Hello and welcome to the Hargreaves Services PLC preliminary results investor presentation. As this is a recorded meeting, investors will be in listen-only mode. Questions are encouraged; they can be submitted anytime by the Q&A tab situated in the right-hand corner of your screen. Simply click Q&A, type in your question, and press send. The company may not be in a position to answer every question received during the meeting itself; however, the company can review all questions submitted today and publish responses where it's appropriate to do so. Before we begin, I would like to launch the following poll, and now I'll hand you over to Gordon Banham, CEO. Good afternoon, sir.
Good afternoon. Thank you very much. Thank you, everybody, for taking the time to listen to the Hargreaves presentation. I always welcome these presentations as an opportunity for retail investors to engage. You obviously have the forum here to ask questions, but Stephen and I and Simon are always available in the interim stages, so if you ever want to drop us a note and ask any questions, please feel free to do so. So let's just talk about the team. I think everyone knows myself after all these years. Stephen, I think everyone knows, is CFO. But the person we haven't met is Simon. So Simon has joined us as our Chief Operating Officer. Key function is to drive the growth of the services business. So I'll just give Simon a little opportunity to introduce himself to you all. So, Simon, please.
Hi. Pleased to be here. Hello, everybody. I'm Simon Hicks, obviously. I'm an engineer by background. I've been 35 years in energy and infrastructure, broken into a few key chunks. One is the first 10 years of my career was in new build, building, gas-fired power stations both in the U.K. and the U.S. I then spent five years leading a logistics business, 15 years, which is the bulk of my experience in U.K. and overseas services, similar services to Hargreaves offers, very similar customer base, you know, key standout projects involved in Hinkley and the Nuclear Islands, involved in the carrier contract, building the carriers.
Ran a very large services business for a number of years until we were acquired and put into private ownership, stayed on for three years to integrate that business, and then moved on to run seven Energy from Waste Assets for U.K. Pension Fund. And then I'm here here at Hargreaves, really pleased. Why is that important? I guess common customers understand the sectors and have good, strong relationships with our key customers in the markets in which we operate.
Thanks very much, Simon, and welcome on board. So just, if you'd bear with me, those who are existing shareholders know the value proposition, but we may have some new people who are not quite so familiar as yourselves. So what we explain to everyone is that the business has basically three pillars. So the services business will be covered in detail by Simon. Simon has been brought in to drive the growth. We think there's a lot of opportunities there, and he'll talk about that in some detail. Then we have our land business. Now, our land business is really simple in two parts. First of all, you have the land that was part of our old mining businesses, so it's held at historic cost. That's a very important point. Alongside that, we have renewable assets. Now, they're on the books at about GBP 7 million.
Jones Lang LaSalle have valued them every year. Again, they've revalued them this year and said they're worth 27 compared to 7. So you've got GBP 20 million of uplift. We've made it very clear to existing shareholders. The plan is that you add the 80 to the 20. You have GBP 100 million of value in your land portfolio, and the plan is to sell that down to GBP 20 million, over the next few years. That will release GBP 80 million of cash, and you'll have a business which has got GBP 20 million of cash tied up, making about a 20% ROCE, so making GBP 4 million a year. Now, one of the great benefits of Hargreaves is the fact that we have cash in the bank. We have no bank borrowings.
So the timing of that will depend on where the market sits, and I'll pick that up in a bit more detail. But the most important thing is the value is there, and it's captured. We haven't written the prices of the land up, so there is a lot of intrinsic value sitting there waiting to be harvested. We appreciate the time value of money, so we're not going to, on one side, rush, and sell at a distressed price. At the same time, there's a lot of value there for shareholders, which we will realize in the next few years. Finally is HRMS, the German business, two parts, trading plus DK. And I'll talk about that in detail, two parts of that business, and I'll explain what's going on there. So just flicking on to the next slide, key highlights.
