Good afternoon. This is the Chorus Call conference operator. Welcome and thank you for joining the Snam nine months 2021 consolidated 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 Miss Alessandra Pasini, CFO of Snam. Please go ahead, madam.
Thank you. Ladies and gentlemen, good afternoon and welcome to Snam 2021 nine months results presentation. Looking at the first highlight, CapEx reached EUR 866 million. While our regulated investments are going as planned, as mentioned before, we have experienced some delays in the deployment of investments in new businesses. For this reason, full year CapEx will be circa EUR 1.3 billion. Following the publication of the first consultation document on the WACC form in July, we sent our comments to ARERA by the deadline of September 12, and we expect soon the second consultation document. We continue to see a recovery in gas demand, which rose by 6% in the first nine months of the year, thanks to a rebound in industrial production and power generation and colder than usual weather.
In the context of current energy market volatility, Snam infrastructure is supporting the resilience of the Italian market. The TAP pipeline increases supply diversification and has contributed to reducing the traditional premium of the Italian gas market versus Northern Europe, with a significant saving on energy costs for the country. Our storage facilities are 90% full, well above other European countries. Sustainability remains core to our strategy. Snam was included in the FTSE MIB ESG index, the new index dedicated to Italian companies with the most effective sustainability practices at the end of September. At the end of September, sustainable finance reached 60%. We are also upgrading our target on methane emission reduction by 2025.
In fact, in line with our ongoing commitment to cut CO2 emissions and reaching net zero by 2040, we have upgraded our target on methane emission to minus 55% by 2025 versus a base of 2015, compared to the previous target of minus 45%. This target is more ambitious than the one set by the Oil and Gas Methane Partnership 2.0 initiative protocol. This is mainly achievable thanks to the acceleration of the leak detection and repair program that implies the monitoring of the emitting components in our facilities to identify methane leaks and the planning of maintenance work to repair those. SnamTEC initiatives aimed at digitalizing operations management of Snam assets is also a relevant driver to tackle methane emissions. Other actions to reduce emissions are in line, recompression and replacement of valves and pneumatic devices.
Thanks to efforts already implemented, we have cut methane emissions by 20% circa over the last three years, and we have a target to reduce them by 43% by 2030 versus 2020, which is more ambitious than the Global Methane Pledge target of -30%. Our financial results in the first nine months of 2021 are strong. EBITDA benefited from the contribution of higher tariff RAB, thanks to the investment in our infrastructure and higher allowed D&A. Financial charges are down by EUR 24 million, 24%, despite higher average debt, thanks to the lower cost of debt that was again below 1%, higher capitalized financial charges related to our investment activity and a different phasing of the OLT shareholder loan.
Income from associate is up by EUR 49 million compared to last year, benefiting from a perimeter effect with the inclusion of the entire period of ADNOC and the entry into the consolidation perimeter of De Nora. The full year contribution of TAP and these effects are partially offset by the expected decrease of our Austrian associates, mainly due to the new regulation in place from January of this year, non-recurring items and the compensation that occurred in the nine months of last year due to the end of the prior regulatory period. DESFA has performed slightly below last year due to the lower unitary tariff, therefore lower WACC and lower tariff RAB, and the reversal of the extraordinary strong performance achieved in the prior years.
Net profit was up EUR 65 million, thanks to the operational results, the lower financial charges and the contribution from our associates. The strong results achieved to date mean that we are comfortably on track to deliver our full year net profit guidance of EUR 1.17 billion. Let's now look more closely to our nine-month results. Net profit for the period was EUR 934 million, up EUR 65 million versus last year. This was driven by our core EBITDA, up by EUR 48 million due to higher regulated revenues, thanks to continuous growth in the transport business due to ongoing investment activities and the commodity effect, only partially offset by the reduction of input-based incentives. The release of past balance sheet items referring to the storage business.
Core business costs rose due to higher fixed costs, driven by some phasing effects, higher operational costs also deriving from a progressive comeback to offices and travel, and higher labor costs due to the national labor contract inflation. Costs also rose due to the support to business expansion, also through internalization of skills and capabilities and the development of our international presence. These are only partially offset by higher capitalized costs and progress on our efficiency program. Increase in other items is linked to the release of past provisions, partially offset by higher costs for business development and higher capital losses. The contribution of new businesses was marginal.
