Earnings call transcript: TransAlta Corp Q2 2025 sees stock rise 7.65%

TransAlta Corporation, with a market capitalization of nearly $5 billion, reported strong financial results for the second quarter of 2025, with notable improvements in adjusted EBITDA and free cash flow. The company’s diverse energy portfolio and strategic initiatives contributed to a stock price increase of 7.65%, closing at $23.49. According to InvestingPro data, the company has achieved impressive returns of over 81% in the past six months. TransAlta’s focus on energy transition and data center opportunities in Alberta were key highlights from the earnings call.

Key Takeaways

• TransAlta’s Q2 2025 adjusted EBITDA increased by $33 million year-over-year to $349 million.
• Free cash flow reached $177 million, translating to $0.60 per share.
• The stock price surged 7.65%, reflecting positive investor sentiment.
• Strategic recontracting and data center developments were emphasized.
• The company is exploring coal-to-gas conversion and renewable additions at its Centralia site.

Company Performance

TransAlta demonstrated robust performance in Q2 2025, with significant contributions from its hydro segment, which reported a $43 million year-over-year increase. While the wind and solar segments remained stable, the gas segment saw a decline of $14 million. The company generated total revenue of $1.84 billion in the last twelve months, with an EBITDA of $600.54 million. Despite this, the company’s strategic diversification across energy sources has positioned it well in the market, especially with its ongoing energy transition efforts. InvestingPro subscribers have access to 17 additional key insights about TransAlta’s performance and outlook.

Financial Highlights

• Adjusted EBITDA: $349 million, up $33 million YoY
• Free Cash Flow: $177 million or $0.60 per share
• Hydro Segment: $126 million, up $43 million YoY
• Wind/Solar Segment: $89 million, flat YoY
• Gas Segment: $128 million, down $14 million YoY

Market Reaction

TransAlta’s stock experienced a notable increase of 7.65% following the earnings announcement, closing at $23.49. This positive movement reflects investor confidence in the company’s strategic direction and financial health. The stock’s performance is notable given its 52-week range of $11.16 to $23.75, indicating strong market support. Based on InvestingPro’s Fair Value analysis, the stock appears to be trading above its intrinsic value. The company has maintained dividend payments for 38 consecutive years, currently offering a dividend yield of 1.19%.

Outlook & Guidance

Looking ahead, TransAlta remains focused on delivering adjusted EBITDA and free cash flow within its guidance. The company is prioritizing safety improvements, maximizing the value of legacy thermal sites, and pursuing strategic mergers and acquisitions. The exploration of data center opportunities in Alberta and potential renewable investments at the Centralia site are pivotal to its future growth strategy.

Executive Commentary

CEO John Kousinioris expressed confidence in the company’s trajectory, stating, "We delivered exceptional results during the second quarter." He also highlighted the importance of developing a supportive framework for data center ambitions in Alberta, emphasizing, "We remain confident that the province will develop a framework that will support our data center ambitions."

Risks and Challenges

• Market Volatility: Fluctuations in energy prices could impact profitability.
• Regulatory Changes: Potential changes in environmental regulations could affect operations.
• Execution Risks: Delays in strategic initiatives like data center projects could hinder growth.
• Competition: Increased competition in renewable energy markets could pressure margins.
• Supply Chain: Disruptions could affect project timelines and costs.

TransAlta’s strategic focus and diversified portfolio continue to drive its strong performance, positioning it favorably in the evolving energy market.

Full transcript - TransAlta Corp (TA) Q2 2025:

Stephanie Paris, Vice President, Investor Relations and Corporate Strategy, TransAlta Corporation: Good morning. My name is Livia and I’ll be your conference operator today. At this time, I would like to welcome everyone to TransAlta Corporation’s second quarter 2025 results conference call. All lines have been placed on mute to prevent any background noise. After the speaker’s remarks, there will be a question and answer session. If you would like to ask a question during this time, simply press 11 on your telephone keypad. If you would like to withdraw your question, please press 11 again. Thank you, Ms. Paris. You may begin your conference. Thank you, Livia. Good morning, everyone. My name is Stephanie Paris and I am the Vice President, Investor Relations and Corporate Strategy of TransAlta. Welcome to TransAlta’s second quarter 2025 conference call.

With me today are John Kousinioris, President and Chief Executive Officer, Joel Hunter, Executive Vice President, Finance and Chief Financial Officer, Blain van Melle, Executive Vice President, Commercial and Customer Relations, and Nancy Brennan, Executive Vice President, Legal and External Affairs. Today’s call is being webcast and I invite those listening on the phone lines to view the supporting slides that are posted on our website. A replay of the call will be available later today and the transcript will be posted to our website shortly thereafter. All the information provided during this conference call is subject to the forward-looking statement qualifications set out here on slide 2, detailed further in our MD&A and incorporated in full for purposes of today’s call. All amounts referenced are in Canadian dollars unless otherwise noted. The non-IFRS terminology used, including adjusted EBITDA and free cash flow, are reconciled in the MD&A.