What we have always said, and we're still consistent, is that we will be paying shareholders to wait while we realize value from our portfolio. So we've put the dividend up by 3%. The underlying profit before tax is up by 4%. And you might say, "Well, that doesn't look very much, Gordon." Well, the answer is, land had a very good year last year, and therefore that's gone down. But services, which is obviously less lumpy, much more recurring in income stream, is up significantly. And again, we'll Stephen will pick that up in the presentation. As I said, again, we have over GBP 23 million of cash in, so we're in a very solid, safe position. So on that note, I think I'll hand over to Stephen, who'll just run through the financial numbers for everyone. Thank you, Stephen.
Thanks, Gordon. So, first slide is the usual run through the P&L, for what happened in the FY in the prior year. If I start looking at revenue, revenue's up significantly on the prior year, 25% growth, up to GBP 264 million, 19% of that growth coming out of services, so up to GBP 244 million. And that growth in revenue is coming from an increased volume of activity, predominantly on major infrastructure sites, but also a growing baseline of smaller contracts, which we've been building up over the last several years now. We've also seen a significant growth in revenue within Hargreaves Land. This is a slight anomaly because of the way that revenue is sometimes treated within our land business because of the split of assets we have. Last year, we sold two significant investment properties for total combined proceeds of around GBP 13 million.
Because they're investment properties, they did not count as revenue, which is why the revenue looked lower last year. So that's part of the growth in revenue this year. What does that mean for profit? Well, in underlying profit before tax for services, we've delivered GBP 15.9 million in the year, which is up from GBP 11.4 million. Significant increase. So part of that is off the back of the growth in volume on these major infrastructure projects and other contracts. And probably most pleasingly is also the read-through to margin. So we're putting higher volume on the same overhead, delivering a higher margin, 6.5%. So real good progress through there. And it really sort of demonstrates the quality of contracts we are working on. We're not looking for low volume, high volume, low margin.
We're looking for good quality margin that rewards our high-quality health and safety, ESG, and our high-quality systems. Looking at lands next. So lands, on the face of it, profit has come down from GBP 8.2 million to GBP 2.3 million. But I would stress last year was a record year in the history of Hargreaves Land at GBP 8.2 million, and we did always flag this would come back more to normality, which is what has happened this year at GBP 2.3 million. Gordon will pick up on some of the key transactions in there, but it has been nice to see a couple of sales complete within Blindwells during the year. Our share of profit after tax of HRMS, which is our German joint venture, is the next element here. Profit up from GBP 1.3 million last year to GBP 4.1 million.
A lot of that growth is in relation to the DK recycling facility, which I'll touch on in a couple of slides' time in terms of what's driven that. Corporate costs and interests are slightly higher than they were last year. Large driver behind that is last year we had the benefit of interest income on our defined benefit pension scheme. For those of you who follow the story, you will know that we bought in the pension scheme at some point during 2024, and therefore that opportunity for upside on that interest is no longer there. That's the main reason for the difference. That gives us underlying PBT of GBP 17.5 million, up 4%. So a lot of moving parts in that growth. Everything else is fairly straightforward. I think the tax rate is ever so slightly lower than it was this time last year.
This year's effective rate's 20%. Last year was 25%. The reason for the discrepancy is, last year we've had a prior adjustment relating to the tail end of the super- deduction. Elsewhere on this slide, land end up 3%. But but something I'd like to draw people's attention to is EBITDA is increasing at a faster rate than our PBT, and that is because of the mix of our profits, more coming out of services than land. So just over the page, where is all of the capital tied up in the balance sheet? So if I go left to right, this is a fairly similar story to those of you who followed us for a little while. On the left, services, total capital employed of just under GBP 8 million. It is up from GBP 5 million.
I think last time last year we had an exceptionally low level of working capital in services. Typically, I would expect this to be between GBP 7 million-GBP 12 million, depending on timing, and how much volume of work we have on. High level of tangible fixed assets in services is plant equipment, yellow plant, diggers, dozers, and such like, funded by leasing debt or HP. If I look at lands, next column along, GBP 83 million of capital employed, slightly up on the prior year. That's due to continued investment into Blindwells. However, the pleasing thing is this is down from our November presentation, so we're starting to see cash come out of land, albeit modest at the moment. Just a reminder, everything in land is held at cost, so any fluctuations in market price values don't affect our balance sheet value. Next column is HRMS.
