Clean Energy Fuels - Q2 2023
August 9, 2023
Transcript
Operator (participant)
As a reminder, this conference is being recorded. It is now my pleasure to introduce our host, Robert Vreeland, Chief Financial Officer. Please go ahead.
Robert Vreeland (CFO)
Thank you, Operator. Earlier this afternoon, Clean Energy released financial results for the second quarter ending June 30, 2023. If you did not receive the release, it is available on the investor relations section of the company's website at www.cleanenergyfuels.com, where the call is also being webcast. There will be a replay available on the website for 30 days. Before we begin, we'd like to remind you that some of the information contained in the news release and on this conference call contains forward-looking statements that involve risk, uncertainties and assumptions that are difficult to predict. Such forward-looking statements are not a guarantee of performance, and the company's actual results could differ materially from those contained in such statements. Several factors that could cause or contribute to such differences are described in detail in the Risk Factors section of Clean Energy's Form 10-Q filed today.
These forward-looking statements speak only as of the date of this release. The company undertakes no obligation to publicly update any forward-looking statements or supply new information regarding the circumstances after the date of this release. The company's Non-GAAP, EPS, and Adjusted EBITDA will be reviewed on this call and exclude certain expenses that the company's management does not believe are indicative of the company's core business operating results. Non-GAAP financial measures should be considered in addition to results prepared in accordance with GAAP and should not be considered as a substitute for or superior to GAAP results. The directly comparable GAAP information, reasons why management uses Non-GAAP information, a definition of Non-GAAP EPS and Adjusted EBITDA, and a reconciliation between these Non-GAAP and GAAP figures is provided in the company's press release, which has been furnished to the SEC on Form 8-K today.
With that, I will turn the call over to our President and Chief ex-.
Andrew Littlefair (President and CEO)
Good afternoon, everyone, and thank you for joining us. If you haven't seen it yet, I'll note that we changed the format of our earnings press release a bit, that will hopefully make it easier to quickly see important data and highlights for the quarter. We know that many of you on this call are juggling multiple companies' earnings, so we want to make it as easy as possible. In that vein, I'm going to also make my opening remarks a little more concise on allowing us to get to your questions quicker. Let's jump in. Fortunately, the issue of historically high natural gas prices being charged by California utilities began to normalize in the second quarter, allowing our Adjusted EBITDA to improve to $12.1 million.
Not only was this a $16 million rebound from the first quarter, it was over 20% higher than Q2 of last year. Thanks in part to the opening of new stations anchored by our customer, Amazon, our RNG Fuel volumes climbed over 17% in the quarter compared to a year ago, to over 58 million gallons. We expect nice growth to continue through this year, with planned openings in the third quarter of additional key stations in Southern California, Texas, Washington State, Michigan, and Maryland. As I've said before, it's great to have a large anchor customer in Amazon, but these stations are strategically located in areas around distribution centers and can easily handle additional fleets. Revenue for the second quarter was $90 million. Remember, this was impacted by $14 million of non-cash Amazon warrant charges.
It's also slightly down from a year ago due to lower environmental credit prices. Those began to increase in the quarter and have held up nicely since. The Alternative Fuel Tax Credit, reinstated for 3 years in the Inflation Reduction Act, increased revenue by $5 million in the quarter. The rebound in our Adjusted EBITDA, growth in the RNG business, including upward trends in environmental credit prices, and $192 million in cash and investments, has kept our balance sheet strong and supports our positive outlook for the remainder of the year and into 2024. The strong demand for RNG continues, not only through our newly built stations, but we're adding customers at our existing fueling infrastructure.
For instance, Liberty Coca-Cola, which is one of the country's largest Coke bottlers, signed a deal to fuel trucks in several, several of our stations in the Northeast. Electrolux, a large appliance company, and Channel Islands Dairy Farms have begun operating RNG heavy-duty trucks for the first time and are fueling at our California stations. Campbell's Trucking Company is deploying heavy-duty trucks that will fuel at a Clean Energy station in Washington State, which has its new low-carbon fuel program in place. I told you on the last call about our recently signed partnership with Tourmaline, one of Canada's leading Energy Companies. Over the last three months, we have hit the ground running on the plan to build a network of stations throughout western Canada.
Partnering with such a recognized and respected Canadian company, we believe this to be the foundation for a significant surge in natural gas fueling by the heavy-duty trucking market and other Canadian fleets. We couldn't be more enthusiastic about this relationship. Our core refuse and transit business saw additional growth with new and the extension of larger contracts. Ecology Auto Parts expanded their relationship with us at multiple California Stations. Several big transit agencies continued to grow their RNG fueling with new deals in the second quarter, including Big Blue Bus in Santa Monica and Gold Coast Transit in Oxnard, California. During the second quarter, the U.S. EPA provided a vote of confidence for RNG fueling when it announced the final Renewable Volume Obligation or RVO. Man targets with an average 30% increase for the next three years.
Both RNG customers as well as investors in additional RNG supply, should be heartened with this significant increase in targets. Our own RNG production projects continue to move forward with the Del Rio Dairy in Texas now operational, and we're in the final commissioning on three projects that we expect to have online in Q3, with two more by year-end. As I said, I'm trying to tighten up my prepared remarks, I'll just end by saying, we believe there are many signs pointing in a positive direction. You've heard me several times about our excitement for the new Cummins 15-liter natural gas engine that is currently being tested by important fleets. I will only add that when it hits the broader market sometime next year, the timing couldn't be better.
Not only will we and the entire industry have a significantly greater volume of low CI RNG available, but fleets will have a new choice in a tested, larger engine produced by one of the most reliable manufacturers in the world. This comes at a time of continued uncertainty and cost with other new technologies and their lack of reliable fueling infrastructures. We are pleased with our progress, and with that, I'll turn the call over to Bob.
