Good afternoon. This is the Chorus Call Conference Operator. Welcome, and thank you for joining the ERG Q1 2023 results conference call. As a reminder, all participants are in listen-only mode. After the presentation, there will be an opportunity to ask questions. Should anyone need assistance during the conference call, they may signal an operator by pressing star and zero on their telephone. At this time, I would like to turn the conference over to Mr. Paolo Merli, Chief Executive Officer of ERG. Please go ahead, sir.
Good morning, everyone, and welcome to our first quarter results presentation. Here with me, as usual, is our CFO, Michele Pedemonte, who will run you through our business performance over the period in more detail later on. Let's get started with the overview of results. I'm on page number four, in line with last year's. Numbers are based on continuing operations, excluding CCGT from the scope, and figures are presented gross of clawback measures and windfall taxes, as those items are accounted for as non-recurring, being extraordinary and temporary measures. Throughout the presentation, anyway, we will provide detailed disclosure of those measures.
In a nutshell, I would say results were solid once again, in line with our budget. Mainly driven by larger installed capacity that allowed us to almost fully offset the sharp reduction in capture prices, also reflecting the zeroing of the green incentive in Italy, given the formula its pricing is based on. EBITDA EUR 167 million, broadly in line year-over-year, as the larger installed capacity, partly through M&A and partly through organic growth, contributed by roughly around EUR 25 million. This amount, positive, say, contribution, was basically completely offset by lower capture sales price, -EUR 20 million. Lower wind availability in general, but let me say in particular in U.K. Solar in the period showed rising volumes to battery radiation.
All in all, we can say that those results, even though in line with last year, are we think a proof of the resilience of our portfolio in this extremely volatile business environment. I'd like also to say that in this quarter, more than 50% of EBITDA came from outside the border. Clawbacks during the period were EUR 7 million against EUR 3 million in Q1 2022. Adjusted for those items, EBITDA net of clawbacks was EUR 161 in Q1 2023, against EUR 165 in Q1 2022. You will find those numbers, I mean net of clawback, in the footnotes of this chart. You have all the number, net and gross. CapEx in the period amounted to EUR 66 million, lower than the same period of last year, as Q1 2022 included EUR 96 million from M&A in Spain.
CapEx over the period was mainly related to the advancements for assets under construction, both repowering and greenfield projects. Adjusted net profit was EUR 84 million, in line year-on-year, reflecting the operating results and lower financial charges. Bottom line, the impact from extraordinary measures was EUR 5 million in Q1 2023 against EUR 17 million in Q1 2022, because I remind you that on top of the clawback measures, Q1 2022, as the remaining quarters of last year, were hit by some windfall taxes, in particular in Italy. Net of these items, net profit in Q1 2023 was Euro, against EUR 67 in Q1 2022. Showing, this is good news, reduced intensity from these measures, which we hope are going to phase out completely soon, given the strong correction and reduction in gas prices. Again, you'll find all these numbers in the footnotes.
Net financial position at year-end was EUR 1.2 billion. Significantly down compared to EUR 1.4 billion at the end of last year. Mainly the strong cash flow generated by the company over the period. On top of the reversal I've been mentioned, say, over the last few webcasts, given the delivery of derivatives that absorbed the last year mark-to-market, negative mark-to-market. Let's move now to page five. I would like to give you a quick update on our main achievements during the quarter. Say, in general, the message is we are moving forward with our strategy, and in particular, with the expansion of our RES portfolio in Europe. As far as organic growth, we started up our Creag Riabhach wind farm in Scotland, 92 MW.
As far as M&A, we made an important step in our diversification in solar in Spain with the recent acquisition of 149 MW under construction. All details will follow. In terms of our financing strategy, we are very satisfied with the investment grade rating just confirmed by Fitch, which is a recognition of our business model and solidity of our financial structure, which remains a distinctive feature in the space of few renewable players. Year to date, we signed refinancing for EUR 330 million at very, very competitive market conditions, as EUR 250 million were pre-hedged in 2019 at almost zero risk-free rate. Therefore, with an all-in cost, which is pretty in line with our current cost of debt, slightly above 1%. As far as PPA, we are moving forward consistently with our route to market strategy.
We signed an important PPA with Luxottica for 900 GW h related to our Partinico-Monreale repowering project. It's gonna be the first entering in operation. In fact, is now under its commissioning phase after the wind turbine erection was completed. We also amended the PPA with the TIM, the telecom, the Italian telecom champion, to extend yearly volumes by 200 GWh and improving economic conditions for the entire volumes in excess of 0.5 TWh . Our ESG path is continuing to be successful with important recognition on all the pillars of our strategy. We have been confirmed in the Bloomberg Gender-Equality Index with an improved scoring as a proof of our commitment to fostering women's leadership in our organization. Sustainalytics improved our rating from medium to low risk as regards our governance model.
