do, provide alternative, reliable supply in gas-producing areas not impacted by a regional extreme weather event. As you can tell from our words and actions, we are laser-focused on ensuring the pipeline remains in service for the communities of eastern Missouri. Over the last several weeks, I'm pleased to know that many are raising their voices in support of the pipeline, including the Missouri governor, bipartisan elected officials, the Missouri Department of Economic Development, commercial and industrial customers, community leaders, and even a key interconnecting interstate pipeline, all voicing their concern over the potential loss of this critical infrastructure to meet the energy needs of the homes and businesses we serve. Now, I'll turn the call over to Steve Lindsey to share details about FIRE's overall STL pipeline operations and what we're doing to protect several million people in Missouri for losing the energy that they count on.