For your reference on today’s call, John and Joel will provide an overview of TransAlta’s quarterly results. After these remarks, we will open the call for questions. With that, I will turn the call over to John.

John Kousinioris, President and Chief Executive Officer, TransAlta Corporation: Thank you, Stephanie. Good morning everyone and thank you for joining our second quarter conference call for 2025. As part of our commitment towards reconciliation, I want to begin by acknowledging that our company operates on the traditional territories of Indigenous peoples across Canada, Australia, and the United States. We recognize the rich and diverse histories, cultures, and contributions of the First Nations, Inuit, Métis, Aboriginal, and Native American communities. It is with gratitude and respect that we thank the peoples who have lived on these lands for generations for reminding us of the ongoing histories that precede us. TransAlta delivered exceptional results during the second quarter. Our Alberta portfolio’s hedging strategy and active asset optimization generated realized prices well above spot prices, while our hydro and wind assets provided significant environmental offsets to our gas fleet’s carbon compliance obligation, highlighting the value of our diverse and integrated generating fleet.

We were also pleased with the performance of our contracted fleet, which exceeded our expectations. During the quarter, we delivered adjusted EBITDA of $349 million, free cash flow of $177 million or $0.60 per share, and average fleet availability of 91.6%. We also successfully recontracted our Melancthon 1, Melancthon 2, and Wolfe Island wind facilities in Ontario. The new contracts will replace the current energy contracts for the three wind facilities when they expire, extending their respective contract dates to 2031 for Melancthon 1 and to 2034 for Melancthon 2 and Wolfe Island. Wholesale electricity prices in Ontario are rising, signaling a growing tightness in the supply and demand balance in the province, which sets our fleet up well for recontracting in the next decade.

We continue to engage directly with the Government of Alberta and the Alberta Electric System Operator on the Alberta data center strategy and their approach to large load integration as well as the restructured energy market design, or REM. In June, the Alberta Electric System Operator released details on Phase one of its approach to data centers, which involved the allocation of 1,200 megawatts of system capacity to data center proponents within the province, including TransAlta. The Alberta Electric System Operator has now commenced work on Phase two of its data center strategy, which will establish the framework for incremental data center development in the province.

The Government of Alberta continues to express their commitment to the development of a data center industry in a manner that enables investment while maintaining an affordable and reliable electricity system, and we remain confident that the province will develop a framework that will support our data center ambitions, which in turn will see significant investment dollars come to Alberta. Turning more specifically to the work that we’re doing in realizing the value of our legacy generation sites, we’re pleased with the progress that we’re making on our Alberta data center strategy and the associated commercial negotiations, which now reflect the AESO’s approach to large load integration. The AESO currently expects Demand Transmission Service contracts to be executed in mid September, which will secure each proponent’s access to system capacity.

We continue to work closely with our counterparties and are progressing towards the execution of a data center Memorandum of Understanding in relation to our system capacity allocation. We’re excited about the data center opportunity in Alberta, both for the meaningful investment it brings to the province as well as the anticipated increase in load, which we expect will rebalance the current oversupply of generation in the province, an added benefit for our diverse Alberta portfolio. At our Centralia site, we’re actively engaged in commercial negotiations and continue to target executing a definitive agreement before year end. We expect to be able to share detailed development plans for Centralia in the coming months as we firm our plan forward for the site. I’ll now pass the call over to Joel.

Joel Hunter, Executive Vice President, Finance and Chief Financial Officer, TransAlta Corporation: Thanks John and good morning everyone. We are pleased with our second quarter operational and financial performance and remain confident in our ability to meet our 2025 guidance range. During the quarter, we generated $349 million of adjusted EBITDA, which was $33 million higher than the second quarter of 2024 due to favorable ancillary service pricing, the use of environmental and tax attributes in Alberta, and the optimization of our assets to capture price volatility in Alberta and at our Centralia site in Washington State. Turning to our segmented results relative to the same period in 2024, hydro segment adjusted EBITDA increased to $126 million relative to $83 million last year due to higher intercompany sales of emissions credits to the gas segment to fulfill our 2024 GHG obligation as well as higher production and ancillary prices.

