Hello, ladies and gentlemen. This is Alan Chapel, Director of Corporate Communications and Public Relations for Rain Carbon Incorporated. In just a moment, we will take you through the performance of Rain Industries Limited during the fourth quarter of 2022. Presenters are Mr. Jagan Reddy Nellore, Vice Chairman of Rain Industries Limited, Mr. Gerard Sweeney, President of Rain Carbon Incorporated, and Mr. T. Srinivas Rao, Chief Financial Officer of Rain Industries Limited. Before we begin, management would like to mention that some of the statements made in today's discussion may be forward-looking in nature, and they could be affected by certain risks and uncertainties. The company's actual results could differ materially from such forward-looking statements. If you could turn to slide 3, Mr. Jagan Reddy will provide an update on key developments within the Rain group. Thank you, and over to you, Jagan.
Thank you, Alan. Good evening, everyone. On slide three of the presentation, we finished the fourth quarter with an EBITDA of INR 6.9 billion, down approximately 29% compared to the Q3 EBITDA of INR 9.78 billion. This reduction should not come as a surprise, as we noted during our previous call that the opportunistic margins we enjoyed during Q2 and Q3 are coming to an end. We expected our performance to be returning to our historically normal range. That was apparent during the H2 of 2022 as the surge in the post-pandemic purchasing started to decline. In addition, raw material costs, which has been chasing us up the sales price curve, rose faster than product line than finished product prices.
At the same time, we entered the winter months, when sales of our seasonal products typically decline. Perhaps more significant change during the H2 of the year was the situation in Europe, which impacted us in several ways. First, a continuation of high energy prices increased our production costs and led to margin erosion for many products. Also in Europe, our raw material suppliers and customers were struggling with the impact of energy on their costs, as well as the fact that inflation motivated many consumers to curb discretionary spending, causing a domino effect of reduced demand across the production chain. The falloff in demand also resulted in layoffs in various industries in Europe, elevating concerns about regional job security, which then further eroded demand for a range of manufactured goods that included our distillation and advanced material products.
While all of that sounds a bit doom and gloom, our 2022 financial performance was good. Despite the fourth quarter challenges, our Q4 EBITDA squarely was within our historical zone. Looking ahead, we believe that things are returning to the old normal, and we anticipate that our near-term performance will be within the typical operating range we have guided to in the past. Of course, recession fears remain worldwide, and the energy situation in Europe is still unpredictable. In addition, while China is open for business now, following COVID lockdowns, its near-term resilience remains a question mark. Turning on to slide four. Moving on to slide four.
Aluminum prices spent most of the fourth quarter below $2,400 per ton. In response, many smelters not running on low hydro costs, low cost hydroelectric power, especially in Europe, remained offline or continued to operate at reduced production levels. As we enter 2023, aluminum prices on the London Metal Exchange dipped to as low as $2,249 per ton. That's important. As we have noted in the previous calls, smelters generally require pricing above $2,300 for continued production and possible expansion. The good news is that in recent weeks, prices have begun to climb, crossing the $2,600 level on several occasions. Looking ahead, there seems to be mixed opinions as to what we should expect in the near term from the aluminum sector.
If you read commentary from the analysts covering the sector, a number of forecasts are pointing to a solid 2023 for the industry with healthy demand and pricing. Aluminum producers, however, seem to have taken a more bearish outlook, as evidenced by reduced near-term demand for calcined petroleum coke and coal tar pitch again. Especially among European smelters that don't have the benefit of low-cost hydroelectric power as their source of electricity. On a positive note, even if the bears are correct, our company is well-positioned to pivot and opportunistically serve producers in other parts of the world that are not hampered by high energy costs. This is the result of our carbon segment having calciners and distillation units strategically located where they can easily serve smelters around the world, thanks to our deep water shipping capabilities.
It is also worth reminding everyone that over the long term, aluminum has a bright future. Despite any near-term hiccups, aluminum has become the metal of choice for an increasing number of applications due to its many competitive advantages. Lightweight for better fuel economy, durability, high strength, corrosion resistant, and of course, it's infinitely recyclable. The last of which is vital to Rain, given our commitment to environmental sustainability and our desire to have a greater role in the pursuit of a more circular economy.
