Thank you for joining us today in this conference call on the results of the first 9 months in 2023. Going on, I would like to share with you an outline of the presentation and the procedures of today's call. As usual, I would start with an overview of the operational and financial highlights, the first 9 months. After that, I will comment on our financial figures and operational achievements in more detail. I will conclude my presentation with our outlook for the remainder of the year. As always, we will then open the line for the sell-side analysts only. All other participants will stay in listen-only mode, as it is our company's procedures for years. As usual, our slides that I will use can be found on our investor relations website.
Having said this, I would like to draw your attention to slide 3. In operational terms, we have made good progress. Nonetheless, I want to point out that we are currently dealing with several external factors that slow us down. The whole industry is currently characterized by numerous factors that are leading to delays in projects. For example, delays in transport, transport permits mean that some projects have to be postponed until next year. The Ukraine and Israel wars create uncertainty and keep supply chains volatile. Higher interest rates and further increases in material costs are also putting pressure. In order to counter these current challenges, we have acted with foresight and launched multiple activities to secure price quality. For example, we ordered 11 transformer stations and 700 kilometers of cable months ago, which we are now receiving at a good price and at the right time.
We were also able to secure KfW loans of around EUR 400 million at favorable conditions last year. This is helping us, at the moment, to partially offset the negative effects, also helped by the higher tariffs. We are in close discussions with our OEMs, municipalities, and politics, and we are pushing very hard to keep those negative effects down to a minimum. In view of these market conditions, we are satisfied with the progress achieved in the first nine months. Despite those difficult market conditions, our project pipeline again achieved another new record, high level, reaching 17.5 gigawatts, gigawatt peak. This trend represents an increase of 53%. We received building permits of six wind farms in Germany alone, and we were successful in all tenders in which we participated. We have sold, put into operation.
I have under construction projects of about 512 MW, MWp by end of September this year. We continued to grow our own wind power generation portfolio from 283 MW, end of September 2022, to 348 MW as of September 30, 2023. Due to this increase in production capacities, we were able to keep power generation output stable year-on-year basis as the increased installed base compensated for lower power prices and lower wind supply. Construction activity is high despite the delays. As per end of September, we had projects with a capacity of 215 MW under construction. These projects include projects with a capacity of 205 MW in Germany and 10.8 MW in France. We are especially pleased with the performance of our service segment.
It now manages a capacity of about 2.8 gigawatts, representing an increase year-over-year of about 27%. That is an impressive performance behind the number. I will come back to the service segment later. Slide four. Looking at the financials, the nine-month results were impacted by project delays and the ongoing investments in our own generation portfolio and development pipelines. Total output grew by 3% to EUR 156.9 million, which is remarkable considering the hindering factors I just mentioned. EBITDA was down 22% to EUR 16.5 million, mainly due to project delays and the lack of major project sales. However, we are still on track to achieve our full year guidance of EUR 30 million-EUR 40 million as we expected a strong year-end.
Our results were impacted by a muted performance of the power generation segment, which benefited from the higher installed base. On the other hand, wind yields were damped, and power prices came down over the course of the first 9 months in 2023. Also, our service segment contributed positively to our performance. All in all, we are satisfied with our results, given all circumstances I mentioned before. Due to the investment in our portfolio and the high construction activity, our cash position came down by circa EUR 38 million compared to the end of last year, to EUR 84 million. It is worth to say that our liquidity position, including credit lines, increased to EUR 212 million. On slide 45, we can see the expansion of our own generation portfolio, which is continuing.
We have 649 MW in operation under construction or through tender. We are still on the way to increase our own generation target to 1,500 MW by end of 2027, under construction or in operation. Just right now, or the ninth month of 2023, we have 348 MW of onshore wind project in operation, and further, approximately 209 MW in Germany and France will be and are intended for portfolio and are under construction. If you put this together with the numbers we think we will get at the end, if everything is ongoing as planned, we are going to have 626 MW in operation or under construction at the end of the year, 2027.