The wind and solar segment produced adjusted EBITDA of $89 million in line with the second quarter 2024, primarily due to higher environmental and tax attributes revenue in Alberta that was offset by lower tax attributes revenue from our Oklahoma assets and lower Alberta power pricing for a merchant wind fleet. In the gas segment, adjusted EBITDA decreased to $128 million from $142 million in 2024, mostly due to lower realized power prices in Alberta and higher carbon and natural gas pricing, which was partially offset by the addition of the Heartland and previously mentioned higher quantity of internally generated emissions credits utilized to settle a portion of our 2024 GHG obligation.

The Energy Transition segment delivered adjusted EBITDA of $19 million, a $17 million increase year over year due to higher market optimization benefits and higher availability at our Centralia facility, which had an extended turnaround in the second quarter of last year. Energy marketing adjusted EBITDA decreased by $13 million to $26 million, primarily due to comparatively subdued market volatility across North American natural gas and power markets and lower realized settled trades in the quarter compared to last year. Corporate adjusted EBITDA was in line with last year at $39 million, largely due to increased spending to support our strategic and growth initiatives and the addition of corporate costs related to the acquisition of Heartland. As a reminder, our adjusted EBITDA excludes the impact of ERP costs as the integration is not reflective of ongoing operations or the performance of our operating assets.

Overall, this strong performance generated free cash flow of $177 million in the second quarter, in line with the same period last year. Our higher adjusted EBITDA was offset by higher sustaining capital expenditures in our gas fleet during the quarter, as well as higher net current tax and interest expenses. Turning to the Alberta portfolio, the second quarter spot price averaged $40 per megawatt hour, which was lower than the average price of $45 per megawatt hour in 2024. The decline year over year was primarily due to incremental generation from the addition of new gas, wind, and solar supply in the province, as well as benign weather.

Throughout the quarter, we deployed hedging strategies to enhance our portfolio margins and mitigate the impact of lower merchant power prices and realized the benefit from approximately 1,900 gigawatt hours of hedges at an average price of $70 per megawatt hour, representing a 75% premium to the average spot price. In addition, our hydro fleet delivered an average realized merchant price of $82 per megawatt hour, a 105% premium to the average spot price, while the gas fleet realized a 55% premium to the average spot price. Our merchant wind fleet, which cannot be used as firm power for hedging activities, realized an average price of $23 per megawatt hour. We were able to deliver additional ancillary volumes across the Alberta fleet in the quarter. Our average realized price for ancillary service pricing settled at $42 per megawatt hour, a 5% premium to the average spot price.

Despite relatively benign weather in the quarter, which resulted in lower spot power prices, we captured additional margins by fulfilling a portion of our higher price hedges with purchase power when prices were below our variable cost of production, leading to an overall realized price per megawatt hour produced of $111. Looking at the balance of the year, we have approximately 4,300 GWh of our Alberta generation hedged at an average price of $69 per megawatt hour, well above the current forward curve of $48 per megawatt hour. Going forward, we expect to continue to optimize our fleet and reduce production in low-priced, high-supply hours by fulfilling our financial hedges and customer requirements with open market purchases. Looking at next year, our team has increased our hedge position to approximately 7,000 GWh at an average price of $67 per megawatt hour, which remains well above current forward pricing levels.

I’ll now turn the call back over to John. Thank you, Joel.

John Kousinioris, President and Chief Executive Officer, TransAlta Corporation: We remain focused on the following priorities for 2025. First, delivering adjusted EBITDA and free cash flow within our 2025 guidance ranges. Second, improving our leading and lagging safety performance indicators while achieving strong fleet availability. Third, maximizing the value of our legacy thermal energy campuses by capturing the opportunity presented in securing a data center customer at Alberta Thermal as well as a coal to gas conversion at Centralia. Fourth, successfully pursuing any strategic M&A opportunities that may arise. Fifth, maintaining our financial strength and flexibility, which Joel and his team advanced through the extension of our credit facilities in July, and finally implementing the upgrade to our ERP program. I believe TransAlta offers a compelling investment opportunity.

We’re a safe and reliable operator with strong cash flows underpinned by our diversified hydro, wind, solar, and gas portfolio located across three countries and complemented by our leading asset optimization and energy marketing capabilities. We’re a clean electricity leader with a focus on tangible greenhouse gas emission reductions as we remain on track to achieve our ambitious 2026 CO2 emissions reduction target. There is significant and growing value in our legacy thermal sites, which our team is actively working to repurpose to meet the growing need for reliable generation in the jurisdictions in which we operate. We remain disciplined in our approach to growth, focused on delivering value to our shareholders within our core jurisdictions as we work to diversify our portfolio and increase the stability and contractiveness of our cash flows. Our company also has a sound financial foundation.