ERG's been included in the global 100 most sustainable company in the world by Corporate Knights in recognition of the ESG strategy fully embedded in our business model. Despite equity markets have switched to a negative mood, say, towards renewables, we are still moving on successfully and consistently with our strategic path. Let me give you a little bit more color on the recent acquisition in Spain. The Garnacha Solar power plant has a total installed capacity of 149 MW. In a very advanced stage of construction. In terms of size, it's going to be the largest photovoltaic farm in the group's renewable portfolio. I'd also like to highlight the quality of the assets that are equipped with best-in-class panels, trackers, and inverters with a load factor of 22%, which means almost 2,000 hours per year.
As regard the route to market, the assets come with a 12 year PPA with Google that covers 70% of production. More importantly, with this acquisition, ERG consolidates its industrial presence in Spain with a total installed capacity of 266 MW and over 1 GW of pipeline under development. We can now move to phase II of our development in the country with greater focus on organic growth. Now, over Michele for his review on Q1 results.
Let's start with an overview of the unitary revenues of the period. In Q1, electricity market prices have been lower than previous year. This trend influences our all-in unitary revenues, which are also affected by the hedging made in the past or by other revenues component. In wind Italy, for example, unitary revenues are influenced by the value of the incentive, which is null in 2023, and lower by EUR 42 MWh versus previous year. On the market, we quote a price in line with previous year, thanks to our hedging policy. All in all, we have a decline in unitary revenues from EUR 124 MWh to EUR 116 MWh. In France, the large majority of our assets operate under FiT scheme without exposure to market prices.
The increase in the unitary revenues is mainly related to the increase in FiTs according to inflation and to some limited hedging activities. In Germany, the one restructure coupled with some short-term hedging, allow us to capture higher prices than previous years. East Europe unit, unitary revenues decreased in Q1, mainly in Romania and Bulgaria. Since Q4 2022, Romanian government introduced the obligation for our plants to sell electricity to a PPA at a capped price, roughly EUR 90 megawatt hour, in order to reduce the impact of high energy prices in the country. In U.K., the decrease in all-in unitary revenues, minus EUR 111 MWh , is related to the PPA prices, which are lower than the spot market price captured in the first months of operation of our Northern Ireland asset in Q1 2022.
As regard the solar all-in unitary revenues, we see value increase in Italy, thanks to the new assets at merchant prices, versus the previous year, completely at fixed prices. In Spain, where our assets have a tariff mechanism that operates as a floor to our revenues, all-in price reflects the lower max scenario. Finally, please note that consistently with the previous year results, our figures have presented gross global measures implemented by various European governments and accounted as non-recurring items also in 2023. Now a focus on productions. We are at page nine. In Italy, 784 GWh, +11% year-on-year, thanks to wind and solar asset acquired in 2022, 116 GWh, partly offset by lower wind condition and worse irradiation.
In France, 396 GWh, +23%, thanks to better wind condition, and 21 GWh coming from new perimeter. In Germany, 203 GWh, -2%, compared to a particularly higher production in Q1 2022. In Eastern Europe, volumes higher than Q1 2022, +10%, thanks to asset entering operation in 2022 in Poland, 41 GWh, partly offset by lower wind condition, especially in Bulgaria and Romania. U.K. and Nordics, we have 132 GWh, thanks to the asset energized by the end of 2022 and early 2023 in Scotland and Sweden, partly offset by lower wind condition with respect of our Northern Ireland assets.
Production at our Furuby wind farm in Sweden was lower than expected, mainly due to a slowdown in commissioning and a ramp-up phase, during which the manufacturer recorded some technical issues. The wind turbine manufacturer, Siemens Gamesa, is currently conducting a full root cause analysis. This is a new platform, one of the most powerful in the onshore wind industry at this moment. Additional testing and fine-tuning of the installed machines is normal during the ramp-up process of the new platforms. In Spain, we have 35 GWh, +30%, thanks to better weather condition with respect to last year. Q1 productions reached 1.8 TWh, mainly due to new asset acquired or internal development in Italy and abroad, and lower wind productions in Italy and Eastern Europe.