As you already know, primary aluminum cannot be economically produced without calcined petroleum coke and coal tar pitch. Two key carbon products where Rain is a leading global producer. Regarding the cement business, demand continues to be reasonably strong in South India. However, the cost of fuel continues to be a cause of concern, thereby impacting the near-term production costs. With this business update, I will now turn over the presentation to Gerry Sweeney to take you through the industry and other business updates on slide 5. Gerry?
Thank you, Jagan. Hello, everyone. It's a pleasure to discuss the industry trends during fourth quarter of 2022. Let's turn to slide 5. In our carbon segment during Q4, we continued to see strong demand for calcined petroleum coke and to a lesser extent, coal tar pitch. On the calcination side of our business, volumes for the quarter were up by about 16% compared with the previous quarter. The increase in CPC volumes was fueled by less customer destocking than we typically see in the fourth quarter, as well as the fact that our U.S. calcination facilities avoided any major weather events during the 2022 hurricane season.
As you can imagine, it was gratifying to be able to run our U.S. Gulf calciners at full capacity during a period of high demand, and to take advantage of the reliability improvements we have made at our plants during the last few years. Moreover, by avoiding any weather-related shutdowns, the cogeneration facilities at our Gulf Coast plants were able to produce more steam and electricity during a high energy price environment, helping us increase our energy revenue in the U.S. compared to 2021, offsetting lower energy revenue in our Indian CPC plants. As we signaled during our last call, the opportunistic margins during the first three quarters began to recede as a result of shrinking gap between our raw material costs and our finished product prices.
That said, our ability to carefully manage SG&A costs and inventories in this inflationary environment helped to shield us from more significant margin erosion. During the quarter, we also made additional improvements to our anhydrous carbon pellets or ACP production facility at our Chalmette plant in the United States. We continue to work with the aluminum smelter customers on product testing. Please understand, however, the commercial adoption is a process. The aluminum industry is very slow to adapt to new technologies and processes. That said, we are confident in the potential for ACP and are scheduling another round of industrial tests with some key customers. Adoption will be a multi-year process. The key now is working with a few primary customers to establish ACP's true potential for the industry.
In the long run, we believe that ACP will offer energy-saving benefits for aluminum producers. It will help us by reducing the GPC fines that are currently combusted during the calcination process. If ACP can enable us to reduce our GPC costs lost by, say, 10%, the cost savings would be significant, especially when GPC prices are high like they are now. Just as important, the resulting reduction in CO2 and SO2 emissions would provide us and our customers with a very tangible sustainability benefit. Turning to Indian calcination, we continue to operate only one of the two kilns at our Vizag facility as we await the government's fiscal year supplemental GPC importation reallocation to calciners of Green Petroleum Coke volumes.
Further in India, we anticipate that the Ministry of Environment, Forest and Climate Change may soon finalize its long-awaited emissions regulations for the calcining industry, as ordered by the country's Supreme Court back in 2019. Since Rain is the only calciner in India that has an operating sustainable technology flue gas desulfurization systems, we remove 98%-99% of SO2 emissions and waste heat recovery systems to generate clean electricity. We believe that our ability to easily comply with the pending regulation will be a competitive advantage for our company. By comparison, other Indian calciners may be required to make environmental and sustainability-related investments in these scrubbing systems, which Rain proactively installed. Moving on to the distillation side of our carbon segment.
Coal tar pitch volumes were down by about 8% in the fourth quarter as the spot sales volumes seen during the Q3 were not repeated. In our other carbon product categories, volumes were down by 11%. Sales of crude naphthalene fell on lower demand by the construction industry, and carbon black oil volumes were lower, largely due to the downturn in European automobile sales. As a result, demand for automobile tires that include our CBO. Separately, as expected, demand for creosote was soft due to seasonal nature of that product. Finally, sales of most of our distillation products were impacted by the fact that many customers decided to work down their inventories as the year came to an end.