Energy efficiency performed well thanks to the residential business, in particular, the kickoff of the Ecobonus, and despite the negligible contribution of the public administration sector that has been facing a slowdown of permitting due to COVID, as well as the perimeter effect related to the consolidation of Mieci and Evolve. This was offset by delays in biomethane, driven by the expected development related to the Biomethane Decree under discussion since the second quarter of this year and not finalized yet. This, together with the lengthening of the authorization process due to the pandemic situation on the public sector, is slowing down greenfield development as well as our third party EPC activity, but on the positive should bring significant capital grant opportunities for biomethane operators when approved. In the meantime, we continue to push biomethane business, being devoted to reinforcing our pipeline.
The continuous investment in our energy transition platform, with a particular focus on hydrogen and lower contribution from Snam Global Solutions over the nine months, that will be more evident in the last quarter due to the contribution that we had last year from a significant contract related to TAP. The delays in the new RAB business ramp-up will impact also 2022, while we continue to invest in insourcing competencies and capabilities, supporting our platform in hydrogen and energy transition. Interest expenses were EUR 24 million lower, mainly due to lower cost of debt attributable to the positive impact of our sixth liability management exercise, treasury management optimization, and natural bond rollover, replaced with cheaper new issuances, as well as higher capitalized financial charges related to our investment activities and a different phasing of OLT shareholder loan.
Associates contribution was higher due to the inclusion in the perimeter of ADNOC and De Nora, and the first full year contribution of TAP, which last year wasn't in operation in the first nine months. De Nora, global leader in sustainable technologies, is performing ahead of expectations. These increases are partially offset by the already commented effect in Greece and Austria. The average tax rate for the period is circa 25%. As a reminder, net profit benefits from a positive one-off component of EUR 255 million that is related to the realignment of the differences between tax and book value of fixed assets. This is possible paying a substitute tax of 3% in a maximum of three installments, while the amount of the realignment is EUR 1.2 billion for the transferred business to be recovered over the coming years.
Turning now to our cash flow. Cash flow from operations for the period amounted to EUR 1,181 million, including EUR 230 million of working capital absorption, of which EUR 136 million related to balancing and settlement activities that includes around EUR 100 million of settlement related to reabsorption of 2020 items and EUR 38 million of balancing activities partially reabsorbed versus the peak that we reached in the first half due to cold weather.
Minus EUR 25 million of tariff related items, and minus EUR 769 million of other working capital, worth flagging the absorption from the contribution of our Ecobonus business that is absorbing slightly less than EUR 120 million of working capital and VAT receivable that are linked to our balancing needs, partially counterbalanced by the positive effect from net tax payable, which are due in November. The new balancing system implies that from January 1, 2020, Snam acquires system gas used for self-consumption with losses and difference between intakes and offtake of the distribution network at market prices.
This mechanism caused a buildup of VAT receivable, related to our balancing activities, and the growth of this VAT receivable is clearly also, impacted by, volumes that were related to the cold weather that we had in the first part of the year, and higher prices that, of course, we are registering in the second part of this year. We foresee for the full year an increase of the accumulated VAT receivable, but this is a temporary effect that we expect to recover over time. Net investment in M&A include CapEx and CapEx payable, and the effect commented already in the first half related to the inclusion, the perimeter of De Nora and the transactions on energy efficiency, as well as the contribution of OLT, shareholder cash in and TAP true-up.
Other outflows for the period clearly have been the dividend paid in 2021 equal to EUR 797 million. We expect full year net debt to be slightly exceeding the EUR 14 billion mark, mainly due to the temporary absorption deriving from the VAT receivable above described and the acceleration of our energy efficiency pipeline deployment. Moving to our debt structure and reduction of the cost of debt.