In the first quarter of the year, we have an overall EBITDA equal to EUR 167 million, in line with Q1 2022. Thanks to EUR 25 million coming from perimeter effect, which is compensated by lower price scenario and lower volumes, in particular in Italy and East Europe. In Italy, the EBITDA is EUR 82 million, in line with previous year, thanks to perimeter effect compensated mainly by the lower value of the incentive, which is null this, in this quarter. In France, the EBITDA is EUR 29 million, benefiting from better wind conditions compared to extremely poor production last year. In Germany, the EBITDA is EUR 28 million, +10%, thanks to higher prices captured through our hedging policy.
In Eastern Europe, the EBITDA is EUR 23 million, lower than Q1 2022, mainly due to lower sales price and lower volumes, partly offset by perimeter effect in Poland. In UK and Nordics, the EBITDA is lower than Q1 2022, -EUR 4 million, mainly due to PPA at a lower price than previous year market scenario, partially offset by perimeter effect, +EUR 7 million. In Spain, EBITDA is EUR 4 million, in line with Q1 2022, thanks to higher productions compensated by lower capture price. At the end, a stable EBITDA in comparison to previous year, in a scenario of strong decrease of market prices, thanks to our revenue securitization strategy into the growth of the installed base.
I'm at page 11. Now I give you a brief overview of investments in the period. We invested EUR 66 million, an amount which is lower than the one invested in Q1 2022, which was affected by the acquisition of solar plants in Spain. About EUR 63 million are related to organic CapEx in wind, referred to construction activities mainly in U.K., France and Sweden, and includes EUR 36 million of CapEx in Italy for the wind projects currently in construction in Sicily. Let's now move on to financials, commenting on profit and loss on a recurring basis. We have higher depreciation, which reflects the contribution of new asset, net of the life extension of our Italian wind assets.
Net financial charges at EUR 3 million, versus EUR 6 million in Q1 2022, mainly influenced by the increased liquidity remuneration in a scenario of interest rate increase, with the debt structure almost completely at fixed rate. Tax rate in the quarter was 22%, in line with previous year. As a result of all this, the adjusted results on continued operation of the quarter amounts to EUR 84 million, in line with previous year. Our CCGT is consolidated in the discontinued items. Net results of minus EUR 6 million includes depreciation of EUR 5 million, and an EBITDA at breakeven, impacted by an extremely negative market scenario for gas generation margins, and further worsened by government measures for maximizing power production not from natural gas, whose negative effects are expected to be mitigated from April 2023.
Results are also negatively influenced by a machine downtime at the beginning of the year, that now has been solved. On page 14, you can find a summary of the clawback measures that we have counted as non-recurring items in the quarter. The impact on the EBITDA can be summarized as follows. In Italy and France, we have EUR 3 million. In East Europe, clawback measures of EUR 4 million, and they refers mainly to Poland and Bulgaria. In Romania, the government set a compulsory PPA mechanism at a cap price, which has the same substantial effect of a clawback measure. These measures have an impact of on net profit for EUR 5 million. Comparing net profit and net of clawback, we see a substantial increase versus Q1 2022, which was easily affected by the first version of the Italian windfall tax.
As already commented in the last webcast, we do believe that these measures are unfair, unjustified, and ungrounded. For this reason, ERG has taken all the required actions in order to protect its interests in all countries where it operates, including by challenging the relevant regulation before the competent courts. Finally, let's take a look at the cash flow statement and the net financial position for Q1 2023. The net financial debt closed at EUR 1.2 billion, EUR 228 million lower than the end of 2022, driven by a solid cash generation from EBITDA, and a net capital positive movement for EUR 100 million, mainly linked to a timing effect from hedging operations done in the period. These impacts are netted by the already commented investment over the period of EUR 66 million.
The net financial position at the end of the quarter includes EUR 40 million, due to the mark-to-market of derivatives on commodities. I think I've touched all the relevant items. Thank you for your attention. I will now hand over to Paolo.
Thanks, Michele. Before going through guidance for 2023, let me take a look with you at ERG's delivery in terms of RES portfolio growth vis-a-vis the target we set in our business plan. You can see from this chart, through a combination of M&A and organic, we expect to add a further 369 MW by year-end, which is bang in line with the trajectory of the business plan. That turns out to be the case, it means we will have increased our RES capacity by more than 1.2 GW in three years' time, from 2021 to 2023.
An average of 400 MW per year, which means an increase of about 60% compared to the end of 2020, when we strategically decided for the asset rotation, hydro and thermal, and oriented our efforts towards a pure wind and solar model, being those, that's our view, the dominant technologies going forward. This growth will continue to be a driver of our results. Let's see now, and I'm concluding, by giving a detailed guidance for 2023. EBITDA is confirmed in the range of EUR 500 million-550 million. Let me point out that 2023 guidance is net of clawbacks.