While we typically see this behavior every year in the fourth quarter, it was more pronounced in 2022 due to complicating factors in Europe. Looking ahead, high energy costs and inflation in Europe are eating into the disposable income of many households and businesses. As a result, demand for our distillation products will remain soft at least through the first quarter. While energy costs have fallen from their peak in 2022, they still are about 2.5 times higher than normal in Europe, meaning that the situation has improved from completely desperate to just bad at this point. As long as the current situation in Europe persists, we believe our customers and ultimate end consumers will remain cautious when it comes to oil purchases.
At the same time, we are hopeful that an unlocked and improving Chinese economy will support strong demand for aluminum, thereby supporting demand for calcined coke and coal tar pitch. In terms of raw material availability, the Russian invasion of Ukraine has vastly affected coal tar supplies. As a result, we have been purchasing more coal tar from distant locations with higher shipping costs. At the same time, we have had success offsetting some of coal tar shortages through our long-term sustainability strategy to increase usage of alternative raw materials. This is true for both our carbon distillation and advanced materials businesses. Turning to our advanced materials segment, EBITDA was negative for the second consecutive quarter due to a combination of factors. Higher costs associated with several planned maintenance turnaround and the resulting under-absorption of fixed costs is also a major contributing factor.
Sorry, guys, I lost the script. Sales volumes of nearly all of our advanced materials were lower in Q4 than the previous quarter, as expected, due to the situation in Europe mentioned earlier. These products, such as resins for automotive components and adhesives for furniture, are much closer to the end consumer. As was the case with our distilled carbon products, households are putting off discretionary purchases of goods that contain our advanced materials until economic conditions improve and they feel more secure about their employment. Continuing with our advanced materials segment, in terms of engineered products, our PetraRes specialty coating was the lone bright spot with increases in volumes driven by higher demand from lithium-ion battery producers as China COVID lockdowns ended, allowing the full reopening of large sections of the Chinese manufacturing industry.
Conversely, continued softness in the steel industry resulted in lower demand for CARBORES, which is used as a binding product in refractory materials used by steel plants. Finally, as is typical, we had a very limited sales of our seasonal asphalt sealer products in the fourth quarter. Looking at chemical intermediates, our BTX Phthalic Anhydride volumes were down marginally compared with the Q3. Sales of modifiers and refined naphthalene declined more substantially due to the widespread slowdown in Europe. Moving on to resins, we saw a decrease in demand for hydrocarbon resins, again due to lower sales of consumer goods and the resulting lack of demand by our customers. However, with China reopening, we expect an improvement in the demand supply parameters for the hydrogenated hydrocarbon resins.
Looking ahead, as with our carbon distillation business, we expect demand for our advanced materials will remain weak until energy costs recede and consumer confidence returns for discretionary spending. In response, given the energy-intensive nature of our advanced materials production, we are doing all we can to optimize our energy consumption per ton of product produced. We are also carefully managing our inventories and finding additional ways to cut costs. Further, we continue to diversify our raw material sourcing and use more sustainable materials.
We believe better times are ahead for this sector and are ready to quickly react and adapt as market conditions evolve. Rest assured that we are doing everything possible to return our advanced materials segment to profitability while improving its sustainability profile. With that, I'll now turn the presentation to Srinivas, who will take you through the consolidated performance of Rain on slide six. Srinivas, over to you.
Thank you, Jerry. Hello, everyone. It is a pleasure to present our financial performance during the December 2022 quarter. In the fourth quarter of 2022, Rain achieved consolidated net revenue of INR 54.11 billion compared to INR 39.66 billion in the fourth quarter of 2021, an increase of INR 14.45 billion. This resulted from an increase in revenue of INR 13.75 billion from our carbon segment and an increase of INR 0.90 billion from our cement segment, offset by a decrease of INR 0.20 billion from our advanced materials segment. Rain's consolidated adjusted EBITDA increased by INR 1,485 million compared to the prior year.
This resulted from an increase in the carbon segment by INR 1,873 million, offset by a decrease in the advanced materials segment by INR 293 million and a decrease in the cement segment by INR 95 million. Turning to the next slide on carbon segment performance. Revenue from our carbon segment was INR 42.33 billion for the quarter ended December 31, 2022, as compared to INR 28.58 billion for the same period last year. During the quarter, sales volume decreased by 2% compared to Q4 of 2021, driven by lower throughputs on account of longer maintenance schedules. The average blended realization increased by about 38%, driven by market quotations and increased raw material prices across all regions.