So this is our share of the German joint venture, currently sitting at GBP 68 million in total, split as GBP 45.4 million in terms of our investment, which is profits built up in the German joint venture. They haven't yet paid to us as a dividend, and GBP 14 million in other working capital loans. Most of that is long-term loans to secure funding in Germany. And within the allocators column, two things I'd pick up on. One is the deferred tax asset, which is down to 7.8 from 11.3 last year. That's really demonstrating the fact we are using our tax losses, which we said would happen, meaning we reduce our tax payments. And then cash, important to remind everyone, positive cash balance of GBP 23 million. We have no external bank funding other than the HP, so very solid balance sheet. Next slide.
Just consider some points of valuation. If you're making your choice, your opinion on how Hargreaves should be valued, just laying out some factors to consider on this slide. First of all, our services business, good level of earnings, good visibility going forward, clearly some sort of earnings multiple would be appropriate here. So we've listed the EBIT number and the EBITDA. EBITDA are now grown up to GBP 30 million on the services business. So in terms of multiples, you can add whatever you want to that. land, Gordon's covered this in quite some detail, I think, already. But base value cost of GBP 80 million with the renewables uplift of GBP 20 million, as previously now reconfirmed by JLL, gives us over GBP 100 million of value sitting within land, which we plan to unlock over the next 4-6 years.
Then on HRMS, book value is just under GBP 70 million now. We are receiving an annual cash dividend of between GBP 6 million and GBP 7 million, which we are using to fund the dividend out onwards to our shareholders. We will continue to focus on getting cash out of that business to fund. Next slide is just a quick cash flow. So we started the year with GBP 23 million in the bank. EBITDA broken down there is operating profit add back depreciation, and less from sale of fixed assets. So it's just under GBP 34 million. Small movements in working capital, and then interest, tax, and CapEx are fairly standard and straightforward, I think, to understand. We then received our dividend from our German joint venture this year was GBP 6.3 million. The next line is a bit of an unusual one.
This is a GBP 4 million cash receipt from the pension fund. So if we looked at this slide, 12 months ago, that would have been the other way around, because when we bought it in the scheme, we had to lend GBP 4 million to the trustees for them to purchase the insurance policy. They did that and have since recovered funds from the underlying sticky assets they had, and they've repaid the GBP 4 million to us in total. Next column relates to lease payments. This lease payments number is high compared to previous years. Part of that is because we've invested in plant and machinery in order to fund the growth in revenue on these major infrastructure projects. And as you can see, the leasing payments broadly cancel out the depreciation earlier on in this slide. It's never gonna be one for one.
In this year, I would say leasing payments are slightly higher than I'd expect them to be going forward. Paid a dividend of GBP 12 million, which ended the year with GBP 23 million. Then the next slide is really just to give a little bit more color on HRMS, because if you looked in the announcement that went out this morning, you can't see too much on HRMS, because it is a joint venture, and all you see is the share of profit. So on the right-hand side, we have a table just outlining some of the key financials. In green, we have the revenue for the two elements of the business. If I start with HRMS, the trading business, revenues are down to just under GBP 180 million from GBP 220 million. And that is not volume related. Volumes have been pretty standard.
What that is, is commodity prices have come down yet further. Predominantly coke prices have come down. So whilst that's reduced revenue, HRMS have been able to hold the margin. So margin as a percentage has gone up to 5.7%, but they've held the PBT at GBP 10 million. So really strong performance from the team over there in what is a challenging market at the moment. The other side to that reduction in coke prices, though, which has reduced revenue, has benefited in DK. So DK profit, you can see in the yellow, or rather a loss, I should say, in the yellow, has reduced from GBP 7.4 million loss last year to GBP 1.4 million loss this year. Two main factors for that. One is the securing of solid fuel prices, being coke in the main, significantly better than it was 12 months earlier.
