Hydro One Limited

Good morning, ladies and gentlemen, and welcome to Hydro One Limited's fourth quarter 2024 Analyst Teleconference. At this time, all participants are in a listen-only mode. After the speaker's presentation, there will be a question and answer session. To ask a question during the session, you will need to press star 11 on your telephone. You will then hear an automated message advising your hand is raised. To withdraw your question, please press star 11 again. As a reminder, this call is being recorded. I will now like to introduce your host for today's conference, Mr. Omar Javid, Vice President, Investor Relations at Hydro One. Please go ahead.

Thank you, Shannon. Good morning, and thank you for joining us in Hydro One's quarterly earnings call. Joining us today are our President and CEO, David Lieber, and our Chief Financial and Regulatory Officer, Harry Taylor. On the call today, we will provide an overview of our quarterly and annual results, and then we'll take some time answering as many questions as time permits. Today's discussions will likely touch on estimates and other forward-looking information. You should review the cautionary language in today's earnings release and our MD&A, which we filed this morning, regarding the various factors, assumptions, and risks that could cause our actual results to differ as they all apply to this call.

With that, I'll turn the call over to our President and CEO, David Lieber. Thank you, Omar. Good morning, and thank you for joining us for our fourth quarter 2024 earnings call. This morning, I'll provide an update on our recent activities and accomplishments this past year. Then Harry will take you through the financial results. As we reflect on 2024 and look to the year ahead, I am proud of Hydro One's journey and the strides we have made together. Through the year, we demonstrated an unwavering commitment to safety, a refreshed strategy, and a dedication to customers, partnerships, and communities. Successful execution of these commitments continues to make us a stronger company. I'm also proud of the hard work and dedication of our team in bringing to the our teams bring to the job every day. It is their enthusiasm and commitment that allows us to meet the expectations and needs of our customers, partners, and stakeholders. The nature of our work means safety will always be a focus for us. I'm happy to report that in 2024, we had another strong year of safety results. Our recordable injury rate was below our target and our high energy serious injury rate held steady at 0.023. In 2024, Hydro One achieved a recordable injury rate of 0.55 for 200,000 hours, which remains well below the world-class benchmark of 1.0. This achievement stems from a culture where every employee feels responsible, not only for their own safety, but also for the safety of their colleagues. For the third year in a row, Hydro One was a recipient of Electricity Canada's President's Award of Excellence for employee safety in the transmission segment. This award recognizes the safest Canadian utility as measured by all injury frequency and lost time injury severity rates. With continued focus, I'm confident we can eliminate all serious injuries and fatalities and ensure our employees come home safe at the end of each day. In May, I shared our refresh strategy, which in large part focused on understanding and meeting our customers' evolving needs while delivering on exceptional customer experience. Even though it's been less than a year since we announced the refresh strategy, our customers are telling us we are improving. In 2024, our residential and small business customer satisfaction scores in our distribution business increased 88%, continuing the positive trend observed over the past few years. Our commercial and industrial customer satisfaction scores also remain robust, achieving a score of 85%. Additionally, we attained high satisfaction scores for our transmission customers with an 85% rating. While there's more work to be done, these results underscore commitment to establishing Hydro One as a reliable energy partner. In 2024, Hydro One met its capital investment commitments, ensuring our transmission and distribution systems continue to meet the growing demand for clean electricity. This past year, we deployed more than $3 billion of capital and in-serviced approximately $2.5 billion of assets. The investments will supply the critical infrastructure needed to support electrification efforts across the province and Ontario's economic growth. We are mindful that every dollar we invest is supported by rates. Consequently, we are committed to spending prudently and reducing capital and operating costs. I am pleased to report that in 2024, productivity savings in capital and operating expenditures amounted to $150 million. Our Chatham by Lakeshore transmission project was completed and energized at the end of 2024. The line was completed one year ahead of schedule and $30 million under budget. The completion of this project represents a significant milestone as it will be the first 50-50 First Nations Equity Partnership. We expect our partners will secure their equity financing in 2025. The Chatham by Lakeshore line will provide clean electricity to support the growth in the agri-food and manufacturing industries, as well as the population growth in southwestern Ontario. In December, we commenced with the construction of the Wassigan Transmission Line project in northwest Ontario. This significant milestone represents the culmination of several years of collaboration and engagement with Indigenous communities, government agencies, local organizations, and community residents. Full completion of the line is expected in 2027. Additionally, we are pleased to announce that Hydro One has been chosen to develop and construct the Wawa to Porcupine transmission line in northeastern Ontario. The line will be a new 260 kilometer, 500 kilovolt transmission line, initially energized at 230 kilovolt between Wawa Transformer Station and the Porcupine Transformer Station in Timmins. The line is expected to be in service by the end of 2030. Reinforcing our position as Ontario's transmitter of choice, In December, we announced an agreement to purchase a 48% interest in the East-West Thai transmission line for $257 million. The line is a 450 kilovolt, 230 kV double circuit transmission line regulated by the Ontario Energy Board, spanning from Wawa to Thunder Bay. The line, which we already maintain, is a strategic asset that will be accretive to earnings and further enhances our ability to support electrification efforts in Northern Ontario. The transaction is anticipated to close the first half of 2025, pending the fulfillment of standard closing conditions. I want to take a moment to address the issue of tariffs. Like many of our peers, we continue to monitor the evolving tariff situation and the uncertainty that tariffs will have on our business. Recently, as part of Team Ontario, I visited Washington, D.C. for meetings and discussions with our American counterparts and Canadians on the ground about the escalating trade tension between Canada and the U.S. There's a lot at stake. What I heard and saw in Washington was a strong desire for many groups and organizations to find a mutually beneficial path forward. Once again, Forbes has included Hydro One in their annual list of Canada's best employers for 2025, marking the 10th consecutive year of recognition. The ranking is based on recommendations from employees and professionals who view Hydro One as a desirable employer. The rankings are derived from independent surveys of more than 40,000 Canadians working in companies with a minimum of 500 employees, Hydro One was also included in Forbes Honor Roll, which lists 30 companies consistently recognized for 10 years. We are proud of what we have achieved at Hydro One, fostering an open and welcoming workplace based on trust and mutual respect, where our teams feel heard, valued, and have a true sense of belonging. Before I turn the call over to Harry, I want to take a moment to acknowledge some recent organizational changes to the executive leadership team. Andrew Spencer, who is our Executive Vice President of Capital Portfolio Delivery, left the company in December. We have started a competitive search process, and we'll look at both internal and external candidates for his replacement. I want to reassure everyone that with the deep bench strength of talent across the organization, we have the critical skills and capabilities to successfully execute Hydro One's corporate strategy, meet or exceed our stakeholders' and partners' expectations, and drive the province's electrification agenda. I thank Andrew for his long years of service to the company and wish him all the best. I'm also pleased to announce the addition of Jillian Whitebread as our new Executive Vice President, Head of Human Resources. Jillian is a seasoned human resource executive with a track record of achieving business results through the alignment of HR practices and business strategies. With her extensive experience, she will continue to strengthen our human capital strategy to meet the evolving needs of our business and to align with our overall business goals. With that, I'll turn it over to Harry to discuss our financial results. Harry, over to you.