Robert Vreeland (CFO)
Thank you, Andrew. Good afternoon to everyone. As Andrew mentioned, our second quarter financial results bounced back significantly from the first quarter. Our second quarter results for 2023 were largely in line with our expectations, with the only notable negative variance on the quarter being a GAAP operating loss of $1.4 million, or -$1 million in EBITDA, attributed to our Texas LNG plant that was and remains under repair. Normally, we could see $300,000 or more per quarter of positive EBITDA from this plant. Of course, we're working diligently to bring it back online, but due to long lead item parts needed for repairs, we may not get that back into operations in 2023. It did have an impact on the quarter for sure.
Our improved financial results for the second quarter of 2023 were principally driven by the three factors we mentioned on our previous earnings call, starting first with the ramping up of RNG fuel volumes, largely coming from our trucking sector. Second, we saw favorable retail fuel margins at the pump, driven by low underlying natural gas commodity costs in relation to oil and really the price of retail diesel. Then the third item is we saw increases in environmental credit prices, albeit we did not see the full effect of the run-up in the RIN prices, which occurred in late June. To put that into perspective, our weighted average RIN price realized for the second quarter was $2.16 versus more recent pricing that's been around $3.05.
Now, we're anticipating that these three factors continue to positively impact our results in 2023, so we're maintaining our 2023 annual financial guidance. Looking at our year-over-year results, our GAAP operating loss of $13.1 million for the second quarter of 2023 compares to an operating loss of $11.9 million a year ago in the second quarter. On the downside, compared to a year ago, the second quarter of 2023 includes $9.1 million of incremental non-cash Amazon warrant charges and $6.1 million in lower RIN and LCFS revenues due to the lower credit prices.
On the upside, compared to a year ago, the second quarter of 2023 benefited by $4.7 million from the non-cash change in fair value of our fuel hedge and by $5.1 million in additional revenue due to the reinstatement of the Alternative Fuel Tax Credit. Our Adjusted EBITDA of $12.1 million in the second quarter of 2023 compares to Adjusted EBITDA of $10 million for the second quarter of 2022, or a 21% improvement. While the lower 2023 RIN and LCFS prices negatively impacted the second quarter of 2023 when compared to 2022, that was by the $6.1 million I just mentioned.
Our underlying base fuel margins, service margins, and the Alternative Fuel Tax Credit in 2023 more than offset the effect of the lower credit prices, as well as some higher operating and joint venture costs that's associated with our growth plans around the RNG efforts. Effectively, we improved our Adjusted EBITDA by 21% over last year. I think that's a testament to our diverse financial model, where we have multiple drivers of margin, where one component can compensate for another. As, as we did last quarter, and we'll continue going forward, we have disclosed the EBITDA components of our RNG supply business, particularly as these dairy projects are being placed into service.
Having said that, our Adjusted EBITDA of $12.1 million for the second quarter of 2023 breaks down as $13.5 million coming from the distribution business and a negative $1.4 million coming from our RNG supply business. I've included a consolidating table of Adjusted EBITDA in our company presentation that's posted on our website.
Andrew Littlefair (President and CEO)
Lastly, I'll say we remain on plan with our capital spending, which called for about $90 million in the distribution business and $40 million in the RNG supply business for 2023. Although I'll note that we have a little over $100 million that's related to the JVs that's off our balance sheet, that's also available to us in that RNG supply business. With that, Operator, please open the call to questions.
Operator (participant)
Thank you. We will now be conducting a question-and-answer session. If you would like to ask a question, please press star one on your telephone keypad. A confirmation tone will indicate your line is in the questioning queue. You may press star two if you would like to remove your question from the queue. For participants using speaker equipment, it may be necessary to pick up your headset before pressing the star keys. One moment, please, while we pull for questions. Our first question comes from Eric Stine with Craig-Hallum. Please go ahead.
Eric Stine (Senior Research Analyst)
Hi, Andrew. Hi, Bob.
Andrew Littlefair (President and CEO)
Hey, Eric.
Robert Vreeland (CFO)
Hey, Eric.
Eric Stine (Senior Research Analyst)
Hey, hoping you could just give an update. You did a little bit in the prepared remarks on the upstream RNG. It sounds like you expect to have six operating by year-end. You know, just curious, beyond that, I think in the past, you've given a number of under-construction engineering phase and then also what your pipeline is looking like.
Andrew Littlefair (President and CEO)
Right. Right. That, that's right, Eric. You'll have six that are, are, you know, in kind of in the final throes of, of construction now. Kind of the next what's called level two engineering and term sheet signed and kind of the phase l Engineering, there's another seven. It's that number that I've used before. Those will go into, into construction in early 2024. We have about four more behind that, that are in level one due diligence and development engineering. Of course, our pipeline continues to be robust. I mean, everybody has a large pipeline.
There's just, you know, upwards of another 15 projects that are in the, the pipeline that are earlier, you know, that we're continuing to, to work on. The team is trying to bring those forward. We continue to, you know, feel good about it. Some of these projects have taken a little bit longer than we, you know, thought, six, eight, nine months ago. We're making very good progress on all of these projects.
Eric Stine (Senior Research Analyst)
Just curious, I mean, is the thought still... I think you've talked about 105 million gallons as, as kind of a, maybe an interim target. With the RVO and credit prices better, I mean, is there any, is there any expansion to that number, with you.
Andrew Littlefair (President and CEO)
No, I think that's still the, the working number that we're using, Eric. You know, as I've, I've, as we, Bob and I, have said often, is that, you know, we also believe there will be opportunities to acquire projects, bring them in from, from others, and we continue to work on that in terms of M&A. You know, perhaps, bringing forward some projects, you know, that have, are under, either under development by other developers. So we, we like that number, and, we feel confident that we can get there.
Eric Stine (Senior Research Analyst)
Got it. Maybe last one for me, just on the Amazon stations, you know, good color on, on the build out there and that, you know, those were in place as well. Other fleets, you know, certainly are using those. I'm curious, though, you know, how Amazon is, is positioning that with their suppliers. I mean, are you seeing instances of them, you know, either strongly urging or demanding that their suppliers use natural gas as well as, as part of their, you know, I guess, what is it? Scope two or scope three emissions?