So prices have come down, reducing the input cost. And secondly, gate fees on the waste material have been improved this year, which have, again, helped to improve the results within DK. And Gordon will touch on a few other factors in DK that could further move that going forward. At the bottom of the table here, we're just breaking down really what was on the like a couple of slides previous. What is the total exposure to HRMS? We're now down to GBP 68 million in HRMS, which is reflective coming down GBP 3 million, reflective of the fact that we received a dividend, and that was offset by some further profits in the year. And I will hand over to Simon to talk about services now.
Thanks, Steve. Just to start with, first, I'm gonna talk about services.
And, reflecting on this, the important thing to remember is the markets in which we operate. We operate broadly, for me, in 3 key sectors. It's called connectivity, which is transport, getting people from one place to another, transport, rail, airports, is in that sector, energy and net zero, that transition of the energy base into a zero carbon place, and the environment, which includes water and waste. It's publicly known. Lots of announcements that folk will have seen as to the increase in that infrastructure core market going forward for the next 5-10 years, which positions the services we offer in a very strong place. Remember, though, that 70+ of our contracts, and that's grown this year from 65 up to 70, are in assets that already exist and assets that we maintain. We operate, and we look after for our customers.
So what does that mean? It means that with those secured orders, for a strong pipeline of orders, we can be selective on the work that's coming towards us as part of the infrastructure pipeline. And it's really important for us to remember being selective is the thing that protects our exposure to credit. It allows us to make sure our contracts are inflation resistant. And we've seen that in recent years. When inflation's been higher, we've still delivered the results that we've been delivering. And it gives us that resilience, in our base market to drive selection. And that's all leading us to those positive cash flows, good, strong cash flows this year, really good return on capital employed. And for the first time, we've gone over 6%. So if you've seen in Stephen's slides, we've gone from 5.6%-6.5% margins.
So the more work we bring through as part of that forecasted increase in the market, that'll drop straight through to our bottom line. So really strong business with really positive outlooks. The sorts of services we do, you'll not see on the high street. We're not in retail, and we're not in one stop, one off project construction. We do deliver major, projects into new build. But the bulk of our business is in services that we offer to customers that exist, you know, mechanical engineering, turnkey engineering. We've got a very strong presence in waste management, bulk handling materials, a transport business, and a land remediation business.
So as we mature our customer relationships over a number of years, which we do, we start to pull through these services and increase the amount of revenue we're taking from our customers by delivering a really strong, excellent service. What underpins the model is the quality of the people that we employ and their ability to deliver those services in a safe, efficient, and effective way. We've got real strong focus within the teams to make sure that we deliver to our customers what they require from us. So taking a look forward to the pipeline, some successes this year. You'll take the connectivity sector, HS2, two more seasons to run. HS2 is now taking us forward to the Lower Thames Crossing project with a preferred partner there to Balfour Beatty.
So as HS2 starts to run off over the next two seasons, we'll see the volumes increase in Lower Thames Crossing. And, of course, that now announced growing pipeline of infrastructure starts to think about things that are further in the future. Most important one on the horizon that we can see is, of course, the Heathrow expansion. Blackwell business already has been active in that space when we delivered the Terminal 5 upgrade. And, of course, we did the initial design work for that when it was on the drawing board. So we know that project, and we're quite optimistic about that coming forward. Energy, again, strong tailwinds. Sizewell C went through FID last week. We are doing the enabling works there, and we have works, service provision.
That now will move forward into the main construction islands and the associated infrastructure around that plant. So nuclear in energy, clean energy, very important sector that we're very well positioned in. And it's a sort of customer where we can deliver a good service and pull through additional services that we showed on the previous page. Not forgetting, of course, that we already, across the U.K. energy sector, we deliver to energy for waste companies. We're supporting energy companies in multiple clusters. A number of those are considering decarbonization options. We're well placed to take advantage of that. And we're supporting the growth in the other bit of the nuclear power sector, which, when it comes forward, the nuclear fusion reactor at West Burton, we're already positioned on that site doing work through our industrial services business. Moving to the environment, we've made good progress here.