The written reserves accumulated in the portfolio of EUR 185.7 million in total. 421 GW of green energy produced in the ninth month, 2023. This is an increase of 21.7% compared to the last year number. So it was 370,000 tons CO2 had been saved with that. The lower results impacted so related to lower wind yield and so they are a little bit less than calculated before. We have on the next slide a project pipeline of 17.5 GW, GWp. This is a 53% increase from 11.454 GW to and GWp to 17.5.
So where we have an increase in the one offshore pipeline by 1.5 GW, within offshore projects, we added by, with 2.5 GW, and the PV pipeline increased from 4 GWp to 6.2 GWp. If you see. If you look to the project pipeline, we could see that we have completed 1 project, Mansbach, in Germany this year. We increased the pipeline there from 2,000 round about to 2.5 GW. We have eight wind farms with 198 MW are under construction. 1 project with 6.6 MW is for external investors. And we have received, in total, 6 wind farm approvals for round about 128.6 MW. France, we got approvals for two wind farms, and 1 project is under construction.
In Sweden, we completed the construction management of Hultema, 60 MW is completed. Project was already sold in 2020. We look to the PV pipeline, a strong growth. We grew more than 50% on a year-on-year base, which is remarkable. We are, we sold projects in Romania with a total amount of 208 MWp to TotalEnergies, and we are still ongoing to work, also, in several countries to increase our pipeline that far. If you look to the P&Ls, we have an output which is similar on the last year's level. The EBITDA decreased by 22%, which is very mainly driven by the project delays, and we are still waiting for the major project sales, we expect to get in the last quarter.
The operating performance is mainly driven, as I mentioned before, by project sales in Romania, 208 MW, the power generation performance, the project development services for wind farm projects, and the strong performance of service business. In total, we increased our staff and the staff expenses, so the staff by 111 people, we could increase and the expenses increased therefore. The depreciation increased due to the higher numbers of wind turbines in operation, and remarkable are that the financial results, comparison to the last year, hugely distorted by M2M valuation of interest swaps and loan liabilities. Interest results from valuations are -EUR 2.7 million in 9M 2019, 9M 2023, versus +EUR 23 million in the 9M 2022. This is really remarkable.
So looking to the segments, we see that they are impacted mainly by the investments in own generation portfolio. We see the project development output increased by 10% to EUR 121 million, while the EBITDA is at -EUR 3.4 million, mainly due to project delays and the investment in their own generation portfolio. In the services, we are very successful, +24%. The output grew to EUR 20.7 million. The EBITDA by 40%, EUR 6.4 million. The renewable power generation output growth is stable at EUR 52.5 million. The large installed capacity base that compensates the lower power prices and the lower wind supply.
In a moment, we talk about, as I mentioned, -9.8% impact, according to Kylo Heather Index, which is sales index, lower wind supply due to the wind up until the ninth month. But we see now in this autumn, the last two months, we see a lot of movement in the wind yield, so it's very positive. We will see what we get. But it looks very positive. The EBITDA is at EUR 40.5 million, -6%, 6%. It's mainly due to the lower prices, having in mind that we came up with 60%, which are of our portfolio, which are related to PPA prices, where we defined the PPAs and we closed the PPAs.
50% went over the spot market, and this is impacted now by this lower power prices. The balance sheet remains very solid. I think remarkable, and this amount is we are close to EUR 1 billion now with our balance number. We have a liquidity, which is decreased to EUR 83.8 million. Further expenses for further development, but also the realization of wind farms, where we are a little bit in delay. Usually, we want to have a little higher cash position, but again, it's only a delay. Equity ratio is at 20%, according to bond regulations, 32.7%. The liabilities to banks are mainly related to non-recourse financing, and the corporate bond is still there with EUR 55 million, 5%.