Our balance sheet is flexible and we have ample liquidity to pursue and deliver multiple growth opportunities, along with the ability to also return capital to our shareholders through dividends and share repurchases. Finally, and most importantly, we have our people. Our people are our greatest asset. I want to thank all our employees and contractors for their commitment in setting the company up for success in the second half of 2025. Thank you. I’ll now turn the call over to Stephanie.

Stephanie Paris, Vice President, Investor Relations and Corporate Strategy, TransAlta Corporation: Thank you, John. Operator. Livia, would you please open the call for questions from the analysts? Certainly. Ladies and gentlemen, to ask a question at this time, you will need to press Star 11 on your telephone and wait for your name to be announced. To withdraw your question, simply press Star 11 again. Please stand by while we compile the Q&A roster. Now, first question coming from the line of Robert Hope with Scotiabank. Q&A is now open.

John Kousinioris, President and Chief Executive Officer, TransAlta Corporation: Hello everyone. First question on the data center discussions.

Joel Hunter, Executive Vice President, Finance and Chief Financial Officer, TransAlta Corporation: With your customers there.

John Kousinioris, President and Chief Executive Officer, TransAlta Corporation: What are the gating factors to successfully?

Joel Hunter, Executive Vice President, Finance and Chief Financial Officer, TransAlta Corporation: Execute an MOU there as well.

John Kousinioris, President and Chief Executive Officer, TransAlta Corporation: If additional capacity does come up for grab, just given the fact that two developers have dropped out, do you have, we’ll call it, enough demand in pocket?

Joel Hunter, Executive Vice President, Finance and Chief Financial Officer, TransAlta Corporation: To go out after those as well.

John Kousinioris, President and Chief Executive Officer, TransAlta Corporation: Good morning, Robert. In terms of the additional stage gating items, it isn’t that there is any significant impediment to us moving forward. It just takes time for us to finalize all of the terms associated with the MOU. We’re working with our customers. They have work that they’re doing as well. We had a shift in the approach that the AESO was taking around data centers, and all of that just takes time. What I can tell you is that we’re very, very pleased with the progress that we’re making and are confident in the project as we’re envisioning it going forward. In terms of additional capacity, we’re focused on the capacity that’s been allocated to us and we’re also focused on what subsequent stages of development could occur at the site. That takes a bit of time to think through with our team.

Those would be the main things. Right now, I’m not seeing any significant impediments. We’re just working things through. Great.

Joel Hunter, Executive Vice President, Finance and Chief Financial Officer, TransAlta Corporation: Appreciate that.

John Kousinioris, President and Chief Executive Officer, TransAlta Corporation: Maybe turning attention to south of the border midlife natural gas. Can you update us on how you’re thinking about that market and is this an increasing focus for the organization? The short answer is yes, it is an increasing focus for the organization. We’re actually seeing quite a few opportunities south of the border, but actually in places also north of the border, I would say around natural gas. Our focus is obviously on facilities that would be in the core markets that we’re focused on, which is the West, in particular the Pac Northwest, and also I would say, the desert Southwest. There are also opportunities potentially in Ontario that we’re looking at. It is very active for our team. We like the multiples that we see those assets being traded at right now. They work for us. Given our energy marketing expertise, they really are a priority.

I would say we are also seeing selectively opportunities around renewables as well, as there’s been a bit of compression in the multiples both on the renewables and at the same time a bit of an increase in the multiples on gas. To a certain point, they actually overlap a little bit. Joel, I don’t know if you want to add anything to that.

Joel Hunter, Executive Vice President, Finance and Chief Financial Officer, TransAlta Corporation: No, I think John, you’re right.

John Kousinioris, President and Chief Executive Officer, TransAlta Corporation: No, it’s a busy time for our team.

Joel Hunter, Executive Vice President, Finance and Chief Financial Officer, TransAlta Corporation: Excellent. Thank you.

John Kousinioris, President and Chief Executive Officer, TransAlta Corporation: Thanks, Robert.

Stephanie Paris, Vice President, Investor Relations and Corporate Strategy, TransAlta Corporation: Thank you. Our next question coming from the line of Maurice Choy with RBC Capital Markets. Your line is now open.

John Kousinioris, President and Chief Executive Officer, TransAlta Corporation: Thank you and good morning everyone. Just a quick one on phase one.

Joel Hunter, Executive Vice President, Finance and Chief Financial Officer, TransAlta Corporation: Just my broad question here.

John Kousinioris, President and Chief Executive Officer, TransAlta Corporation: It sounds like you have really good.

Joel Hunter, Executive Vice President, Finance and Chief Financial Officer, TransAlta Corporation: Momentum here towards securing your MOU. I’m just curious if the timeline has changed in terms of your expectations since the Q1 call.