We've now secured new contracts with Yorkshire Water, Northumbrian Water, and Severn Trent Water. Really good service we're providing there through both our industrial and our environmental businesses. And our SBU business that we acquired a few years ago is well positioned in some frameworks for the end of AMP 7 and moving into AMP 8 cycle now. So we're supporting the water customers, in that space. And not forgetting our earthmoving business, of course, with a rollout of the country's new nine reservoirs. We're already doing the trial pit digging on two of those reservoirs, and we'll see our relationship with that increasing and improving over the years. So what we're saying here is good sector spread, which gives us balance.
We're in sectors that are forecast to grow over years, and we've got really strong long-term relationships with customers in those sectors, high-quality, blue-chip customers, providing us with confidence that we continue to grow the services business in this space.
Thank you, Simon. So, just moving on to the land piece again for people that don't know us. Just want to highlight what we do, really. So two parts to the business. We owned a lot of land, which was to do with the old mining business. And that held at historic cost. So, therefore, we're working through that as a multi-phase master developer. We're doing bespoke commercial development. So we're working on that section alongside its renewables. Now, a lot of our land is in Scotland, and, therefore, there's a lot of wind farms, batteries, solar on that.
So those are the two parts of the business, as I mentioned earlier. One of them sits with about GBP 80 million of balance sheet there. The other is, in that 80, GBP 7 million of renewables worth about GBP 27 million. So you've got GBP 100 million of value. land at historic cost in here. So it's all about harvesting that. To just take you over the page. Blindwells is our flagship. It's about GBP 40 million of cash tied up in there, and you can see that it's a fantastic site close to Edinburgh. So, that site will continue to be sold down and generate that cash. We're also working on Unity, and we're looking to sell some of the renewables. Now, key point is that the property market is a bit quiet at the moment. Let's be honest. You can see that everywhere.
We're not concerned because we are holding the land at a set historic cost. So the important thing is, we will, as a board, make the decisions on when we look to sell bits and pieces as it's appropriate to get the the best value for shareholders. So that's the land piece in itself. Just want to move on to renewables. So the good thing for everyone is, Jones Lang LaSalle did another revaluation of this portfolio and has confirmed that it's still still worth about GBP 27 million-GBP 29 million. We mentioned earlier that we brought to the market, about what Jones Lang LaSalle valued at nearly GBP 13 million of assets. We are in detailed discussions, to sell that portfolio. I hope to make an announcement shortly on that, probably a little bit later than I would have expected. But, fine, we're determined to get the best price.
So I hope to very shortly update that. Remember, we talk about. So Jones Lang LaSalle have only valued GBP 27 million-GBP 29 million. We then have these further out schemes further down, which we think will add some more significant value over time, and we will update the market each time on that. Finally, in land, as I said. You know, you start with a GBP 100 million. We're gonna trade it down to GBP 20 million, delivering a ROCE of about 20%, so making about GBP 4 million. And this is all about the future.
This is about option agreements, promotion agreements, etc., that we have. And we're building that pipeline. So as the cash comes out, it will turn into much more this option type business. And this is just giving you a flavor of how that's growing and how we're securing that long-term stream from that type of business.
So land, the outlook is very good. We have. You know, real upside coming through, and it's just gonna happen over the next three or four years. Just take me over to the next one. Thank you. So this is just Germany. So remember, Germany's split into two bits. Again, for those of you who do not know us, there's a trading business that's ring fenced from DK. So those are the two bits of the business, really. Trading business. So if we talk about that first on the next slide. We always said to everyone it'll trade in this blue box range, between GBP 10 million and GBP 15 million.
Guess what? You know, everyone knows that Europe's had a quite difficult last 12 months. Guess what? We came in at the bottom of the range. The volume was still very similar to prior year. So happy with the volume.
It made the number we expected. So, you know, nice, steady, recurring income. But I've always said to people, it's a trading business. So please, in your own head, as a sum of the parts, value it as book. One day, when the trading team decided they want to retire, we'll just close this business down. There's no closure costs because it makes about GBP 1 million a month. So when the traders retire, we'll just close the books three months to clear the inventory. That'll make GBP 3 million, and that'll deal with the closure costs. But, like I said, we have a great leading trading team. They're keen to move forward with us. But, one day it will close down when they retire, and then, you'll get booked back. DK Recycling is the interesting thing. So what does it do?