CapEx range is moving up from EUR 400 million-EUR 500 million range, to EUR 500 million-EUR 600 million range, to include the recent acquisition in Spain for EUR 170 million, partly compensated by the fact that some M&A CapEx was already included in our 2023 initial guidance. Net financial position is expected now in the range of EUR 1.4 billion-EUR 1.5 billion, compared to the previous EUR 1.3 billion-EUR 1.4 billion. As a consequence of the same reason, the revised CapEx. Thank you very much for listening, and we are now ready to take your questions.
Excuse me. This is the Chorus Call conference operator. We will now begin the question and answer session. Anyone who wishes to ask a question may press star one on their touch-tone telephone. To remove yourself from the question queue, please press star two. We kindly ask you to use handsets when asking questions. The first question comes from Enrico Bartoli of Mediobanca.
Hi, good morning, everybody. Thanks for taking my question. Actually, I have a few. First of all, a general question on your comment, Paolo, about the fact that the market is not really very much in love with the renewables. I was wondering if you can update on your view on the sustainability of the returns from your investments, and maybe some comment on actually what the market is maybe wrong in appreciating in the share prices of the sector and on ERG in particular? The second question is regarding Spain. You completed this important acquisition in the past days.
Also here, I'm interested in your view on the Spanish market because there is a lot of discussion whether actually the prices for solar assets are going to be sustainable going forward, considering the capacity additions in this market. Actually Spain is going to be a big driver of your growth over the next years, you highlighted the 1 GW of pipeline under development? The third one is related to PPAs in Italy. You signed this large contract recently with Luxottica team. If you can provide some color on the environment for PPAs in Italy. I have the impression that actually demand is continued to grow, and some comments also on the pricing environment?
The last one is an update on the hedging in terms of volumes and prices for this year, considering the evolution of power prices in the past few months. Sorry for the many questions.
Good morning, Enrico. I try to follow the order of your question. The first was about our view on the current business environment, including the regulatory. Let me say, and vis-à-vis, say, the performance of the renewable as an asset class in the equity markets. Now, say, our view is that there are three main factors right now that are putting a little bit of uncertainty on the sector. The first is for sure the regulatory, because the big mess that has been created with this clawback, windfall taxes, say, extraordinary measures, have increased quite significantly the perception of the regulatory risk.
On this, on this aspect, my personal view is that sooner or later, and I hope soon, Europe will realize that the energy transition can go on just if the environment for investors stabilizes. I know the European Commission is working on giving a guidance to the member states whether to extend or not the clawback measures. I think this should be quite important message.
My personal expectation is that they have realized the impact they have done with this measure, and they will stop them at the natural phase out date, which in general is 3rd June of this year, even though some member states such like France have already extended the measure till the end of the year. Let's say I expect 2023 to be the last year with this kind of measure, and then back to normal or, say, back to market. The other reasons, the other two factors, in my opinion, underpinning this poor performance of the sector, not of ERG, of the sector, is also the interest rates that are keep moving on up.
From this point of view, let me say, we are in a quite ideal situation because we have EUR 2 billion of the gross debt, which is a cost of one point something, less than 1.5%. The only fundraising we needed in the short term was already done in this 1st month of the year at a very super competitive conditions, basically in line with the cost of our debt. That was made possible because we pre-hedged mostly this amount in a time where interest rates were basically zero. This provides the company with a very strong financial power. The next, say, fundraising, based on the business plan should be in 2025, let's see.
My personal expectation is, the interest rates should be reached or have already reached the peak probably in 2023, I expect to cool off a little bit. The third element is the volatility of the gas price. Last summer, it touched EUR 340 per MWh, and right now is EUR 35. The volatility is really extreme. In fact, we are glad to confirm the guidance and to have posted our results in Q1 that are basically in line or even slightly better than our budget. The number was embedded in our guidance. This is the third element, and again, I expect the market will find a balance soon.
Probably we expect the energy prices anyway to remain in the range of EUR 100, not go back to EUR 50 or EUR 60 as they used to be before the green inflation, the war, and everything went on in the world. That's our view. About Spain, for sure, the elements you underlined, the penetration of renewables in the market is one of the elements that has been taken when deciding the investments and when deciding the strategy for the country as a whole. We still believe the areas of Spain is quite interesting area for photovoltaic investments, given the huge presence of the resource. Let's take our recent acquisition.