John Kousinioris, President and Chief Executive Officer, TransAlta Corporation: Sounds like you would have been able to announce an MOU on this call.

Joel Hunter, Executive Vice President, Finance and Chief Financial Officer, TransAlta Corporation: Had it not been decision to move the AESO decision to mid September.

John Kousinioris, President and Chief Executive Officer, TransAlta Corporation: More broadly, do you.

Joel Hunter, Executive Vice President, Finance and Chief Financial Officer, TransAlta Corporation: Think Alberta is capable of delivering power to, say, gigawatt-scale data centers even.

John Kousinioris, President and Chief Executive Officer, TransAlta Corporation: If it’s over phases?

Joel Hunter, Executive Vice President, Finance and Chief Financial Officer, TransAlta Corporation: What would that require? Thank you.

John Kousinioris, President and Chief Executive Officer, TransAlta Corporation: Yeah, on the first point, look, when we talked about sort of mid-year, roughly speaking, to get an MOU done, that was on the basis of the best knowledge we had at the time. In that first quarter, we are actively involved right now. We are making progress. There has been an evolution in the way that we envision the project developing, not just in terms of our immediate allocation but over time. That just takes time to work through. We’re diligently progressing that, and we do expect to advance that in a very orderly way in the coming period. On your second question.

Joel Hunter, Executive Vice President, Finance and Chief Financial Officer, TransAlta Corporation: Yep.

John Kousinioris, President and Chief Executive Officer, TransAlta Corporation: On the second part on delivering additional megawatts here, all of the discussions that we’re having with the AESO, I think the vision that the province has on seeing incremental load come into the province and develop a healthy and vibrant data center industry in the province remains unabated. I would say we’re focused on bringing subsequent phases of load on our site. We have all these great attributes at our facility there to see it through. We’re not alone in the province in that regard, and I think we’re confident, I know our company is confident that we will see a pretty vibrant data center industry develop in the province over time. The other thing I would say is this shouldn’t be lost on people.

It will serve to also rebalance load in the province, which is a particular benefit, I would say, to a company like ours that has that diversity of fleet that can benefit through the portfolio and the great optimization team that we have.

Joel Hunter, Executive Vice President, Finance and Chief Financial Officer, TransAlta Corporation: Sounds great.

John Kousinioris, President and Chief Executive Officer, TransAlta Corporation: Thank you very much.

Joel Hunter, Executive Vice President, Finance and Chief Financial Officer, TransAlta Corporation: Sure.

Stephanie Paris, Vice President, Investor Relations and Corporate Strategy, TransAlta Corporation: Thank you. Our next question coming from Benjamin Pham with BMO Capital Markets. The line is now open.

Joel Hunter, Executive Vice President, Finance and Chief Financial Officer, TransAlta Corporation: Thanks, Kamor. Want to stay on the same topic, and maybe just for you, John, can you elaborate? You mentioned versus Q1 or maybe a different timeline. The project materializing a bit differently than how you envisioned. Can you expand on that a bit? Is that size, counterparty, just any additional details would be helpful.

John Kousinioris, President and Chief Executive Officer, TransAlta Corporation: No, it isn’t about counterparties or even particularly about size. It’s more around getting clarity in June from the AESO in terms of how the phase was going to actually play out. Up until that time, we were not really guessing, but anticipating the pathways that it could take and how our facilities could fit into that. We got clarity, you know, a month and a bit ago, and we’re working with our customers to kind of realize it now that we’ve got clarity and also spending time with them to figure out, you know, what subsequent stages look like and what the timing would be. It’s not that there’s a deviation or a significant change in the process that we’re doing. It just takes time to get it done in the way that makes sense for everybody. We remain very confident.

In fact, I’d say more confident now and very pleased in the process that we’re making.

Joel Hunter, Executive Vice President, Finance and Chief Financial Officer, TransAlta Corporation: Okay, that’s good to hear. I know you mentioned the mid-September DTS execution, but that doesn’t suggest from your eyes that an MOU is around that timeline. It sounds like your timelines have shifted a bit from your initial expectations.

John Kousinioris, President and Chief Executive Officer, TransAlta Corporation: That’s right. We’re working on it. The DTS execution timeline is something we’re obviously aware of because we’re focused on securing our position. We will be entering into that contract on that date. Honestly, our MOU is working kind of in a pathway that is separate from a timing perspective to that. That DTS contract component is a given from our perspective, if I can put it that way.

Joel Hunter, Executive Vice President, Finance and Chief Financial Officer, TransAlta Corporation: Okay, got it. Maybe just the last one. Same topic here is, let’s just assume what you have here, the allocation phase. One year, you shored up MOU, and then contract. Is there additional opportunity from Keephills or other assets to engage in additional PPAs with data centers that are built that need power, which is a strategy that maybe some other folks may be taking?