Again, for those of you who don't know, it takes waste dusts from steel plants across Europe. There is really a little bit. So, the options, if you're a steel plant, is you put it into landfill, you give it to us, or there's a small amount that can go into the cement sector. So really, as the ESG agenda pushes into the steel plants, they really have to come to us instead of going to landfill, and that gives us pricing power. What we do is we mix about 500,000 tons of dust with coke and coal in a blast furnace, and you produce pig iron, zinc, and energy. The energy is we sell a little to the grid, but basically, we're protected from spiking energy price because we generate our own power. So, what really drives the profitability of the business?
Well, if you think about it, it's pig iron prices, zinc price, and gate fees, so that we're looking to drive gate fees on. In the period, we were able to not only drive on gate fees, but also we were able to reduce the cost of the input raw materials, the coke and coal. We did expect pig iron prices to move up, due to Russian embargo, etc. Now, the Russian embargos kicked in now. It's effective from September. Obviously, everyone is appreciative of the fact that with the tariffs on steel, the market's been very, very flat. So, it hasn't moved up very much. But to give you an idea, a 1% movement in pig iron price adds GBP 1 million to the bottom line. So, I'm looking forward to updating you in January about what's happened with pig iron prices.
I think they're on the floor at the moment. Can't see them going much lower. If they move up, that will be a positive thing for us. So just over the page. ESG is very important to us. I'd like to reassure you, as a fellow shareholder, that this is not about ticking a box. It's what our customers are demanding from us. And that's. This is all about value for money for you as a shareholder. So, the customer wants ESG. We're providing what the customer wants because that helps us win work. So the team in the ESG team, they're held accountable by the divisional MDs to make sure they're helping them win contracts. So we don't have this ESG team. They are a value add. Not just an overhead. So they're keenly focused on delivering value to the business.
So ESG is part of what we do. It's important. So, in summary, just take you through to recap. Like I said, a lot of you know this. So really, starting at the bottom, Germany continues to pay the dividend. Great. Bottom of the cycle. We expect that to move up. land, you've got a huge amount of value in there. We hope to throw off about GBP 80 million of cash in the next few years with the sale of renewables and the land assets. At least, if we get better than book, clearly, you'll get a profit on top of that as well. So land will go down to a much smaller business, making about GBP 4 million. The big driver is the services group, and that's why Simon's joined us to give it that focus and attention.
Those of you who know who have been on the journey know that, the group has come a long way. Now is the critical moment to really take that opportunity in services. And I have to say for the, again, those of you who've been with me a long time. You know, we're probably in the best place I've ever been. We've tidied up the history from a coal company to a green company. And now. And you'll have to. I'm not taking the credit for this because it wasn't about positioning. We've been very lucky. The sectors that we live in, and we are exposed to are going through a golden patch that we will look to capitalize. And that's why Simon is here to help me with the execution and take those opportunities for shareholders.
So just over the page and to complete before I move over to questions. Please remember, you have a very experienced board. You have Roger McDowell. You also have Harwood Capital represented on the board. So, as our biggest shareholder, that means there's some very strong shareholder alliance alignment. Also, strong balance sheet, no debt, so we don't have to do suboptimals. We are very conscious. A number of our shareholders are keen for the dividend. So again, you'll see it was increased by 3%, to reflect inflation. So we're keeping pace with that. And I think we have three very strong pillars that are easy to understand for people and work out the value of the business as some of the parts. So look, that's done the presentation. I think I now hand over for.
Fantastic. Absolutely, Great. Thank you very much, indeed. Ladies and gentlemen, do please continue to submit your questions just using the Q&A tab situated in the top right-hand corner of your screen. Just want the team to take a few moments to review those questions submitted today. I'd like to remind you we're recording the presentation along with a copy of the slides and the published Q&A can be accessed via your investor dashboard. As you can see, we've had a number of questions submitted, both during today's presentation and pre-submitted. Stephen, if I may just hand back to you just to read out those questions where appropriate to do so. Once complete, I'll pick up from you at the end.