The plant has got roughly 2,000 hours per year, almost 2,000 hours per year, which is usually a load factor you can see for wind and not for solar. Consider also that our strategy is the strategy for route to market is always based on PPA, and we have quite clear evidence that the PPA market is still hot. I think one of your questions was about PPA. We have signed two PPAs with Italian entities, Luxottica and TIM, which was an extension of the previous PPA, but the company proved to be able to process PPAs also outside Italy.
We made it in France, in U.K., and we are working also, or we will be working after closing this operation, which is already provided with a PPA to further secure the remaining part of the revenues which are floating because the PPA with Google covers roughly 70%. Looking forward, I think, we think, this acquisition should move our attention about M&A in other countries, in the sense that with this acquisition We will reach a size of roughly 300 MW, and the next installation, the next moves should be more focused on organic growth.
From this respect, we are working on several projects which are in our pipeline, are quite large scale photovoltaic projects, maybe with a time to market of few years, but still very, very, very promising. I don't know, Enrico, if I touched?
The hedging. As you can see from our net financial position, the mark-to-market of derivatives is quite low, in the sense that the reversal we said last year has already partly, mostly, realized in the 1st quarter. We still have some hedging as regards 2023. Not very much on 2024 because our strategy is progressively moving from this kind of hedging to physical hedging provided by PPA.
Thank you. Sorry, just for some quick detail on the hedging. In terms of pricing, can you give some hints on where actually your average price is going to be in 2023 compared to 2022?
The hedging price for 2023 on average is above EUR 100 per MWh because it's a mixture of the hedging done, say a few years ago when prices were lower and the ones executed last year. All in all, I think value of this hedging are quite satisfactory.
Okay, great. Thank you very much.
Thank you. Thank you, Enrico.
The next question is from Roberto Letizia of Equita.
Yes, good morning. Thanks for taking my question. The first one is on the guidance. I would like you to explain us which conditions may allow you or build up, not full deep date, but just a sense to understand if those contracts, for example, provides you a floor to the energy prices. I guess that they have a profile which follows the market, I guess. I'm wondering if it gives you a floor, and if you can provide any sense of what kind of floor is embedded in those countries to let us understand how are you protecting against the risk of zero prices, for example. How much do you think in the midterm you will stay, still be open to market pricing, especially in Spain? Thanks a lot.
Okay. Roberto, again, I try to follow the order of your questions. The first is about the guidance, and I perceive through the lines that how confident we are about this guidance and what are the assumptions the guidance is based on. Say, the necessary premise is that the price scenario is extremely volatile, as it has never been. Our forecast, and therefore guidance, is based on the most recent forward curves, which are lower than the ones our initial guidance was based on. The fact that we are confirming the full year guidance, which is positive in itself, is because Q1 was likely better than our budget.
Going forward throughout the year, we expect results to be supported by several factors, among which our revenue structure, which is mainly based on long-term contracts and fixed price tariffs. As the PPA we recently signed got a starting date from 2023, 1st January 2023, even though we announced them later on. The second point, which is maybe the most important, is the strong contribution we expect from new assets, the one that have already entered into our portfolio, and they are already up and running. Also the ones that are going to start production during the course of the year. I mentioned during my speech that one of them, the first repowering, the Partinico-Monreale wind farm, is now, in these days, energizing and start production.
The deployment of our investments, as represented during the webcast, is on track, and we expect this contribution. Last but not least, I would say a very, very big attention, a great attention of the group on fixed cost, which maybe could be lower than what was envisaged in our guidance. All in all, these three elements are suggesting us absolutely a forecast that is in line with our previous budget. To reach the cap of the range depends on several factors, but the most important one is the price scenario.
The gas price is so volatile. We can't rule out that the gas price will reverse the last month's trend, going up again during the summer when hot should play a major role in supply-demand balance. The scenario, let me say, is the most important driver. Also the availability of wind and solar, because, you know, the presence of wind can change the game very, very easily. Down, but also up. Those are, I would say, the main elements. As regards the clawbacks, really difficult to predict the evolution of the regulation. For sure, it's quite evident also from public statements from EU representatives, that they are very well aware of the damage they have created with these measures.
We expect these measures to progressively phase out from our landscape. Say, during the last webcast, the previous webcast, I said those measures were going to have an effect of the tune of EUR 100 million. Now it's much less because the price scenario went down. You see in the quarter, just EUR 7 million. You can simply try to figure out how much could be for the full year, but surely less than half what we expected just few months ago. Yes, in our guidance, we are expecting all the measures. We are a little bit cautious from this point of view, to stay on for the full year.