There was a depreciation of EUR against Indian rupee by about 2% and an appreciation of US dollar against Indian rupee by 10%. Due to the aforesaid reasons, revenue from carbon segment increased by about 48% during Q4 of 2022 as compared to Q4 of 2021. Adjusted EBIT of the carbon segment increased by INR 1,873 million as compared to Q4 of CY 2021 due to an increased lag between raw material costs and finished good prices, offset by a depreciation of EUR against Indian rupee and increased energy cost. Turning to the next slide on the performance of advanced materials.
Revenue from our advanced materials segment was INR 7.68 billion for the quarter ended December 31st, 2022, as compared to INR 7.88 billion for the same quarter in 2021. During the quarter, there was a decrease in volume by about 34%, driven by lower production on account of maintenance shutdowns, closure of the aromatic chemicals business, and lower overall demand. During Q4 of 2022, the average blended realizations increased by 33%, primarily due to increase in energy cost and oil-related quotations and raw material quotations, offset by depreciation of euro against Indian rupee by 2%. Due to the aforesaid reasons, revenue from advanced materials segment decreased by 3% during Q4 of 2022 as compared to Q4 of 2021.
Adjusted EBITDA from the advanced materials segment decreased by INR 293 million due to higher manufacturing costs and lower production volumes, depreciation of Euro against Indian rupee, and increase in the energy cost, which is partly offset by improved realizations. Moving to the next slide on cement business. During the fourth quarter of 2022, cement revenues increased by 28% compared to Q4 of 2021. The increase was primarily due to increase in volumes by about 26% and an increase in realizations by about 2%.
EBITDA from cement business decreased by INR 95 million due to high energy costs, offset by increased sales volume. Moving to the next slide on debt. We ended the quarter with total debt of $1,175 million, including working capital debt of $152 million. Net debt was $958 million. Based on LTM EBITDA of $478 million, we ended the quarter with a net debt to EBITDA ratio of 2.0x. We are comfortable at this level as our average borrowing cost stood at 5.4%.
Although the 6 months Euribor, which is the interest rate for our Term Loan B in Germany, moved to positive during the quarter after a long time, as a negative interest rate, it will not have a material impact on the average borrowing cost of the company, as majority of our debt is designated in fixed interest rate of 7.25%. You might also have noted the decrease in senior secured notes, which was due to repurchases of bonds during the current year. We incurred about $85 million towards capital expenditure, including plant turnarounds during the year. Our requirement for expansion, capital will be minimal going forward. With that, I will now turn the presentation to Mr. Jagan for closing remarks. Over to you, sir.
Thank you, Srinivas. With INR 37.55 billion in EBITDA, our financial performance 2022 was better than the past few years. Of course, much of that was driven by unusually high demand during the first three quarters and what we have referred to as opportunity margin. During the fourth quarter, as we cautioned in our last call, those high margins began to erode, and our quarterly EBITDA returned to its historically normal range. Looking ahead, persistently high energy costs in Europe, a continuation of reduced economic activity around the world, and the fact that several key industries we serve have reduced their demand by 10%-20% in response to current conditions all pose challenges to our business. In fact, almost every business.
That said, a bright spot for our company is all the work we have done in recent years to cut costs, improve efficiencies, increase our capacity utilization and plant reliability, and secure affordable, reliable, and more sustainable supplies of raw material will help us. These efforts will play an important role in helping our business to preserve earnings, margins, and our sustainability standing in the months and years ahead. Finally, I finally want to thank and congratulate our employees in making 2022 one of the safest years in our company's history.
While we are in the business to consistently make money and create shareholder value, protecting the health and safety of our employees and neighboring communities is job number one. With that in mind, I am pleased to report that for the third consecutive year, we had an annual Total Recordable Incident Rate of less than 0.2. That ranks us among the best in class companies in our industries. It gives me enormous pride. Thank you for your continued interest in Rain Industries Limited. We look forward to next quarter's presentation. Thank you.