Of course. Yes. And first question, Gordon, it's probably for you. This is a pre-submitted question. Has there been any improvement in the profitability of the German coal pulverization plant?
So for those who don't know, the business has a pulverization plant that basically grinds coal for cement plants. It was positioned to replace the lignite coal mines that were in Germany. Now, interesting fact, for those of you who don't track it, is that Germany still has a huge carbon footprint because it runs a lot of its power stations on horrible lignite brown coal. Because of the issue in Ukraine, and the fact they closed their nuclears, they are still continuing to run their lignite brown coal mines, which is a huge CO2 footprint. When those close, that will open the opportunity for this grinding plant to supply the cement industry in Europe. Remember, cement will always produce CO2. It doesn't matter if it burns coal or not. It's part of the chemical process. So they will have to fix carbon capture.
So, at the moment, it hasn't moved, but we still think there's a good long-term future for it.
Thank you. I think you picked this one up, but just to close it out, Q from John asking, when do you anticipate the sale of some of the renewable assets to be completed?
In the very near future. Thank you for asking. To be honest, I expected it to happen before this roadshow. And some of these things take a little bit longer, so it's really irritating. I will be really disappointed if I'm on the roadshow in January and that hasn't happened. We are at very advanced stage. So don't be surprised. Hey, you might see it in a couple of weeks, but it isn't very far away.
Thank you. I think this one's relating to services.
So Paul's asking, with strong cash generation and improved profitability, are there plans to pursue M&A, particularly in services and renewable energy infrastructure?
Currently, no. There are no firm plans. Obviously, as time goes by, we'll consider things, but currently, there are no firm plans.
Thank you. Brandon has asked a few questions in a row. I'll take them one at a time. Gordon, Tungsten West seems not to be mentioned this time like it has before. Has confidence in the start of the mining decreased?
No, it's a very good question. People ask that. It's just the layout, but I'm glad you asked. So, if you're tracking Tungsten West, you'll see that they raised another GBP 4 million, which gives us confidence that, it looks as if it's going ahead, or at least their backers think it's going ahead because they've put GBP 4 million in.
Come December, I think we'll all know because that's the deadline they've set themselves. They did pay us another GBP 1 million, which they were contractually obliged to do, which was paid in June. [crosstalk] . Look, if if they haven't raised their money, they've got to pay us another GBP 1 million next June. So look, if they raise the money, we have this mining services contract. If they don't raise the money, we will take the site back and restore it. So we're very comfortable. I think the focus, and it's a good point, that with the layout of the presentation's changed a bit. But, Lower Thames Crossing, Heathrow, things like this are really interesting. And if we're not careful, put too much in there. I think the theme is there's a huge amount of opportunities for services. Generally.
Each time I come on this roadshow, the opportunity in the spaces we work has got bigger, not smaller. That's probably why it got bumped out of the presentation. It's all about, do you trust this management team to take those opportunities? The goal, as I put it, the goal is open. The goal isn't even standing in the goal. Do you trust us to put it in the back of the net is the question, or at least Simon to put it in the back of the net, helped by me and Stephen.
Gordon. I'll take the next one. So Brandon's just asking, or statement, are you slightly surprised that a large proportion of the sales proceeds from Blindwells have to be reinvested into the scheme? So if you look in the presentation, we've had two sales total total proceeds of just under GBP 14 million.
Not all of that is cash upfront, particularly the Avant deal is phased. So some of not all that cash comes up, but nevertheless, a sizable proportion does need reinvesting into Blindwells. As we've got, I think there's five or six new, remaining plots left on the Blindwells site before phase one is completed. We still need to service and settle those sites before they're able to be sold. So we are at a peak. We have come down slightly from November. I expect over the next 3-4 years, that to go away significantly quicker as sales happen and the level of infrastructure drops away towards the back end of the site. So, it you have read it correctly, Brandon. This while I'll take the next one also from Brandon on HRMS.