Andrew Littlefair (President and CEO)
Right. Well, you know, I'm gonna let Amazon really speak, you know, for any more advanced, you know, discussions they're having with their, you know, their third-party, AFP haulers. You know, we, we have said in the past that they have had, you know, very constructive conferences where they've introduced the RNG to their, their different haulers. We work with them on that, so we feel optimistic that, you know, they'll continue to bring the RNG heavy-duty trucks into their fleet with those that haul for them. What kind of time will tell on how that exactly all plays out, but I know it's something that they continue to work with their, their haulers.
Eric Stine (Senior Research Analyst)
Okay. Thank you.
Operator (participant)
Our next question comes from Rob Brown with Lake Street Capital. Please go ahead.
Rob Brown (Senior Research Analyst)
Good morning, Andrew and Bob, or good afternoon. Excuse me.
Andrew Littlefair (President and CEO)
Hey. Good afternoon, Rob.
Rob Brown (Senior Research Analyst)
Just wanted to get into a little bit more detail on the Amazon rollout. Sort of how would you say that, where's that in terms of your plan? How many kind of stations are now fully running, and how many are kind of yet to go for the year and in the next year?
Andrew Littlefair (President and CEO)
Okay, Rob, let me let me do a little thinking here while, you know, we have what we announced with Amazon almost a year ago was 19 stations. What I've said this year so far is that, you know, by the end of this year, we would have all, if maybe less one, open. We're still on track for that. This is a very important time. We have a lot of stations that are opening right now and that'll open the remainder of this year. You know, we fuel a lot of trucks in the network right now, and I've said that, you know, before, is that we have 85 different stations that are accommodating Amazon heavy-duty trucks, you know, in the network now.
Though we're very excited about these stations, they come online because they get immediately, really overnight, loaded with trucks that'll kind of redeploy from other parts of the network that we may or may not be fueling now, that'll be base loaded at these stations. You know, the program's kind of working as Amazon and we wanted it to. You know, I think Amazon has said that they've fielded as many as 2,000 or more trucks, and you can tell by the volumes that we're seeing in our trucking going up, that those trucks are coming online. It's an exciting thing. You know, we're also very mindful of the fact that this is, you know.
I like to think that the Amazon deployment is, is one that'll be used with other significant fleets as they begin to look at how they would deploy these, you know, the Cummins 15-liter. That's what I'm very excited about. That's what our sales force is working hard on with these different fleets that are now in, customer introduction and testing this summer with the 15-liter. It's to, you know, develop some, like programs for these other significant national fleets as they begin to bring the 15-liter into their fleet.
Speaker 13
Okay. Thank you. Thanks for the overview there. Then on the RVO, kind of specifics being settled, what's sort of the impact on your business? Do you see sort of better, you think, kind of better RIN pricing, or do you see more RNG volume kind of demand coming through?
Andrew Littlefair (President and CEO)
Well, I'll let Bob help here, but, obviously, the first impact you saw is, I mean, I saw the initial, you know, program you remember, called for perhaps some regulation that might incent RNG to go to electric vehicles. That, as you know, didn't make the final rules that went into place. Now, that may, you know, the e-RIN thing may come back at some point. We'll see. However, I see it as it was a real strong endorsement for using renewable natural gas for heavy-duty transportation. I think there's no way around that there was a recognition that this is very powerful and something that can be happen and, you know, be put into place right now.
The first thing we saw is an immediate overnight strengthening of the RIN price, right? From something around $2 to something closer to $3.10. That settled back in around $3.05. That was significant-
Rob Brown (Senior Research Analyst)
Mm-hmm.
Andrew Littlefair (President and CEO)
In terms of strengthening. When you look at the RVO, so that's the, the obligations, the, the increase of, of RNG that'll be required going forward over the next 3 years. That, you know, often, Rob, you'll remember that, that used-- they used to kind of grow those, that obligation about 12%, something like in that neighborhood. Because there's so many projects and, you know, in the works, they moved that up to 30%. So there's kind of a 30% growth rate over the next 3 years. You know, to me, you put all this together, it's very strong for RNG in transportation and in generation as well.
Rob Brown (Senior Research Analyst)
Okay, great. Thank you. I'll turn it over.
Operator (participant)
Our next question comes from Dushyant Ailani with Jefferies. Please go ahead.
Dushyant Ailani (Equity Research Analyst)
Hi, guys. Thanks for taking my question. I actually just have one question. Wanted to stick with the, the RVO. With the run-up in pricing, what do you think about the guidance, you know, your, the full year guidance compared to what you had initially given? Do you think that there's any potential upside if RIN pricing stay where they are?
Robert Vreeland (CFO)
Yeah. Well, certainly Dushyant, it's very helpful. I'm being a little cautious on that because, you know, we had some headwinds there with the California situation. I think that, that was one reason why we were able to maintain our guidance. Because there were some question as to how we could weather a storm like that from our, in the first quarter. This, the, the RIN was factored in. Frankly, you know, the fact that it's maybe gone up more than what we would've factored in is within our range.
Dushyant Ailani (Equity Research Analyst)
Got it. Thank you. I'll turn it over.
Robert Vreeland (CFO)
Yeah.
Operator (participant)
Our next question comes from Manav Gupta with UBS. Please go ahead.
Manav Gupta (Executive Director)
Hey, Bob and Andrew. First question on the CARB side. There is growing chatter that within next few weeks, there will be meetings, and then even if the final regulation doesn't come up, there is a very strong possibility that CARB is looking at a reset of the program and a higher reset, which helps everybody out. On that front, you obviously talk to CARB, do we have any kind of insights from you on that front?