In the first 9 months of 2021, we further strengthened our financial structure, thanks to transition bonds issued in February and June 2021 with low coupon, which contribute to the reduction of below 1% of the cost of debt in the current year. The new EIB loans aim at financing energy efficiency projects planned for Renovit and new ESG term loans linked to ESG KPI for an overall EUR 600 million, of which EUR 250 million have been secured a few days ago. There are no refinancing needs for the remaining part of the year, while bond maturity profile is well spread over time. With respect to treasury management optimization, we continue to exploit the good market conditions, which allow us to fully utilize our euro commercial paper program and the large use of uncommitted credit lines, both at deeply negative yields.
The EMTN program, recently renewed, incorporates sustainability KPIs for the issuance of sustainability-linked bonds and could be used to finance projects aligned with the Taxonomy Delegated Acts that are issued by the European Commission. Thanks for the attention, and I'm now ready to take and answer 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 and One on their touchtone telephone. To remove yourself from the question queue, please press Star and Two. Please pick up the receiver when asking questions. Anyone who has a question may press Star and One at this time. The first question is from Harry Wyburd with Bank of America. Please go ahead.
Hi. Afternoon, everyone, and thanks for taking my questions. I've got three. Just firstly, I know you gave a lot of detail on this already, but I wondered if, just in very simple terms on the net debt, I believe the target when you last had your strategy update in November last year was about EUR 13.5 billion, if I remember correctly, and you're now guiding to a touch above EUR 14 billion. I wondered if I remember those figures correctly, you could just help us with a very simple bridge of what's led to the additional half a billion EUR, just in very simple high-level terms, and to what extent that might be brought back again next year.
Second one is just on the regulatory review, very quick one, but what are your expectations on timing for the next regulatory document? And has there been any update in your thinking or outlook since the initial proposals and since we last had a conference call? And then finally, just on De Nora, I know this is a recurring question, but is there any update there on your plan to potentially crystallize some value from that asset? Thank you.
Thank you very much. On the first question, I think when we came out with our strategy plan, De Nora wasn't part of the numbers. If you add back De Nora to the EUR 13.5 billion that you recall, you get to the EUR 14 billion that was the number we indicated back in March for De Nora. What we are saying today is that we see probably our year-end net debt to be slightly above the number we said, EUR 14.1 billion, due to working capital related items that are connected to what I commented before.
A stronger contribution on the positive side from Ecobonus, that means more working capital related to that, and the buildup of this VAT receivable due to our balancing activities and activities that we need to carry out buying gas for managing our network. That's how you get to the EUR 14.1 that I commented just before. On the regulatory review and on the WACC, we expect the second consultation paper to really come out soon, maybe as soon as next week or the week after. We will of course provide our further comments and observation depending on what will be there in due course. The process is due to finalize in December with the final decision taken by the regulator at some point during the month of December.
When it comes to De Nora, I think, as I said, we are extremely pleased with the way the company is performing. It's performing really strongly and ahead of plans. As we stated during our first half call, they are building momentum as the rest of the world is building momentum on everything that is related to energy transition and hydrogen in particular. We continue to discuss with the company and its shareholder option to crystallize value from our investment, but don't have many more comments to offer, if not that we will be there to support their growth, which we expect to come significantly in the coming years.
Okay. Thank you very much.
The next question is from Javier Suárez with Mediobanca. Please go ahead.
Hi, all, and many thanks for the presentation. Three questions from me as well. The first one is on your comment on certain delay on the development of new businesses. I think that you have been guiding for a CapEx of EUR 1.3 billion. You can again share with us the reasons for that delay on the development of new businesses and new opportunities and what we should expect from the next year, for example, on that. Any light on the reasons behind would be helpful. The second thing is on the contribution of business equity consolidated activities.
If you can help us to understand which are the main contributors or deviations versus last year contribution in your equity consolidation, consolidated equity line and any guidance for that line by the year end, that would be helpful as well.
The third question is on the, it has appeared on the press, the potential interest of Snam to continue investing in putting equities in the Middle East, in Aramco asset and other. You can help us to understand how do you see the balance sheet of Snam and the capacity that the balance sheet of Snam has to embark on other equity investment. Any order of magnitude would be helpful as well. Many thanks.