How much is the CPP carbon pulverization plant in the books at, and is there hope it might do more than break even? I think Gordon's covered the profitability point. In terms of what it's in the books for, it's in the books for approximately GBP 24 million at the moment. That would stress that is part of the HRMS total investment number if you're looking for where it is actually on the balance sheet. And final question, I think, from Brandon, unless there's any further down. Is there any way that the capacity within DK can be increased? It does seem to be a product that may be in demand.
The answer is no, but in some respects, that's good because it gives me more pricing pressure. So you can flex it up by about 15%. But then you're pushing it.
So I'm very happy at the, rather increasing the margin as opposed to the volume.
Okay. Another one for you, Gordon. I think from Martin, is there any update on the position with CBAM?
Yes. So CBAM is still proceeding as planned, so nothing's changed on that. Nothing's changed on the Russian embargo on pig iron, and nothing's changed on CBAM. The EU have got to get together early 2026 to review CBAM. So they're having another review and then setting it once and for all. On the Russian embargo, which is a point I should pick up. The Russian embargo is in place. No more Russian pig irons are layered into Europe. People brought in material. Those stocks will be exhausted, well, they are actually exhausted now.
A lot of the foundries have closed for August, so it's going to be very interesting to see what pig iron price is doing September, October. And again, I will have a real clear update for you in January.
Thank you. Next one is from Aslan. I think I can probably take this one. What is the value of the carbon credits from the planting of trees in the year? 170,000 trees. So we didn't plant 170,000 trees this year. That's the total trees we've planted over the life of the schemes that we have. And we are not harvesting carbon credits from those trees. We're still looking at those tree planting schemes that we had and whether or not carbon sequestration is the most appropriate way to go with those.
Some of those trees that we planted were an obligation of planning as well, particularly on the Blindwells site to comply with our obligations there. So, the answer is we haven't got any carbon credits in relation to those trees in the Hargreaves Group. And I think this was the final question, unless a late one comes in from Martin. The large global wind turbine manufacturers have been highlighting a slowdown in the wind segment. Is this affecting the land business at all?
No, not at all. So in terms of the sites in Scotland, you know, the ones that we expected are being built. And the ones that are further down the pipeline are still progressing. So no, no, it's not having an impact on us at all.
Thank you. That is all of the questions that have been submitted.
Thank you very much for your interest.
Fantastic. Thank you, indeed, for answering all those questions. And of course, any further questions that do come through, the team will be able to review those. And we're public responses as well if we're able to do so on the Investor Meet Company platform. Just before redirecting investors to provide you with their feedback, you know, it's particularly important to the team. Gordon, if I could just ask you for a few closing comments, please.
Yes. Look, first of all, I'd just like to say thank you very much. We do value this interrelation with the retail investors. I've been CEO of this business for over 20 years, as many of you know. I genuinely believe that we are in the best place we've ever been. We are poised. Now, it's all about execution. But we are poised.
Everything always takes longer than you expect. I think we're all realists on this call. But look, we've got GBP 80 million of value. It's all about timing getting it out of land. Germany, it's all about taking the opportunity for when the market moves. And services. You know, we are just very lucky. I'm not going to take the credit for it because it wasn't positioned like that on purpose, if we're honest. The opportunities are there. There's no goalie in the goal man. We just need to put the goal in the back of the net, and that's up to us whether you trust us to execute. But I'm really excited. You know, look at the opportunities on the reservoirs. Lower Thames Crossing, Tungsten West. There's just so much work out there. I think we've got a great opportunity.
The news flow in the next 12 months will be very interesting. Hopefully, a renewable sale. Hopefully, one of the big infrastructure projects will be able to announce, and that'll lead to upgrades. Some more land sales, etc. And steady delivery. So I think there's going to be quite a good news flow in the next 12 months. And I look forward to catching up with you all in late January, early February. So thank you for your attention.
Gordon, thank you. And thanks to the team for updating investors today. Please ask investors not to close discussions. We automatically redirected to provide your feedback in order the management can better understand your views and expectations. This will only take a few moments to complete and is greatly valued by the company.
On behalf of the management team of Hargreaves Services PLC, we'd like to thank you for attending today's presentation. That concludes today's session. Good afternoon to you all.