Andrew Littlefair (President and CEO)
Well, Manav, I think you're right. You know, the, the, chatter is that, you know, the kind of the new program, if you will, the new outlook, the new regulations are kind of in the works. Not altogether clear, the timetable of that. You know, it's been suggested that could happen, go forward, be published here in the next two weeks or the end of the, the month. I think it's, you know, it's, obviously, it's coming. Then, as you know, Manav, probably then there has to be kind of a period, for comment, and then it'll go forward, you know, late in the year, hopefully, to the CARB board for approval.
That could, that could even move into the early part of 2024, and then those rules will be in effect sometime, I believe, late in 2024. You know, our view is, and a lot of the commentary has been that this is a great opportunity. You know, I think there's a general understanding that the Low Carbon Fuel Standard in California has worked and has been very effective. So, you know, there's been. As you remember, the choices were: would you increase the obligation from a, you know, a reduction of carbon from 20% to 25%, 30 or 35?
There are studies, and there's commentary from the industry that, that there's enough RNG available, there's enough, renewable fuels available, lower carbon fuels, that could actually make it so that the state could actually go beyond 35%. I'm not speculating whether or not they do that here, but I think to me, it looks like CARB is beginning to, to tend to, understand that this is a great opportunity to increase the targets, increase the obligation curve, you know, lower the carbon that's being used in the state. I'm thinking that you could see something on the aggressive side, you know, closer to on the 35. Now, this would mean that it would be, I think, tremendous for all of, of, us.
I think it'd be great for the state, but it'll be tremendous for those of us that are in the RNG business. The state will need all the RNG it can get. That should be constructive to LCFS pricing going forward. I think, you know, likely once, you know, if, if it goes this way, Manav, and it, the targets go to on the aggressive side, I would guess you would see kind of a market response early. Then, of course, I think the LCFS would then strengthen out into the next year as it becomes clear what this is going to mean to be able to, you know, for obligated parties. Our fingers are crossed. We're working hard. Our teams are working.
We're fully engaged with the ARB staff, board members, those in government, air regulators, to make them understand that we have a fuel that's ready to go today and can help the state move toward its stated goals of being a, a 45% reduction by, oh, I think that's 2040. You know, it's, it's necessary for them to be aggressive if they're going to hit their own stated targets.
Manav Gupta (Executive Director)
I agree with you. I have the one question that keeps popping up, and we don't agree with it, is that somewhere, somebody says: Well, CARB is not going to be supportive of RNG or, or kick out RNG. I know you have addressed this in the past, but have you heard anything on that side? We firmly believe RNG should be part of the CARB program and should not be kicked out under any circumstances.
Andrew Littlefair (President and CEO)
Well, Manav, you and I see eye to eye on that. There are some, you know, that do believe that, you know, methane that's captured at dairy should somehow not be in the program, in the Low Carbon Fuel Standard program, and there's those that have suggested that it should be eliminated. I think this would mean that you would have a renewable diesel program in the state of California. I'm not sure that that's exactly what ARB wants, and I'm not sure it's altogether clear you could hit the targets that they want if you eliminate our fuel, which is so low, low in carbon.
You know, I'm not saying that there aren't those that would, would want that, but I, I kind of believe, we believe, I think the industry is feeling better about the fact that ARB has recognized and has said so at these different workshops, that, that, that renewable natural gas is an important part of the Low Carbon Fuel Standard program. I don't...
Manav Gupta (Executive Director)
I agree with you.
Andrew Littlefair (President and CEO)
I don't believe you'll end up seeing that be the case.
Manav Gupta (Executive Director)
I, I agree with you. My last question here is, sometimes people don't give you enough credit for something, which is your third-party volume growth. Could you just remind everybody how your third-party RNG volumes are growing in 2023, 2024, and 2025? How is the pipeline looking on that front?
Andrew Littlefair (President and CEO)
Yeah, well, it's looking, you know, as we've planned it, you know, most.
Robert Vreeland (CFO)
... most all, well, all of our volume this year and, you know, is third party. We've kind of laid out that growth rate on the third party, and that's looking good. And, you know, there's a lot of work that goes behind that, securing, you know, we've got, you know, over 60 suppliers and, you know, we continue to tap into the RNG sources as they come online. We have good partners that are in that space, particularly BP, with their recent acquisition. We're feeling good about.
Andrew Littlefair (President and CEO)
You know, Manav, it's, it's a fair point, though. I mean, we, we bring in, you know, we still account for about 50% or 60% of all the RNG in transportation. So, you know, we source from almost every RNG provider that's out there. So we have a team that works really hard cultivating those relationships and bringing on those contracts. And, yeah, we have good growth on that, on that front, and we're gonna need it. You know, even at the end of 2026, if you look at our plan that we laid out, that we're, you know, sticking with, is, you know, it, it called for about 105 million gallons of our own, you know, equity of supply.
We still need, and with the growth that we see in the, in the trucking area, we need another almost 400 million gallons of third-party RNG. It's an important part of our, of our, of our business going forward.
Manav Gupta (Executive Director)
Thank you so much.
Operator (participant)
Our next question comes from Derrick Whitfield with Stifel. Please go ahead.
Derrick Whitfield (Managing Director and Senior Analyst)
Good afternoon, Andrew and team, and thanks for taking my question.
Andrew Littlefair (President and CEO)
Sure. You bet, Derrick.
Derrick Whitfield (Managing Director and Senior Analyst)
With regard to your pipeline, that's been at, kind of at that 15-20 level for a few quarters, what do you see as the greatest impediment to advancing those opportunities into the contractual and engineering phases?
Andrew Littlefair (President and CEO)
Well, I don't know if it's an impediment, Derrick. I think this is just reality that these take some engineering, right? There's a lot of considerations in terms of the interconnects, and each dairy is a little bit different on what needs to be solved in terms of, you know, the cleanup and the composition of the manure and how it's handled. So there's just lots of things that go into... You know, I wish these projects. I, and I happen to believe that over time, we'll be able to, you know, make these a little bit less custom, if you will. But there's just a lot that has to go into it. We're still learning as we go.