John Kousinioris, President and Chief Executive Officer, TransAlta Corporation: What I would say to that is the way that we are working with our customer right now would sort of see us at least in the immediate phase, being a comprehensive solution for the customer that we’re working with. We’re not currently envisioning that we’re breaking that up or parceling it up at this point in time.

Joel Hunter, Executive Vice President, Finance and Chief Financial Officer, TransAlta Corporation: Okay, got it. That’s useful. Thank you.

John Kousinioris, President and Chief Executive Officer, TransAlta Corporation: Yep.

Stephanie Paris, Vice President, Investor Relations and Corporate Strategy, TransAlta Corporation: Thank you. Our next question coming from the line of John Mould with TD Cowen. The line is now open.

Joel Hunter, Executive Vice President, Finance and Chief Financial Officer, TransAlta Corporation: Hi. Morning, everybody. Maybe just starting with potential fleet investments in Alberta, and that’s in the context of the data center opportunity. In the scenario of a material market tightening, your older coal to gas units, presumably we wouldn’t see them running at 90% capacity factors outside of K3. What kind of normalized capacity factor could we see from the Sundance or Sheerness assets if the market does tighten by 1.2 gigawatts, let’s say. Are there any additional investments that you need to make on your end to maintain that level of utilization?

John Kousinioris, President and Chief Executive Officer, TransAlta Corporation: Yeah. Good morning, John. If it depends on the pace at which the data centers come into the province, but in the scenario that you described, where the full 1.2 gigawatts ends up coming into the province, reliability in the province would absolutely require our fleet to be running at relatively high capacity factors. It doesn’t take too much for the reserve margin in the province to actually tighten up, with the result that our units have both significantly higher capacity factors and also an associated increase in the realized spot price in the province beyond, I would say, what the forward curve is currently indicating. In terms of capital investment that we would need to make sure that we do this so that we’ve got the units in the appropriate kit, in the context of also our own data center obligations, it is relatively modest.

I would say we’re not talking numbers that are beyond kind of the tens of millions of dollars, normal core sustaining capital for the units to make sure that they’re able to run. What is required on the part of our company, which is work that we’re doing now, is envisioning what do the 2030s look like as we get into the next decade to meet in an efficient manner load growth over that period of time. I think we’re in a good place because we’ve got a lot of optionality around our fleet, and it is, physically, operationally, in a very good place. Okay, thanks for that detail.

Joel Hunter, Executive Vice President, Finance and Chief Financial Officer, TransAlta Corporation: Regarding your comments around the phase two expansion and engaging with counterparties there, I am wondering what those discussions are like so far in terms of the timing that customers are hoping to see and what kind of initial dialogue you’ve had with government or AESO regarding phase two, how they’re approaching it, the pace that could be achieved on that consultation, and giving the market clarity there.

John Kousinioris, President and Chief Executive Officer, TransAlta Corporation: Yeah, I’ll maybe start with the back part of your question and then flip to the front part of the question, John. Look, the discussions with the AESO and even the government are at, I would say, at a relatively early phase. We understand that they want to encourage the development of the industry while making sure that we have reasonable prices in the province and an appropriate level of reliability. That makes a lot of sense to us in terms of the way that they’re progressing that. The work and the discussions are at an early phase. I think in principle, that makes a lot of sense and is very logical in terms of timing. I can tell you that we’re encouraging them to do it as promptly as they possibly can. Ideally, we would end up getting some certainty before the end of the year.

Maybe it drifts into the early part of the next year. I think it’s important from a planning perspective for companies like ours, given where the supply chain is, if you see what I’m saying, in terms of our need to envision the 2030s and beyond to be able to have that certainty, to get the planning that we need to move forward. The AESO understands that and they’re acutely aware of that going forward. In terms of our discussions with our customers with respect to that, there isn’t a lot that I can candidly say on the call other than it is a focus area for them. They do have a view on what a ramp up could potentially be, and we’re working with them to be able to plan that up and make sure that we serve their needs in an appropriate manner as we go forward.

Okay, that’s great.

Joel Hunter, Executive Vice President, Finance and Chief Financial Officer, TransAlta Corporation: Thanks.

John Kousinioris, President and Chief Executive Officer, TransAlta Corporation: Maybe one last one.

Joel Hunter, Executive Vice President, Finance and Chief Financial Officer, TransAlta Corporation: On carbon credit sales, those are up year over year, and I appreciate some of that’s a function of the TIER program structure. Alberta has said it’ll freeze the TIER price. You know, obviously that’s in conflict with the minimum national carbon price from the federal government. How are you thinking about your carbon credit portfolio more broadly? And then a bit of an aside, but does that remain a tool in the data center discussion, or is the carbon aspect of that data center conversation less relevant right now?