I think this is really remarkable that mainly non-recourse financing is there. Ladies and gentlemen, this leads me to the outlook. In view of these market conditions, we are satisfied with the progress achieved in the first nine months. Our countermeasures have taken effect, and our resilient business model is helping to cushion the impact. Nevertheless, we are not immune to projects being postponed. I would also like to mention that those projects are only delayed and not lost. The good news is also that we are starting to see light at the end of the tunnel. Despite the fact that some projects are lagging behind due to external factors, we are confirming our guidance for the full year 2023 for the group EBITDA in a range of EUR 30 million-EUR 40 million. We are expecting a strong year.
Several sales processes are ongoing in Germany, in Romania and Italy. We also intend to put further wind farms into operation and under construction. We expect more than 600 MW in our own portfolio in operation or under construction by year-end, well above the 500 MW target we defined in our scale-up process in 2020, end of 2023. The foundations for achieving our ambitious targets for the remainder of the fiscal year have been laid. We are still positive that we will achieve them. Ladies and gentlemen, before I conclude my presentation, please allow some remarks on the strategic side. The strategic review process concerning our U.S. activities was concluded, and we entered into a structured sales process of those activities....
To remind you, we believe that an exit from our U.S. business at the current market stage, with a reasonable price level for our activities, could free up resources, which we could steer into our business expansion in Germany and other markets abroad. Negotiations with one interested party were intensified as part of the sales process, but no agreement with terms satisfactory to us could be reached at the present time. The process will therefore be extended to other interested parties. However, it is unclear whether a deal will be reached this year. At the end of the day, margin always comes first for us, and we will not to be put under pressure to sell this year. Ladies and gentlemen, this concludes my presentation. Thank you for your attention. We are now open for questions.
Our first question comes from Jan Bauer, from Hauck Aufhäuser. Please go ahead.
Good morning. Can you hear me?
Yes, I can hear you. Hello.
Perfect. So you already elaborated a little bit about the sale or disposal of the U.S. project pipeline. Is there any, like, a certain timeline you set for yourself, or is it just now talking with other parties, and then maybe we will hear something in the next year?
Yeah, I think the chances are 50/50, I think, for this year or next year. So again, I don't want to bring us in a situation that somebody is dealing, and we want to have this price quality we think about, which is right for this market and for our projects, and our company.
Okay. So if I just crunch the numbers, so you expect a pretty strong Q4 in terms of project sales to reach your guidance. Can you shed a little bit of light on the sales process in Romania, UK, and Italy? Which kind of projects and which kind of sizes we can expect there?
So in Romania, we talk about a 160 MW project, and it's 15 4 MW projects, which are PV projects, which we have in the last stage of the sales process. In Italy, we talk about a pipeline which is 140 MWp. And which are eight projects. And in Poland, we talk about 49 MW, but what we see just right now is a very difficult negotiation.
Okay, so the highest probability is that you sell in the end in Romania and Italy, your PV projects?
Exactly.
Okay. Regarding your procurement strategy, so, you already said at the beginning of the year that you secured, like, cabling and transformer stations. Will you pursue this strategy? Can we expect that maybe, like, working capital is going up a little over the next months, so you again secure parts for the next year?
Yeah. So we will do it on a regular basis. We are not under pressure, but in one example, the lead time for transformer station increased from 12 months to 24 months to 36 months. So we are really have now taken time because of our big orders, but nevertheless, we have to order on regularly basis, maybe two or three substation in advance to secure delivery times and also for the wind farms. So this is. This will be done on regularly basis.
Okay. And, one last question regarding your now revitalized offshore activities. Do you think that you will need to make any, like, upfront investments in terms of hiring new staff, or will you be capable to deal with this project with your existing overhead?
It depends on that, what we see, to summarize is, the PDP 8 came. The PDP 8 defined, not in detail, so the project development plan in Vietnam. They defined more or less that the, the regulations, will come up and related to the, more to the local government and to a central office. And we will see what we will get then. But we are very optimistic due to the fact that we have, excellent support in Vietnam and, from the local and from the, from the, higher politicians. So from therefore, I'm, I'm pretty sure we, we have a good, good situation, and then we will see. And right now, we do the whole wind measurement, and we do the preparation of the offshore project.