Thank you, Javier. On the new businesses, it's a combination of a couple of things effectively. One, the pandemic has implied a lengthening of the authorization processes in general, and this applies also to the authorization that you need to have, whether it is the connections for the CNG stations, whether it is biomethane plants, or whether it is everything that has to deal on the energy efficiency front with the public sector. People are starting to get back really to the office now, and things are really starting to recommence now, but that has had an effect effectively on those type of activities. That's on the negative side.
On the positive side, and this applies to biomethane, there is this Biomethane Decree that has been discussed and that we expect to be approved, which effectively will introduce grants that will give a strong boost to biomethane development. Tactically, for some of the greenfield initiatives that we had in our pipeline, we are also waiting to see that decree to come out to make sure that we maximize the value creation opportunity out of our biomethane pipeline, which remains very relevant. Effectively, you have one negative in a way, but also one positive, particularly on the biomethane. This is causing a delay in the ramp-up of our new businesses, particularly around that.
Effectively versus what we thought is almost saying that probably we have one year of delay, give or take, because of this element. At the same time, we do have more opportunities and value creation to come out of that. That's on the first. When it comes to— as I said, also next year, we will expect some delay versus what's expected. Everything is kind of rolling forward a bit in a way. That's the way you should think about it. When it comes to our associates, as I said, versus last year, we do have the expected revision or impact of the regulatory revision both in our Austrian associate and in DESFA, which effectively contributed less than last year.
At the same time, DESFA volumes keep going strong. In a way, the performance of DESFA also towards the second part or I mean the last quarter of the year will remain strong. Then you have the full contribution coming from De Nora, ADNOC and TAP. Remember that TAP came into operation at the end of last year in November, but for the rest of the year, it actually absorbed or had a negative contribution to our net income because it was still in construction. You need also to account for that when looking at the delta one year versus the other. ADNOC was part of the consolidation perimeter only starting from July, and of course, we didn't have De Nora.
Looking at the last quarter, we expect the strong contribution from De Nora to continue, and we expect DESFA to continue to perform in a relatively strong manner. Overall, I think we indicated effectively some sort of flattish type of performance for our associates. I think we will do better than that, slightly better than that. Keep in mind when looking at the fourth quarter that there were a number of one-offs last year. You had one-offs in Teréga for the recognition of certain items. You had one-off from, of course, from Italgas. You had one-offs also on TAP. Once you normalize that, and effectively the way to think about is a coherent performance on everything but a strong performance on DESFA and De Nora.
When it comes to M&A, as you know, we never comment on M&A. I mean, our names get often mentioned here and there. Our investment criteria remains the same. I'm sure you are familiar with the way to look at our financial flexibility, whether you look at RAB or whether you look at fixed assets, and you look at what are thresholds that rating agencies place on us. It's fairly straightforward to get to what that means. Effectively, we remain committed to our capital allocation policies in everything we do.
Interesting. Many thanks.
The next question is from Jose Ruiz with Barclays. Please go ahead.
Yeah. Good afternoon. Just two questions. The first one is related to the new targets of CO2 emissions by 2025. I was wondering, what is the CapEx required? And if there is no straight answer, is basically are you advancing a new CapEx plan that will be announced in the capital market day by changing this target? The second question, if you could please clarify, what do you mean by the, in the tax effect, the two hundred and fifty million euros, the book, the alignment of the book value of assets?
Is this going to affect depreciation or it only affects tax depreciation? Thank you.
Thank you very much for your questions. On the revised objectives, I think it's negligible in terms of investment amount because we are talking about small devices. It's not really a CapEx heavy plan. It's a CapEx light plan, but with a great contribution to reducing our methane emissions. When it comes to the question on tax, it's just a tax-deferred liability, so it doesn't have any impact on depreciation. Sorry, what was the other question that you asked? I think I lost a piece of it.
No, it was part of the second question. I think I got the answer. Thank you very much.
Okay. All right, thanks.
The next question is from Enrico Bartoli with Stifel. Please go ahead.