If they will, if they will be canceled in the second part of the year, when it's the natural, because the natural expiring date for most of these norms is third of June 2023. For sure, we should have a little upside, let me say. You ask also for the CCGT. Okay. You've seen the results were very poor during the quarter. I start from here, I mean, even though I know the question is more oriented to the sale process, but let me elaborate a little bit on the results of the first quarter for the plan. We deem the poor results over the quarter were due to a couple of extraordinary factors.
The first and most impactful is an extraordinary weaker business environment between spot spreads, in particular, in the area where the plant operates, under strong pressure. This is mostly related to the Piano di massimizzazione. It's a program that has been approved by the government last summer and still in place, based on which oil, fuel, and coal plants can run at full speed to reduce gas consumption. This program is resulting in an oversupply that is pushing margins down. This program was expected to finish at the end of March 2023, but was recently extended till third of September of this year.
The economic impact from lower price scenario, at least looking simply the comparison with the price scenario we had last year, was EUR 5-6 million during the quarter, quite a huge impact for the plant. The good news is that although extended, this program has been significantly reduced in intensity. As a matter of fact, the nearby fuel oil plant, which is impacting our economics the most, has been stopped since April 1st, as a consequence, April I can say went better. Looking forward, we can't rule out the possibility that this fuel oil plant will be activated again between now and September, if necessary. The program looking forward, will definitely come to an end, and eventually. Because it's in contra, let me say, with the energy transition target, simply, it's a polluting plant.
After that, we expect CCGT profitability to come back to normal. This is an external factor, but it's quite clear in impact. The second one is more company specific, because during the quarter, at the very, very beginning of the year, we had a downtime of a 400 voltage cable on a transformer connecting the module one with the grid. This failure resulted in 1.5 months shutdown for the module one, which I remind you, is the one of the two trains benefiting from White Certificates under the CAR regime, the high efficiency cogeneration regime. This downtime had an impact of roughly EUR 3 million-4 million on the reported EBITDA over the period, so the first quarter.
The failure has now been repaired, and the plant has been fully up and running since March. If you, I like you to do it, but if you adjust the zero EBITDA of the quarter for these two main effects, you can see the normalized EBITDA is pretty in line with the historical, say, profitability of the plan. When it comes to the sale process, I just say that it's moving forward. The objective absolutely remains to complete the disposal by year-end. The fact that ISAB Refinery has found a new owner, as publicly announced last week, gives more visibility and stability to the Priolo industrial site as a whole, and therefore, we are confident to deliver on our object, I can say more than that. Spanish, there was another question.
Spanish, the market and the PPA characteristics. I say, about the market, I have already said that we are quite well aware, we are on the market, we are aware of this item, underlined by several analysts, and by our organization itself, devoted to market analysis, that the penetration of solar in the market should have as a consequence some hours with very low prices and so on. This has been factored in our valuation. Yes, the PPA, I can give very much detail because you know, we are under confidentiality agreements. I say, you said right. The PPA provide for a kind of floor to the energy, to the sale price. Thus providing a minimal return of the investment that is quite safe.
Roberto, I hope to have answered.
Yeah. Thank you. Thank you.
The next question is from Naisheng Cui of Barclays.
Hey, good morning, Paolo and Michele. Thanks for taking my questions. I have three, if that's okay. The first one is just to follow up on the CCGT asset disposal. Paolo, I think you mentioned earlier that you are very confident to get that done end of this year. May I ask, with the introduced uncertainty around external oil and coal plants, will you be able to achieve similar EV as you announced last year, around EUR 180 million? Is that still possible? My second question, also a comment you mentioned earlier regarding high power price volatilities. Just wonder if you can let us know, for the merchant exposure part of your portfolio, what is the realized power price discount you have seen across your business? My third question is on strategic investors.
IFM Infrastructure Fund, I remember they purchased about 21% of ERG at about EUR 31 per share. Do you know what are their views on the current share price? Are they happy with the business strategy? Do they want anything to change? Those are my 3 questions. Thank you.
Thank you, Naisheng. About the CCGT, I can just say what I already said. We had a very extremely negative scenario business environment for the first quarter, for the reasons I hope I have explained well. Going forward, it's inevitable. Let me say, it's inevitable that this optimization program will be ended in the next months, because we can't continue to produce energy from coal and from fuel oil, which is even more polluting than coal. I'm quite confident that after that, the natural ending of this measure is September 30. As I said, has already been reduced quite significantly since April first.