We're gaining a lot of experience, with our, with our construction folks and our engineering teams, and we've built out a bigger team here now to be able to handle it. I, I don't know that it's any particular impediment. It's not necessarily equipment. you know, we saw that a year ago, where we had some long lead time, you know, situations with certain cleanup technologies and some steel. I think that's generally resolved itself now. But, you know, going forward, we'll get better at it and bring these things on. They take some time to get through the, the engineering phase.
It's probably time well spent to make sure that you have a project that can, you know, meet, bring on the fuel at the carbon intensity as designed and meet the, you know, the returns that we've, that we've figured on.
Derrick Whitfield (Managing Director and Senior Analyst)
Great, that makes sense. Maybe shifting over to policy for my follow-up. Now that we have full rulemaking in place, around the ITC, how should we think about the CapEx implications for your upstream business over the next few years?
Robert Vreeland (CFO)
Well, Derrick, I, I would say we're motivated to accelerate whatever CapEx in, you know, within the ITC period. We're, we are, you know, managing, we're managing our, you know, projects to under kind of that mandate, right? To take advantage of it, first and foremost. I mean, we were fortunate that we had a number of projects in place before the Inflation Reduction Act, that was kind of gravy on top of the returns. You know, now as it's kind of in, then we're definitely part of the conversation is timing on, you know, starting the construction by the end of 2024 on that. I mean, we're, we're basically trying to take advantage of that as, as much as possible.
Derrick Whitfield (Managing Director and Senior Analyst)
Maybe just a follow-up to that, do you see it more in the 30%-40% range as the potential benefit for you?
Robert Vreeland (CFO)
Yes. Yeah. You know, there's, there's. Going from the 30 to 40, you know, there's some nuances there with, domestic content and a number of things, but, but frankly, you know, I think the, the projects are looking pretty good on that, on that front, in that range.
Derrick Whitfield (Managing Director and Senior Analyst)
That's great. Thanks for your time.
Robert Vreeland (CFO)
Uh-huh.
Operator (participant)
Our next question comes from Matthew Blair with TPH. Please go ahead.
Matthew Blair (Managing Director)
Hey, good afternoon, Andrew and Bob. It looks like your RNG share of total volumes rose to a record, 81%, so congrats on that. However, your capture of RINs revenue these past two quarters has been lower on a percentage basis than what we saw in 2022. Is this just timing-related, or have there been any structural changes in how much, you know, RIN revenue you're receiving for these RNG volumes?
Andrew Littlefair (President and CEO)
No, nothing structural, Matthew. I think just kind of normal, normal market dynamics. You know, we have to also look at LCFS. I mean, we look at both, kind of together on that. You know, but I think it's just, you know, we look at it together with the LCFS and just seeing their normal activity from our standpoint. There's no structural changes going on there. It's still good money.
Matthew Blair (Managing Director)
Okay.
Andrew Littlefair (President and CEO)
We're comfortable with all that, yeah.
Matthew Blair (Managing Director)
Sounds good. Bob, I think you mentioned the Texas LNG plant may stay down for the remainder of 2023. If that happens, what's the total EBITDA headwind approximately in 2023 from this outage?
Andrew Littlefair (President and CEO)
Well, you know, I mean, this quarter, I won't say that we'll necessarily sustain the what happened this quarter. I mean, we're gonna really try to have e-equipment going in to capitalize it, but, you know, there's, there's still work that we're, you know, testing on some of that. What I said is that that plant could, you know, generate $300 thousand or more, you know, in that neighborhood, in a quarter of EBITDA. That depends on how you wanna look at it. If you, if you come up with a negative, then, you know, frankly, that's $1.3 million effect, which is really what it was to our second quarter, in my view, because it was negative $1 million, and we should have made about $300 thousand.
The rest of the year could be $2 million or more, and we factored that. You know, again, I'm looking at our guidance and just all things considered, we've, you know, that little-- that was enough of a headwind to... It's kind of binary. It's like, you know, that plant's either operating or it's not, so it's a little... that, that doesn't just kind of get absorbed into the normal activity, so we called it out. W-we'll get it repaired and get that flowing again, but that, that'll have some impact.
Matthew Blair (Managing Director)
Great. Thank you.
Operator (participant)
Our next question comes from Pavel Molchanov with Raymond James. Please go ahead.
Pavel Molchanov (Senior Investment Strategist)
Thanks for taking the question. We had a lot of questions on, on CARB policy. Also, literally today, there was, a statement by Governor Newsom about a new hydrogen strategy for California. Might, might be a little early for you guys to comment on specifically that, that statement. Can you just talk more broadly about your approach to, kind of the, the green hydrogen economy?
Andrew Littlefair (President and CEO)
Yeah, Pavel, thanks. I, I don't have a comment on what the governor may have announced today, though, you know, we, we actually had a board member who has since r-rotated off our board, who was kind of, I would say, on the cutting edge of hydrogen policy in the state of California. Often at our board meetings, we discuss this with-- at our board of, of directors, how we would participate. We've been kind of clear, Pavel, and I think, you know, you and I have talked a lot about this. I mean, w-we, we have a hydrogen fueling station and have had for almost 10 years. We actually got into the hydrogen, and what we called it at the time, Hythane, years ago in Canada. We built a station now twice at our LAX station.
We recently brought one on, a new state-of-the-art hydrogen fueling station for one of our customers. We're out with RFPs for three or four of our transit properties right now, where we would build them stations and provide hydrogen. We see that RNG could likely be one of the most elegant solutions for a low-carbon feedstock for hydrogen in the future. Now, having said that, while we understand high-pressure fuel, we believe that RNG running through the pipeline, reformed at the station, could be a, just a dynamite way to be able to deliver hydrogen to fuel cell vehicles in the future. There's more work there that needs to be done, and don't count on us to go out and spec hydrogen fueling locations yet. We need to see some...
