Boralex Inc.

Good morning, ladies and gentlemen, and welcome to the Borlux First Quarter 2022 Financial Results Conference Call. Note that all lines are in a listen-only mode. Following the presentation, we will conduct a question-and-answer session in which financial analysts, shareholders, and investors will be invited to ask their questions. To ask a question during that session, you will need a press star 1 on your telephone. Also note that this call is being recorded. For webcast participants, you can also ask questions during the conference, but they will be answered by email after the call. Finally, media representatives are invited to contact Boralex's Director of Public Affairs and Communications, Isabel Fontaine. Her contact information is provided at the end of the quarterly press release. I would now like to turn the conference over to Stephan Milo, Senior Director, Investor Relations of Boralex. Please go ahead.

Merci beaucoup. Thank you, operator. So, good morning, everyone. Welcome to Barrelex's first quarter resolve conference call. So, joining me today from our head office in Montreal are Patrick Dacoste, President and Chief Executive Officer, Bruno Guilmette, Vice President and Chief Financial Officer, and other members of our management and finance team. So, Mr. Dacoste will begin with comments about market conditions and the highlights of the quarter. Afterwards, will carry on with financial highlights and then we will be available to answer your questions. As you know, during this call, we will be discussing historical as well as forward-looking information. So when talking about the future, there are a variety of risk factors that have been listed in our different filings with securities regulators, which can materially change our estimated results. These documents are all available for consultation at CDAR.com. So in our webcast presentation document, the disclosed results are presented both on a consolidated basis and on a combined basis. So unless otherwise stated, all comments made in this presentation will refer to combined basis figures. So please note that combined is non-GAAP financial measures and do not have standardized meaning under IFRS. Accordingly, combined may not be comparable to similar name measures used by other companies. For more details, see the Non-IFRS and Other Financial Measures section in the MD&A. The press release, the MD&A, the consolidated financial statements, and a copy of today's presentations are all posted on the Boralex website at boralex.com under the Investor sections. If you wish to receive a copy of these documents, please contact me. So Mr. Dacasse, when I start with his comments, please go ahead, Patrick.

Thank you, Stéphane. Good morning, everyone. Bonjour à vous. It's a pleasure for me to present our results and achievement for the first quarter. I'm very proud of all the hard work our teams in Europe and North America have put together in the past few months. Everyone in the organization contributed to this 13% growth in ABDA and a 28% increase in consolidated IFFO, but also to the closure of two significant partnerships and the additions of projects to our pipeline as well as the selection of wind projects in the most recent request for proposal in France. That being said, the market conditions continue to rapidly evolve during the quarter. In the U.S., investments in renewable energy have been integrated into a plan aimed at bringing back manufacturing to the United States and reduce inflationary pressures. The federal government is also quickly committing infrastructure investment and Job Act funds to deploy 7.5 billion U.S. dollars in electrical vehicle recharging infrastructure. The increased adoption of electrical vehicles is expected to increase power consumptions by 1,425 TWh in the United States by 2050, an increase of 36% compared to the 3,930 TWh consumed in 2021, considering only the electrification of transportations. In Canada, Hydro-Québec made public its 2022-2026 strategic plan, taking into account the energy transition underway and the government's ambition reflected in its 2030 plan for a green economy. Hydro-Québec expects that more than 100 TWh of power will be required in Québec by 2050. Among the avenues identified to reach this objective, Hydro-Québec intends to rely on the development of wind energy by building with partners a 3,000 MW portfolio of wind energy projects by 2026 to be developed as and when the need arises. Hydro-Québec also announced... recently requests for proposals for 1,000 MW of wind and 1,300 MW of renewable energy. In Europe, the geopolitical context reinforces the need to ensure security of energy supply and sovereignty. The sharp rise in energy prices in France mainly due to maintenance and corrosion problems to some nuclear reactors could also significantly favor the development of renewable project and corporate ppa in the coming years i will now review the main variances in our portfolio of project the 73 megawatt increase in the early stage was due primarily to the addition of three new wind power projects and two new solar projects totaling 75 megawatts in europe as well as the addition of two new solar projects totaling 25 megawatts in north america this was partly offset by the inclusion of a wind and solar power project totaling 9 MW in Europe under the mid-stage phase and changed in the expected capacity of a solar power project as well as the discontinuation of a wind power project for a total of 18 MW in Europe. The 159 MW increase in the mid-stage was due primarily to the addition of a wind project and adjustment to the pipeline following the announcement of the partnership agreement with Hydro-Québec and Énergir representing a total of 167 MW. The increase also comes from the inclusion of a wind power project and a solar power project under the mid-stage phase and change in the expected capacity of a solar and wind power project in Europe for a total of 12 MW. The increase was partly compensated by a 20 MW solar power project in Europe moving to secured phase. The 116 MW increase to advanced stage was primarily due to the addition of a project and adjustment in the pipeline following the announcement of the partnership agreement with Hydro-Québec and Énergir for a total of 133 MW. Change to the expected capacity of wind project in Europe also at 9 MW. This was partly offset by the inclusion of a 26 MW wind project in Europe in the secured phase. In total, we are now developing a portfolio of wind and solar projects of 3.6 GW and 177 MW of storage projects. Let's review changes to the growth path now. The 38 MW increase in the secured stage was driven by the inclusion of two wind projects totaling 46 MW and capacity addition of 6 MW to existing projects. This was partly offset by the inclusion of a 14 MW wind project to the under-construction and ready-to-build phase. Project under construction, or ready-to-build phase, increased by 14 MW by the addition of Bois-Ricard wind project. As shown in the growth path, we had assets in operation with 2,492 MW of installed capacity as at March 31, 2022, the same as at December 31, 2021, and an installed capacity of 2,447 MW as of May 10, 2022, following the disposal of two power stations after the end of the quarter. Commissioning of secured facilities and projects under construction is expected to bring our installed capacity to 3,146 MW. In conclusion, as you can see on the slide 12, we are pursuing the execution of our strategic plan and are making good progress on all the four strategic orientations. I won't cover in detail our progress as I already have highlighted our main achievements. One last point for my part. Earlier this week, we announced the results of our most recent CSR scoring by Ecovadis for our French operations. I'm very proud to say that we got the gold medal being classified in the top 95 percentile of corporations in our industry evaluated by Ecovadis. This shows the dedication of all our employees to constantly improve on CSR and brings one step closer to our goal of being recognized as a CSR reference by our different stakeholders. This completes my part. I will now let Bruno cover the financial portion in more detail, and we'll be back later for the question period. Bruno?