Hi. Good afternoon , for taking my questions. I have two left. One is related to the guidance, which confirmed the EUR 1.70 billion net profit for the full year. Actually, if I calculate well, after the nine months results, the net profit implied by the fourth quarter would be lower than last year, even stripping out the one-offs in the fourth quarter of 2020. Can you elaborate on this, on the drivers in the fourth quarter and if there are some, let's say, negative factors that you expect to have an impact on the fourth quarter that would determine this kind of a comparison? A second question is on the gas market situation in Europe.
If you can share with us some thought on how you see this situation evolving over the next quarters, in particular if you think that the proposals by the EU in order to moderate the impact on gas prices can have an impact, in particular on your business. Some governments are proposing a shared management of the storage assets in Europe. If you can comment on this proposal and if this could have some impact on your business. Thank you.
Thank you, Enrico. On the guidance, I think that there are a number of components that you have to keep in mind to avoid that you just normalize and apply, like, do the annualization, let me put it this way, based on the nine months. First, you have a particularly positive contribution on the financial charges, which should be normalized. As I commented, there were particularly heavier contribution on capitalizing those charges related to our investment activities. There were phasing effects as it relates to the OLT shareholder loan.
Once you normalize that, you will have a slightly less positive contribution on the financial charge vis-a-vis last year, despite the fact that we continue to expect a lower cost of debt versus last year. On associates, you have two components. You clearly have not the benefit of the one-offs of last year. You also have the fact that associates typically contribute less in the fourth quarter vis-a-vis usual the rest of the year. Some other items that clearly, like the one I commented on, release of provision and the storage item that contributes to our regulated revenues that are not going to be repeated in the rest of the year.
If you sum up all of this, that's why we are comfortably on track for that. There is nothing negative or specific. It's just that there's a combination of phasing elements as well as very specific one-off that we had in the past that are not gonna be characterized in the first quarter this year. When it comes to gas and the current situation, a lot will depend on how cold the winter will be. In Italy, we start from the situation of having our storage assets relatively full, which is very good and important. We are well above rest of Europe.
If the winter will be cold, you may expect further spikes on the price, which clearly is not gonna be a positive overall for the industries, for example, and the recovery from an economic standpoint. It's not gonna be something that impact our business. If anything, what the current situation is proving is how important is diversification of supply, and that was one of the reason why we were able to close the gap between the PSV and the TTF this year. Getting to actually export gas in certain months in important volumes, which is something that only happened occasionally in the past. That combined with our approach to storage is clearly something that is somewhat protecting Italy.
Now, the proposal that has been put forward is that we have been, of course, in discussion with the other TSOs and other institutions. I mean, to the extent you were to have strategic reserves dedicated to manage particular peaks, that would help mitigate price spikes like the ones that we are experiencing. People sometimes forget how strategic storage is, it's in times like these that people realize that having storage used for strategic reasons rather than hedging or portfolio contract management reasons makes the difference in the energy system. Should that happen, it's clearly something where we would provide our support and be cooperating with other TSOs and players, but it's not gonna be something that will have an impact on our business.
If anything, it's just proving how strategic our assets can be.
Thank you very much.
The next question is from Stefano Gamberini with Equita SIM. Please go ahead.
Good afternoon, everybody. Three questions also from my side. The first regarding the hydrogen. Could you give us an idea when will you have some update whether your storage facility could also be used for hydrogen or not? The second still related, you wrote in the press release that you launched this HyAccelerator project to invest in hydrogen startups. Just to give us an idea, what is the amount of money that you should invest in this, we can say associate related to the hydrogen? Because most of them now are invested in gas companies, excluding EUR 400 million for and so just to understand if this project could be something relevant or not. The second regarding the costs.
Regarding the regulated activities, I noticed that the fixed costs were flattish in the nine months, but increased by EUR 11 million in the third quarter. Is this a trend that we could see also in the forthcoming quarters due to the reinforcement for your structure that you are working on, or it is just a one-off? Third one regarding the taxonomy. According to the press, the majority of EU countries are in favor of treating gas as helpful for green transition.
What could be the final solution in your view regarding European Commission, the decision on gas, in particular, considering that in the last presentation, you showed investment just at 40% eligible for Taxonomy, and so if we could expect some significant improvement of this ratio? Many thanks.