John Kousinioris, President and Chief Executive Officer, TransAlta Corporation: Yeah, look, I would be remiss if I started sort of predicting where kind of the province will end up from a tier perspective at the $95 level where we are today, versus the escalation that is required from a policy perspective at the federal government. For much of the planning that we do, we tend to think of a continuation of carbon pricing. I think that’s sort of a conservative view that we take in terms of the fleet. I think that’s to be determined. To be candid, John, in terms of our environmental attributes portfolio in the province, it is a real advantage that we have both on the hydro side and on the wind side.

It is able to provide a meaningful reduction in the impact of the emissions that we have on our fleet, which tends to be a little bit less efficient than some of the new facilities that have been built. It basically nullifies that differential between ours and those kind of facilities. The values are pretty significant. We see a lot of value in those attributes. We’ll continue to, I think, Joel, probably the right word is monetize those assets as we go forward and use them to ensure the competitiveness of our fleet, but also in a cost effective way meet the needs of our data center customer going forward. It’s a real asset, I would say, that we have. Okay, I’ll leave it there.

Joel Hunter, Executive Vice President, Finance and Chief Financial Officer, TransAlta Corporation: Thanks for taking my questions.

John Kousinioris, President and Chief Executive Officer, TransAlta Corporation: Thank you.

Stephanie Paris, Vice President, Investor Relations and Corporate Strategy, TransAlta Corporation: Thank you. Our next question coming from the line of Mark Jarvi with CIBC. Your line is now open.

John Kousinioris, President and Chief Executive Officer, TransAlta Corporation: Good morning everyone.

Joel Hunter, Executive Vice President, Finance and Chief Financial Officer, TransAlta Corporation: Are you able to state how much allocation you received in phase one?

John Kousinioris, President and Chief Executive Officer, TransAlta Corporation: Mark, we haven’t stated how much allocation we have, and we’re not in a position to actually give that right now. What I would say is we’re comfortable with it, we’re working around it, and our customers are also comfortable with it, particularly in the context of how they envision the development of our site working forward. Our focus with them is as much on subsequent stages as it is on the base amount.

Joel Hunter, Executive Vice President, Finance and Chief Financial Officer, TransAlta Corporation: Have you made changes in terms of which assets you think you would use to serve the customer on the allocation through phase one, like I seen before, like Keephills Unit 2 was there, is it more thinking Unit 3 or combining with hydro? You kind of made a comment about the hydro offsets being something that might be a tool you can use for your customer.

John Kousinioris, President and Chief Executive Officer, TransAlta Corporation: Yeah, I think there’s sort of two parts to that question. I think one of them would be in terms of the physical location for the data center. That would very much be, you know, in and around our Centralia site. That is the work that we’re doing, and all of the, you know, everything from permitting right through to geotechnical work, it’s all with a view to developing the physical site there for the center. As you know, it requires a large-ish footprint to be able to do that. In terms of how we serve the load, we can serve it more broadly from, I would say, our entire fleet. It isn’t just wedded to Centralia. As we think of subsequent phases, it might be a little bit, you know, potentially a little bit more unit contingent, if I can put it that way.

Right now we absolutely have our entire, you know, based on the structure of phase one, we absolutely have our entire portfolio to be able to use to basically serve the needs of our customer going forward, which is really, really helpful. It’s great having that portfolio. No, that’s great to hear.

Joel Hunter, Executive Vice President, Finance and Chief Financial Officer, TransAlta Corporation: Do you need clarity on phase two to get to a dissent agreement with your customer, or can you do it in stages where, using the first allocation, you can move to commercial final contract and then have an ability to contract beyond that for subsequent megawatts?

John Kousinioris, President and Chief Executive Officer, TransAlta Corporation: Yeah, I think it’s more the, if I remember your statement, more the latter part. In other words, we’re looking at the finalization of our MOU will not require the finalization of phase two of the consultation process. I think we have a number of tools to be able to deal with subsequent staging going forward. Hopefully that gives you a sense. No, that’s helpful.

Joel Hunter, Executive Vice President, Finance and Chief Financial Officer, TransAlta Corporation: The last, just for me on this topic here is just.

Stephanie Paris, Vice President, Investor Relations and Corporate Strategy, TransAlta Corporation: The decision.

Joel Hunter, Executive Vice President, Finance and Chief Financial Officer, TransAlta Corporation: Not to try to buy allocations from other people. Obviously, it would have been upfront payment for that, but versus having to invest to bring in new capacity to serve new load, which I believe is the criteria that will come through in phase two. Just trying to square those two opportunities to get as much as you can now through phase one versus a bit more of a capital-intensive opportunity set through phase two.