I'm quite sure that the number you mentioned can be realized after that, because the plant is super efficient. It's got the PPA contracts in place until 2031 with the refinery, with the other plants in sight. We are confident. Looking at 2023, we are not providing any guidance right now, also because we are under the process of sale. Still, I repeat, we expect the forthcoming months to be much better than the Q1. First, because we have solved the technical problem. Second, as I said, in April, we have seen already an improvement in the price scenario given the reduction of this optimization program.
About the exposure of the group to merchant, say we have in place kind of risk policies to cover roughly 80% of our production. If you take our production portfolio, you see we should have roughly 1 terawatt hour, which more or less is exposed to market, while the remaining part is secured through tariffs, PPA or some hedging in place. The volatility of the price scenario is affecting or could affect just this portion of the portfolio. Consider the portfolio is very well diversified. It's in France, it's in Germany, Spain, Sweden, U.K/, Italy.
If you look at the forward price this morning, you realize that in France, the prices went up quite significantly over the last few weeks, maybe related to nuclear, I don't know. While in other countries are lower. The portfolio and the diversification of the portfolio as is Q1, anyway, provides strong resilience of the revenues. Let me say like this. About IFM, I can say I can't speak for them. They are present in our board of directors, in our strategic committee, and they are super confident about the value of the group also vis-à-vis what they paid for the entrance in the group.
We are all together committed to move on on our plan, and maybe to do more than our plan. We remain super positive. I said, in my opinion, the market right now is not pricing well, the sector in general, and particular maybe Enel itself. Because the results are solid, we increase the dividends, current prices, the dividend yield is almost 4%. We are keep generating cash flow. We are moving on our strategic path. I'm confident, very confident about the future. Maybe it's a moment with some factors that are coming together, and I already said what kind of factors we are talking about. The gas prices going down, regulatory uncertainty, interest rates, and those are the factors that are affecting, I think, the performance of the sector.
We expect a reversal, hopefully of all these three factors, in 2023. Lash, I hope to have answered your questions. That's all I-
Yes, very helpful, Paolo. Thank you so much.
Of course.
Thanks a lot.
Thank you to you. Thank you to you.
The next question, sir, is from Emanuele Oggioni of Kepler Cheuvreux.
Hi, everyone, thank you for the presentation. I have only a few clarification. The first one is on the guidance. I'd like to understand better because you mentioned that the end of global in H1 could leave upside in your guidance, in your estimates. Just a clarification, if given the guidance in your guidance, you have included the global for only for H1 or for the full year? This is the first question. Second is still further clarification on PPA pricing. Could you confirm that the pricing for PPAs have stabilized on a quite high, for sure higher, price levels compared with historical averages, so interesting levels, thanks to...
Thanks to this level, you could confirm or even increase the profitability of the IR for your projects. Indeed, they are supportive, more than the historical average, for the profitability for IR on your projects. Third question is on the cost inflation. I wonder if you say, do you expect to have seen the peak of the cost inflation, in the future for the future procurement, the CapEx per megawatt will be lower compared to the expectation of a few months ago? Thank you.
Okay, thank you, Emanuele. Again, following the order of the questions. Guidance, yes, I confirm clawback are included in our guidance. The guidance is net of clawback. Yes, I confirm in our guidance, clawback measure in any states of Europe are expected to last till the end of the year. We are taking a cautious approach, assuming that they will be extended till the end of the year, even though the hope is exactly the opposite. About PPA, yes, I confirm the pricing of PPA remains much higher than the one we got used in the past, of the tune of EUR 100 per megawatt hour. It's around that figure, even for duration of 10 years or something like that. Absolutely, this is one of the driver of the return.
It's the most important driver of the return of renewable investments, is right now capable or enough, let me say, to fully compensate or offset the reduction of returns related to CapEx increase. About CapEx increase, as expected in the plan, is still going on, going up. Our projects or the current one that are under construction were more or less secured to also framework agreement, but going forward, the cost has progressively moved from EUR 1 million per megawatt hour for wind, let's say to EUR 1.2, EUR 1.3, probably EUR 1.5, if you have to build a new project right now.
Difficult to say about the future for wind because, without mentioning any names, but if you just look at the results, the economic results of the main OEM, they are under strong pressure, so I think they should have recovered marginality. It's difficult to say that CapEx per megawatt in the wind industry will go down. Probably the opposite, but I'm quite sure that in the end, at the end, the sector should find a balance to make the supply chain as a whole sustainable. The solution is for us, either PPA or higher tariffs in the auctions. That should be the game changer.
Some countries in Europe, like France and Germany, have already increased the price auction, the price for auctions, moving from progressively from EUR 50 to EUR 75, EUR 80 or something like that. This should be the path, and I expect these tariffs will should come to a level, should reach a level that is consistent with an overall investment case that provides the right return for the sector. Either PPA or tariffs should be the solution to let the sector growing going forward.