You know, we need to see the industry be able to come along with vehicles. We are working with some of the largest industrial hydrogen companies in the country, and we have ongoing discussions with them. We happen to think that RNG will be a player in that. You know, we have a 49% ownership in a compressor company that's in Canada and in Italy. We have acquired a hydrogen compressor company and bolted that on there. That's doing very well right now. We're gaining lots of understanding about how our network will be ready to go to deliver hydrogen in the future, but it's out there a ways, a little bit, Pavel.
We are trying to learn about how our RNG might be available, if you will, or we participate in the Low Carbon Fuel Standard program, because I think there will be money made there to provide, you know, super low carbon hydrogen. I, I think there'll be a play for us there as well. We're kind of in early innings on how Clean Energy will participate in the hydrogen economy. Though, I think we're as well positioned as anybody because we have the infrastructure to be able to deliver it.
Pavel Molchanov (Senior Investment Strategist)
Yep, understood. Maybe shifting north a bit to your recent deal with Tourmaline. Still obviously early days in that, do you have a sense of how big that fuel station network in Western Canada can ultimately become?
Andrew Littlefair (President and CEO)
Well, you know, just a couple of things. Bob, you know, at our company, is actually the chairman of that joint development committee for our company, so I'll let him speak to it a little bit. You know, I've been involved in Canada almost for 25 years. Got a couple of important things at work. Well, first off, you got a huge resource base of natural gas in Canada, and you have pretty expensive diesel in Canada as compared to... You have very good economics. You have a very important, largest gas producer in Canada is our partner. So, you know, we have some stations on some of the highly traveled corridors in Eastern Canada.
Now, this focus with Tourmaline, we're gonna start out in Western Canada, where they have long, a lot of truck activity that goes from, you know, Calgary, west. I think, you know, that joint venture program right now contemplates building 15 stations, you know, to start. We'll start. Now let's be clear, we're gonna start with four or five, and then we'll, depending on demand, we'll move to 15. Eventually, I think, our friends at Tourmaline believe that you could need as many as 30 stations out there in Western Canada. It's exciting, but it's gonna take a little bit of time. We'll get those first four stations up. We're working with the largest fleets now.
You know, we're already fueling one of the largest trucking companies, at our Edmonton, and we've just, are purchased, land for our station in Calgary. We're excited about the potential. We'll get those first four up, and then we'll begin to gauge how quickly we need to bring more stations online.
Robert Vreeland (CFO)
Yeah. The, the roadmap is, the roadmap is there. I-- but the, Tourmaline is, it's nice working with them and seeing their motivation to, displace diesel as the fuel there, and frankly, can be with natural gas. You know, we start-- the initial, you know, agreement was CAD 70 million Canadian, so CAD 35 million each, to kind of start this first wave. You know, it-- the timing is good because the, synced up with a 15-liter engine, which is very important in Canada. So, we are going about as fast as we can just to get these, these stations, the four station ones up and running, and then the remaining three. It'll coincide really with the, with the 15-liter, you know, truck coming in.
Which, look, is gonna be kind of coming in, you know, mid to late 2024, if, you know, and not really necessarily big, meaningful volumes. You're, you're kind of looking into 2025, on some of this. The progress that we will make from between now and then will be really important, you know, to talk about.
Pavel Molchanov (Senior Investment Strategist)
Last question. This is a little bit below the radar, I think, more recently for you. Two years ago, you started participating in this Adopt-a-Port project, I guess, in Long Beach, maybe somewhere else, on kind of the marine space. How is that going?
Andrew Littlefair (President and CEO)
No, it's, it's been. Thank you, Pavel. You know, that, just for those that may not be familiar, this is where we. You know, there's there's been a 10-year effort, and we've been involved in it from the beginning. The dirtiest air quality in the airshed in Southern California is the port. The ships, the haulers in and around the port. So there's been effort, a couple renditions of clean air trucking programs at the port. This program, the, what we call Adopt-a-Port with Chevron, is where Chevron has put up money, which we've largely spent now, and it'll be, it'll be topped off with a new, new tranche.
Where we have, working with Chevron, using their balance sheet, if you will, we've made grants to our trucking customers in the port that may have some public grants as well, to purchase new natural gas trucks. The deal here is, is that we'll buy RNG from Chevron, they're our supplier, at our stations. Those trucking customers then are obligated to buy certain amounts of fuel from us at our stations, that's, that's the Chevron. It's kind of a win, win, win. Puts brand-new super low carbon RNG trucks into the port. I think we have almost 400 trucks that have participated in the program. We've got another 200 that are kind of in the queue to get funded and kind of get through that.
I've talked to Chevron about topping off the money that's in there to add to it. I think they're been very supportive of the program, and we'll probably expand it. It's not, you know, it takes a while because you have to buy a new truck, and there's a lot of grant and public things you got to go through. It's not as fast as any of us would like it, but it's been successful. I mean, you know, at the same time, Pavel, there's probably been 15, 20, 30 electric trucks. With all those, you know, public statements about that we're going to zero trucks, zero electric trucks in the port. I don't know. There's probably 30 operating down there, maybe 15 are parked.
We've got 480 RNG-500 RNG trucks operating every day in the port. I think it's been a huge success.
Pavel Molchanov (Senior Investment Strategist)
Thanks very much.
Andrew Littlefair (President and CEO)
Yeah. Thanks, Pavel.
Operator (participant)
Our next question comes from Ryan Todd with Piper Sandler. Please go ahead.
Ryan Todd (Managing Director and Senior Research Analyst)
Thanks. Maybe if I could just follow up on a couple of comments from earlier. There was a question earlier on the ITCs, and I know the IRS provided some guidance on transfer pricing for the ITCs. What do you understand is... Or, like, what's your expectation in terms of what the timing might look like for you to start monetizing some of this? Do you need to wait until... Is that clearly a 2024 event? Can you start monetizing some of this stuff earlier? What are the, what are the bottlenecks to you guys monetizing some of these, some of the ITCs at this point, as far as you understand it?