John Kousinioris, President and Chief Executive Officer, TransAlta Corporation: Yeah, look, I’m not going to speculate or get into discussions on the reallocation of the megawatts that ended up taking place going forward. What I would say is I agree that the second phase is going to, like our working assumption is, it’s going to require incremental generation to be provided. What I would say in response to that, and this is a point that we’re working to speak to the government and the AESO about, is that underutilized facilities are akin to incremental generation being brought on in the province. If something has a capacity factor of 20%, it has a lot of room to provide additional generation to serve the needs of a data center customer, whether it’s in front of the fence or behind the fence, candidly, to be able to see it through.

That’s just something that we need to be very mindful of and is certainly a speaking point for us.

Joel Hunter, Executive Vice President, Finance and Chief Financial Officer, TransAlta Corporation: There’s one last one. The units that you had earmarked for the Pinnacle project, are those things that you can repurpose for a data center customer?

John Kousinioris, President and Chief Executive Officer, TransAlta Corporation: Potentially, yes. Okay, great.

Joel Hunter, Executive Vice President, Finance and Chief Financial Officer, TransAlta Corporation: Thanks.

John Kousinioris, President and Chief Executive Officer, TransAlta Corporation: Thank you.

Stephanie Paris, Vice President, Investor Relations and Corporate Strategy, TransAlta Corporation: Thank you. Our next question coming from the line of Julian Dumoulin Smith with Jefferies. Your line is now open.

John Kousinioris, President and Chief Executive Officer, TransAlta Corporation: Hi, this is Tanner on for Julian. Good morning, everyone.

Joel Hunter, Executive Vice President, Finance and Chief Financial Officer, TransAlta Corporation: Maybe just a follow-up on John’s question regarding the developing phase two discussion. Are the potential counterparties you’re speaking with the same kind of subset and type of customers, the same types of goals as phase one? Do you see discussions progressing similarly to the ones you’ve had over the past year?

John Kousinioris, President and Chief Executive Officer, TransAlta Corporation: Good morning, Tanner. What I would say is that our discussions are with a singular, I would say, customer, and they would encompass not only sort of phase one, but phase two. Okay, great, thanks.

Joel Hunter, Executive Vice President, Finance and Chief Financial Officer, TransAlta Corporation: I just wanted to follow up on your Centralia commentary and the extended timing. Do you still view the opportunity through the lens of a specific and singular customer with a well-defined development plan?

John Kousinioris, President and Chief Executive Officer, TransAlta Corporation: On site, or are there at this?

Joel Hunter, Executive Vice President, Finance and Chief Financial Officer, TransAlta Corporation: Point competing visions or counterparties under deliberation? Thanks.

John Kousinioris, President and Chief Executive Officer, TransAlta Corporation: Yeah, the work that we’re doing in Centralia is with respect to meeting the needs of a singular customer in that jurisdiction. It is around literally devoting the entire facility to that customer on a coal-converted-to-natural-gas-fired generation basis for an extended period of time. It would be a long-term power purchase arrangement or tolling agreement for that facility. There would need to be capital spent to do the conversion from coal to natural gas. It literally is in terms of the existing facilities we have on site all around Centralia Unit 2 and how we would bring that forward. Having said all of that, we do have a very large geographic footprint in the region.

Our team is also exploring potential opportunities to add other generation there, likely because of the gas constraints, at least initially, more in the vein of renewables, whether that would be solar power or wind power or possibly even storage on site. That could be for that singular customer or it could be for other customers. That’s something that is developing. The site is great. It’s about 80 kilometers, 60 miles or so away from the city of Seattle. It’s a great footprint. We have a skilled workforce there. Transmission is ample, to use a Canadianism. It’s really at center ice of the grid there. We view the unit as being critical to the reliability of the grid in that part of the world.

Joel Hunter, Executive Vice President, Finance and Chief Financial Officer, TransAlta Corporation: Fantastic. Thank you.

John Kousinioris, President and Chief Executive Officer, TransAlta Corporation: Thank you.

Stephanie Paris, Vice President, Investor Relations and Corporate Strategy, TransAlta Corporation: Thank you. There are no further questions in queue. I would now like to turn it back to Stephanie Paris for any closing remarks. Thank you, everyone. That concludes our call for today. If you have any further questions, please don’t hesitate to reach out to the TransAlta investor relations team. This concludes today’s conference call. Thank you for your participation, and you may now disconnect.

This article was generated with the support of AI and reviewed by an editor. For more information see our T&C.