Thank you, Stefano. On H2, we will provide an update at our strategy plan on our vision and investments on hydrogen, including how storage will play into that. On the innovation hub announcement, we are talking about really supporting even. I wouldn't even call them startup, but universities in developing innovation ideas. We're talking about really small amount of numbers, like few millions here and there. This is really more to have the right antennas on future evolution of technologies in the application and production of hydrogen that will be relevant when thinking of our infrastructure and the role we can play for people that are served by our infrastructure.
Nothing of scale, but really small amount, but still clearly that's part of the investment in terms of having PhDs and knowledgeable people that can help understand and interact with this innovation hub in an effective manner. That leads me to the question on cost. On what you have in the nine months is something that is phasing, but a good part is actually related to continue to invest on our energy transition and clearly our hydrogen capabilities across different segments is not just production, but is also transportation and storage. All of this are effectively in-sourcing capabilities and creating our making sure that our platform can cope with the future growth.
Clearly, as we have on the other side experiencing delay on some of the implementation of our new businesses, effectively you see costs growing but not yet offset by revenues because those have been pushed. That's what effectively you are seeing in particular starting from these nine-month numbers. This is a trend that we will continue to invest in this also next year. It is something that is part of making sure that we can fully grasp the opportunities as we continue to build the pipeline and before all revenues will start to flow through. When it comes to Taxonomy, we've always been confident that ultimately the commission would have recognized the strategic role that natural gas has and its essential role to get to the transition.
This seems to be confirmed. While, yes, we had the last year in our plan taxonomy aligned investment for around 40% of it, I think we will get more. We'll disclose more at the plan, but we are now above that number. What is important, I think, is more despite the momentum, which is incredibly positive, that hydrogen is getting, the even stronger recognition that gas remains an essential part of the transition to achieve net zero, which is something that more and more countries and companies are committing to.
The next question is from James Brand with Deutsche Bank. Please go ahead.
Oh, hi, Alessandra, and hello to everyone else on the call. I had three questions. The first is on the net debt. You're very clear in terms of the full year net debt guidance, but you mentioned a few things on the call around working capital moves, the VAT receivable, on the working capital side, some of which sounded like they would reverse and some sounded like maybe they wouldn't. Maybe you could just tell us embedded in that net debt number at year-end if it's possible to give an estimate for how much working capital or VAT receivables that we should assume will reverse in future years. That's the first question.
Secondly, I just want to clarify on the regulatory review. I'd heard that the regulatory document might be coming out Friday afternoon, and you kinda said maybe in the next couple of weeks. Should I take that it's probably not gonna come out this week, or we just don't know? And then the third question is slightly more complicated one, is around incentives for storage. Because I remember, seem to recall that you had some output-based incentives for the storage business that generally we don't talk about very much because I don't think they were delivering you any profits. But I was just wondering if you can maybe remind us what incentives you have for the storage business.
Given how extreme market conditions have been this year, I was just wondering whether they actually might start to be profitable. Thank you very much.
Thank you. On the net debt, I think you can infer from, given that we have indicated that EUR 100 million more contribution in a way in negative terms, in terms of capital, working capital absorption, what that delta is going to be. Structurally, I mean, the Ecobonus is a credit that you get reimbursed over a period of five years. When it comes to the tax, the VAT payables, that's instead an ongoing activity. It's very hard to be too precise on 'cause it's in a rolling activity, right? Every amount then gets old, and then you move to the next one. You keep building on the balancing activities on one side.
I think this peak is more due to the combination of the two things I said, colder weather, so we have to buy more gas and higher prices. Again, the way this will evolve will depend on this. Keep in mind that we had this already last year, but clearly last year was a very different year, both in terms of energy prices and in terms of volumes. Before we were not due by the regulator to buy gas, and that's something that changes or is a slightly new element of our working capital that we didn't have before. On the WACC, we expect it to be soon. I said soon, it means really soon.
We expect it maybe more next week, but what is right or next week, frankly, it doesn't. I mean, it's up to the regulator to publish. We will just stand ready to capture and work on the comments for that. What is important is the fact that we expect it to be finalized by year-end. When it comes to the storage, you are right. We haven't been spending a lot of time on those services, and we expect similar to what we expect on transmission to develop more. I mean, what I said in responding to the question of Enrico about the gas market, it's an important point.