Andrew Littlefair (President and CEO)
There's not really bottlenecks, Ryan. I would say we're, you know, we're going, we're going through the process of qualifying all the expenditures at the location, so we're kind of following the process. I've got teams of folks that are, you know, coming up with what are the qualified CapEx expenditures, and then we're, you know, and then we're, you know, frankly, we're kind of putting our feelers out on the, you know, on the market in terms of what, you know, the transfer market looks like. I believe that it'll be more of a 24.
I'm not in a, in a, in a rush to need capital, but that doesn't mean we're, we're taking our time on going through the process, and making, you know, making sure that we understand it all and what kind of clawbacks there are, and, you know, when you go through a transfer like that. We kind of want to have it all buttoned down, and, we're, we're counting on the money and principally for this first wave of projects in 2024.
Ryan Todd (Managing Director and Senior Research Analyst)
Okay.
Andrew Littlefair (President and CEO)
You know.
Ryan Todd (Managing Director and Senior Research Analyst)
Thank you.
Andrew Littlefair (President and CEO)
We split that with our partners. You know, we get 50% of the value that we, you know, of the capital that goes into the total project. But we intend to likely, transfer ours and monetize it.
Ryan Todd (Managing Director and Senior Research Analyst)
Okay, perfect. That's helpful. You mentioned earlier some of the, like, early tests ongoing on the 15-liter engine. Have you heard any early signs of feedback on anything there? Any thoughts on, you know, maybe how the timing or milestones might play out over the next year in terms of testing and feedback, and when you might, you know, when you think you might see, like, the earliest signs of around visibility, around potential uptake of that engine?
Andrew Littlefair (President and CEO)
Well, you know, I think it's important first, Ryan, to just kind of remind everybody, while this is a new, new engine, it's not exactly new, right? I mean, they've had great success with this natural gas heavy-duty engine in China, and I think last year they sold 35,000 of these in China. Now this engine is improved on that engine, but it's essentially, it's in many ways the same. I think it's important for those listening to understand that this isn't a test of a brand-new, you know, heretofore untested, product. All right? This isn't an alpha. This is really a fleet introduction. And Cummins is very careful about the way they do these things, and they're not in a rush.
They wanna make sure that everybody, you know, that they've got it right because it's their name after all, and they do this on diesel, so they're, I used to hear about the 5 testing gates of hell or whatever, Cummins used to talk about. You know, I think it's important that they have lined up some of the largest fleets in America. This is, you know, this is Amazon and UPS and FedEx and Walmart. You know, they're not, they're not planning on stubbing their toe here because they've got all the boys that, boys and girls that can really buy big trucks are involved, Knight-Swift and, and Werner and, and J.B. Hunt.
I, I, I feel that that's really important, and I think there's 40 some odd that will be, you know, are in this introduction phase this summer, and those are out there happening now. We've heard anecdotal stories, and I don't want to get ahead of Cummins here, but we've heard good things from the driver acceptance so far. We know that some of those are being tested in the sort of the toughest topographies, over the Grapevine in California and, Rocky Mountains. Yeah, I think that's great. We've heard there's been an improvement in the fuel economy, which is what Cummins said would be the case, so I think that's great. I don't know that I have the latest, other than we know that this always takes a little longer than we think.
That the order book was supposed to be, you know, maybe open in Q3, Q4. I'm not sure how that's going. I think it's safe to say, though, that if you're looking for milestones, it'll be, you know, how did it go? What is the feedback? We'll get that some, at point here for some of these big fleets. It'll be late this year, though, and then you'll begin to have serious order book open up. I'm guessing either late in 2023 or early 2024. You know, don't look for those orders to get built until sometime in, you know, Q2 of 2024, is my guess. It'll be interesting to see what those initial orders look like.
Think we've moved past, and I know that Cummins, and I'll put words in their mouth here now, you know, is anticipating that these will be more substantial orders. I think we're past the days, you know, years ago, when we did the first, 11.9, you know, the 12 liters, it was a fleet saying that they would take two. We're now dealing with fleets that can buy substantially more than that, so I think we're thinking it's gonna be orders of hundreds and not, and not, you know, five. That's good news. You know, finally, we've gotten to those that buy a lot of trucks every year, have, you know, big turnover, and that's what excites us. That finally, you know, we've got an engine.
You know, after all, the 15-liter engine accounts for something like 75% of the diesel engines that are sold, and we haven't had it. I think this is important for the industry.
Ryan Todd (Managing Director and Senior Research Analyst)
Great. Thanks. That's great color.
Operator (participant)
Our next question comes from Betty Zhang with Scotiabank. Please go ahead.
Betty Zhang (Director and Equity Research Analyst)
Great. Thank you. Hey, Andrew. Hey, Bob. Good afternoon, thanks for taking our questions.
Andrew Littlefair (President and CEO)
Betty, Betty? Yes.
Betty Zhang (Director and Equity Research Analyst)
My first question is just on kind of trucking demand. We've heard of softer e-commerce, weaker industrial production, and so on, having some impact on shipping demand and other logistics. Just curious if that's had any impact on your volumes at all?
Andrew Littlefair (President and CEO)
We really haven't. We haven't really seen that.
Robert Vreeland (CFO)
No. I mean, it's, you know, oftentimes the natural gas engines are the ones that get used the most. You know, if there's gonna be a little, you know, back down on some of that, it's, they're not gonna pull the natural gas engines out of the mix.
Andrew Littlefair (President and CEO)
Our, I mean, our trucking volume's up. I, you know, I, I'm not doubting that that's been the case. We just haven't seen it in our, in, in our numbers.
Robert Vreeland (CFO)
Yeah.
Andrew Littlefair (President and CEO)
In our limited, you know, exposure to it.
Robert Vreeland (CFO)
Not something we're managing around or through right now.