I don't know, Michele. Paolo, let me add my comment on solar procurement. On this second technology, on the contrary, we see some signs of reduction of the cost per megawatt in comparison to the expectation that we had some months ago, when we were preparing the business plan. We see really sign of a reduction in price for solar panels. The industry is very different in the solar industry. We have much more competition among the supplier. The structuring of the industry is completely different, and this is leading to some significant reduction in cost per megawatt.
You know that we have a repowering project on our solar plants in Italy, and we are experiencing some positive news on this side, in the procurement activities of this project. While the view is a bit more cautious on solar, we see signs of improvement.
Thank you for your clarifications.
The next question is from Davide Candela of Intesa Sanpaolo.
Hi. Good morning, gentlemen. Thank you for taking my question. I just have two. The first one is actually a follow-up on the supply chain and especially speaking about wind. I was wondering when you see a normalization of the supply chain from the logistic and also from the cost side. Is more a matter of the second part of this year or you are seeing better prospects on 2024? The second one is a more general question on the authorization procedures both in Italy and in Europe in general. If you can provide your view on how these are going.
If on my understanding the Italy at least photovoltaic is lower than 1 MW, is going quite good and better than utility scale projects. Just a general view on the evolution of the authorization procedures. Thank you.
Say, starting from the last, the permit things remain harder for the sector, for renewables in general, solar and both solar and wind. The time to market, so the time needed, from scratch to install the capacity remains too long, in our opinion. They have done, I mean, they, all the member states have done some simplification to the, to the permitting, still they are discussing over the nature of overriding public interest of renewable, which should provide the power to governments to say, overtake the boundaries and the constraints put in from regions, from local authorities and so on. Still, it's a jungle where we are capable of moving. I think we've provide some visibility on that, given our growth over the last few years.
We are dealing with it, but still we are not where we need to be, in my opinion. I hope also this should be a point of acceleration in 2023, because Europe must accept their policy right now. They are not enough to reach the targets they set out for 2030. For 2030, sorry. About inflation, yes, I expect 2023 should reach a peak because inflation in general should cool off, and then interest rates should stop increasing and the same for the CapEx trajectory. I let Michele maybe elaborate a little bit, being responsible for procurement in the group.
Yeah. I would say that maybe it's reasonable to expect an improvement in the second half of the year, beginning of 2024. I see a couple of trends. First of all, we see that commodities are going down in respect to the peak. What happens is that the buying manufacturer sometimes as a edge, already edged the commodity at a price near to the peak. Before having the possibility to pass through the reduced commodity price to final customers, maybe they need some additional months. For the moment, we don't see in the first half of this year strong change in the market.
Consider that our last order are inside our frame of agreement that's going to expire in the next months. At the end, we have some limited exposure to this to this to this trend. The second trend that I see that could cause a decrease in our technology is the increase of the size of the wind turbine. If we have the possibility to install 4 MW, 5 MW, 6 MW wind turbine, for sure the cost per megawatt will decrease. There is a technological improvement that allow us to reduce the cost of our megawatt output.
Thank you.
The final question is a follow-up from Roberto Letizia of Equita.
Yeah, sorry. Very quickly, 'cause we are now approaching June, and I guess the view progressively will move on 2024. Wondering if you can spend just a few words on how much visibility you have on capacity addition for 2024. Thanks a lot.
Roberto. Okay. We have several projects that are currently under construction that are expected to enter in 2024. We have just approved yesterday in the board, the investments related to three new projects, two in France, one in Northern Ireland. The two in France should enter in operations probably late 2023 or 2024. Anyway, they are moving on. We have other projects that have already entered into a reconstruction phase. I mean,
which is a big wind farm in Italy, in Sicily, recovering, it's a recovering project. The megawatts gross of the megawatts that will be shut down from the whole plan is more than 100 MW. We have another project, Salemi-Castelvetrano , that is larger than, again, larger than 100 MW, under construction right now. It's, again, another recovering project. I just try to remind, let's say the size of what we could expect in 2024 is very similar to the one we expect in 2023. On top of that, we keep seeking for the right opportunities in M&A.
Thanks a lot. Thanks a lot.
Okay. Thank you too.
Mr. Merli, at this time, there are no more questions registered, sir.
Okay. Thank you very much for the interest and attention and, speak to you soon on the view for next webcast or maybe other events. Thank you very much. Have a good day.
Ladies and gentlemen, thank you for joining. The conference is now over, and you may disconnect your telephones.