The market will need more flexibility, as it keeps evolving in the energy mix. This means that there will be, we expect, opportunity to maybe develop services around it. This is more of an intention, so I don't want you guys to put numbers into your model yet. We see the opportunity for more of these type of initiatives and services to be introduced. Now, coming into the numbers, yes, we did have some contribution. We're talking about a few million euro.
In the nine months, we had, I think out of my memory, around EUR 5 million or so of contribution for short-term services, effectively allowing more to book capacity, not just for pure seasonal needs, but with the increased frequency, effectively enhancing the liquidity for those guys who actually need to store.
Great. Thank you very much, and good luck for the second consultation.
Thank you.
The next question is from Bartlomiej Kubicki with Société Générale. Please go ahead.
Hello, good afternoon. A couple of issues I would like to discuss with. Firstly, if you can share with us your view on future Russian gas flows following a potential or not approval of Nord Stream 2. Whether do you think most of the imports will go via Nord Stream, or do you think the sort of Slovak-Polish pipelines will be also utilized? Whether this will have an impact on your transmission capabilities, potentials from Austria in the future.
What do you think is the sort of long-term outlook as well for those pipelines and for those flows? Second, on the supply chain, are you seeing any disruptions with suppliers and what is the cost inflation you are seeing and whether you think all the increased costs will be fully approved by the regulator and will impact your RAB. Last, I remember there have been talks for a long time already about the potential additional remunerations on your RAB equal to zero or additional output-based incentives. When do you think you can have some visibility on those? I mean, I think you talked about this last year already, but this should be approved this year. I don't think it is yet.
If you can share with us your view on this one as well, please. Thank you.
Thank you very much. Very clear. I mean, Russian gas flow, we leave politics outside of the room. I think what is really important is the diversification of input routes, which Italy has, which I think is very important. Ultimately, whether gas will choose one route versus the other, still gas will flow to Austria and then in Italy, so it doesn't really matter for us. I think the volumes will be more a function of the energy mix and the speed at which energy mix changes rather than anything else.
It must be said that, I mean, the gas market as any commodity market is a rational market, so people try to monetize their molecule outside of commitments that are connected to existing contracts where it's more convenient. One of the reasons for the recent spikes has not necessarily been shortage of gas, but actually increased demand coming out from Asia due to the combination of a strong economy recovery on one side, but at the same time the accelerated switch that a number of countries there are doing from coal into gas. As you have growing demand there, that is where people are trying to focus on, and that is one of the reason why prices has gone up rather than shortage on the supply. Again, from our standpoint, it's not very relevant.
When it comes to the supply chain, I think the only notable element is increase in price. We don't have or we're not experiencing any issue in terms of supply chain, differently from other sectors and industries. Clearly, where we see inflation coming is on steel, which is significantly increased, but that we are confident that there is no risk in that respect when it comes to our investments. Now, on the OpEx side, the next review is gonna be with a reference year in 2022. From a timing standpoint, it's not a bad timing because hopefully we will have the benefit of numbers that reflect higher inflationary environment.
When it comes to CapEx, clearly, all of this is very timely again because, as we all know, TotEx will start to be introduced from 2024. The work on standard costs and having these spikes as part of the journey to our TotEx is something that probably actually normalize some of the lower prices that we have seen in the prior period. When it comes to replacement assets and incentives, you're right. We've been talking about it for quite some time with no news.
What I can say is that we expect the consultation document to be published by the regulator between now and year-end, and that will be the commencement of the process that once finalized will determine the structure and the amount and the timing of output-based incentives related to replacement of our fully depreciated assets. We'll keep you posted as things progress, but that's the latest that I can share.
Great. Fantastic. Thank you.
There are no more questions registered at this time. Ms. Pasini, the floor is back to you for any closing remarks.
I just want to thank you very much for your questions and attention and wish you a good afternoon.
Ladies and gentlemen, thank you for joining. The conference is now over. You may disconnect your telephones.