Betty Zhang (Director and Equity Research Analyst)
Okay, got it.
Andrew Littlefair (President and CEO)
Fortunately.
Betty Zhang (Director and Equity Research Analyst)
Great. Great. Then, second question on, kind of your full year guidance. You've kept that the same. You know, we're gonna need about $47 million in the back half of the year to reach the midpoint there, so at least $20 million a quarter. Can you maybe give us a bit more color on what gives you the confidence to reach that? Then I, I know you mentioned, you know, ramping RNG volumes, favorable margins, and favorable credit pricing. Maybe, can you talk about what you're assuming for credit pricing, specifically for the remainder of the year? Thank you.
Robert Vreeland (CFO)
Yeah. Well, I'm, I'm kind of... Well, I'm assuming that the, that the RIN kind of stays maybe up around where it is right now. I- it possibly could go higher, but I'm not, I'm not going there on, on that. I think that that RIN jump was good, and, and that kind of keeps us there. We feel that the, the LCFS could go higher than where it is right now, too. Now, it's mu- it's quite a bit higher than what we had initially in our forecast, if you will, for this year, which was around, you know, the low sixties, like 62, 63. We're already kind of, you know, we're already seeing some improvement from that. The biggest driver on that is, is, as we've talked about, will be volume.
All the factors are very important, absolutely. They're meaningful, but, I mean, ultimately, as we open more stations, then that's really where the, that's really what drives the margin the most. All those, the RIN, the credit are definitely meaningful. I mean, you're talking about multiple millions of dollars that, you know, helps us get there. I mean, frankly, the, you know, the disappointment is we're trying to recover from, you know, a bit of a dinger there in the first quarter. The external environment looks all around favorable in our view, so that would really the volume. It's a ramp up, so, you know, you don't necessarily divide the pounds for the year by two. We'll continue, we'll see a, you know, a ramp, but that's how we get there.
Betty Zhang (Director and Equity Research Analyst)
Great. Thank you.
Operator (participant)
Our next question comes from Jason Gabelman with Cowen. Please go ahead.
Jason Gabelman (Director of Energy Equity Research)
Yeah. Hey, it's Jason Gabelman. Good afternoon.
Andrew Littlefair (President and CEO)
Hi, Jason.
Robert Vreeland (CFO)
Hi, Jason.
Jason Gabelman (Director of Energy Equity Research)
I wanted to go back to the RNG upstream volumes as they're beginning to ramp up. Sounds like limited earnings contribution this year, but can you just remind us, the timing for the certification process on the LCFS, on the RINs, and when do you expect those gallons to start contributing positively to earnings? I guess tied to that, maybe frame the dollar-per-gallon potential in given the current credit prices that we see out there. Then finally, if you could comment on potential uplift from the Clean Fuel Production Credit and your outlook for when we should hear about that, and I'll leave it there. Thank you.
Andrew Littlefair (President and CEO)
Okay. You got those, Bob?
Robert Vreeland (CFO)
Yeah, on the. Well, you're right, Jason, on the contribution, not really meaningful. In fact, really, there's maybe a little bit of, you know, net drag from the, in 2023 from the RNG supply because of that certification process. We're, you know, we're gonna look into, you know, later into 2024 before we're gonna really be able to monetize that. That's being a little, you know, I mean, that's assuming we get these commissioned as we are, are stating here, and then taking, the time on the LCFS, that can be, you know, 12 months. That kind of puts us toward the latter half of 2024.
The contribution, you know, in 2024 will be minor, I'll say, but there'll be contribution in 2024 from the projects that go into that we commission this year. I'm not. I don't want to give 2024 guidance right now, you know, on specifically what the numbers are going to be. I mean, where things stand with our construction and what's injecting gas, and then the certification process, you're gonna go into 2024 before you're, you know, monetizing that from a RIN-LCFS standpoint. But we'll. We're always evaluating, you know, optimization of, you know, at what point is the best time and makes sense to monetize, 'cause there's different markets out there that will take that.
This is where I, you know, get into, we're, you know, we'll be steady in 2024 and what we want to do with the gas that we're producing, right? Because, you know, maybe we don't store it all, and then we don't, and then we don't have to wait for the certification process as well, if we get an appropriate price. Yes.
Jason Gabelman (Director of Energy Equity Research)
Got it.
Robert Vreeland (CFO)
Um-
Jason Gabelman (Director of Energy Equity Research)
Then just thoughts on the Clean Fuel Production Credit. If you've, if you've heard anything from inside the Beltway on, if, if it comes in at the high end or low end, in terms of allowing negative carbon intensity without a lower bound, and, and timing on when we could hear an update.
Robert Vreeland (CFO)
Yeah. Okay. We haven't heard anything on that, right, with that. You know, we're listening to others that know that at, you know, negative 250 and, and, and beyond, that production tax credit gets, can get large per gallon. You know, in that $5-$6 a gallon kind of category. We'll see if that, we'll see how that plays out. Well, I don't have anything meaningful on the, on the, on the, on that 45-
Andrew Littlefair (President and CEO)
We haven't heard anything on the, on the timing of that or when that might be promulgated or when the secretary would deal with that.
Robert Vreeland (CFO)
No.
Andrew Littlefair (President and CEO)
We haven't heard that yet, Jason. We're listening, and we have our tentacles out, but we haven't gotten picked up anything on that yet.
Jason Gabelman (Director of Energy Equity Research)
Understood. Thanks for the answers. Appreciate it.
Andrew Littlefair (President and CEO)
Operator.
Operator (participant)
There are no, there are no further questions at this time. I would like to turn the floor back over to Andrew Littlefair for closing comments. Please go ahead.
Andrew Littlefair (President and CEO)
Thank you, Operator. Thank you, Operator. Thank you everyone for joining us today. We look forward to filling you in on our progress next time. Thank you. Have a good evening.
Operator (participant)
This concludes today's conference call. You may disconnect your lines at this time. Thank you for your participation, and have a good day.