In the moment, we are enough with our people, but if we see good signs, then we will invest furthermore... We think about-
Okay, I understand that.
We think about it, maybe middle, end of next year, we will come to the next, to the next.
Okay.
Situation. But it depends on the decisions of the Vietnamese government.
And also on the offshore wind business, I mean, like, this year, we've seen some trouble from peers, like in Ørsted in the U.S., and also other offshore developments that they came underwater due to rising costs, interest rates, and stuff. So, do you think that your offshore activities would also be affected by issues like that?
The difference is that, we see, as per example, United States, the last tenders had been given and the winner had been around, they had to pay $450 million at risk for the next five years. So you have to earn this money through the project, and that means you need better margin, better amounts, higher prices. So I think every government, even in Germany as well, they have to be careful, otherwise, it will be a showstopper if the prices are that high. That at the end of the day, the projects will not be built. So I think this is a typical way of a showstopper, if the prices are too high on risk, too high on risk.
On the other side, we have changes in prices of machine and cost for machine, and cost for steel and energy and interest rates. So therefore, all this together is not really positive. Yeah.
Okay, thank you.
Thank you.
The next question comes from Holger Steffen from SMC Research. Please go ahead.
Hello, Mr. Lesser. My first question is in connection with your project development section. We saw a big EBITDA loss in Q3 in this section. Maybe you can give us more details about these figures.
Yeah, sure. First of all, good morning, Mr. Steffen. So, yeah, this is exactly where I wanted to show a little bit with the delays. We have transportation permits are missing, so sometimes the trucks have to go on a long journey. We have 1 project 100 kilometers far away. They have to go for 700 kilometers and had to start the permission process and transportation for 7 months and for 6 months ago. And if you have tiny changes, then Autobahn, the new company, and Autobahn GmbH wants to have a new transportation permit. So that...
So there we are a little bit on delay with projects, where they will sometimes wait for one rotor blade or something like that to finalize the construction. So, and on the other sense, we would like to start more projects, but this is always related to the wind turbine manufacturers, so we are in a little bit in delay in this as well. So, this is, and to be honest, we wanted to finalize the sale of one remaining project earlier. So this is usually, we are a little bit behind our plan, but we are not far behind our plan. I think this is in total, maybe two months.
Okay.
We think we get it done until year-end. Yeah.
Mm-hmm. Okay, fine. Three months ago, you've mentioned possible project sales in Poland and Panama, too, until the end of the year. Now, it seems that these will be postponed. Can you give us an update about the actual situation there?
Yeah, in Panama, in Panama, we had a, with some, with one investor on the final stage of the process. He stepped back, and we—because we couldn't come together in some, some, important positions. So, and now we have to restart the project, the process again, which is not, not di—not that difficult because we have other interests as well. So, and in the, in the middle of next year, we, we think this, this, sales, I hope this sales... We, we get the sales under control again. Was Panama and Poland?
Poland.
Poland, yeah. Due to the, due to the changes, we got a delay in, in the grid connection. So we wanted to sell 200 MWp projects, several projects, but exactly in this area, there is a delay in, in, grid connections, and, and therefore, we couldn't sell it in that amount we would like to sell. So we wait until the prices and, and the value of the projects are better, and then sell it next year as well, hopefully. We have to see-
Okay.
We have, you know, we are not in charge of the grid connection, so therefore, that's why I said hopefully. So we have to see what these guys are doing.
... Okay, fine. If we take a look at 2024, you've mentioned these projects could be ready for sale. What are the further projects which may be ready for sale next year? Can you give us an idea?
Yeah, I think we work on a lot of projects in South Africa, in Poland, additionally, and we have projects in Italy, we will see. But I think I will come back at the end, and we'll give you a much better overview. And as for now, I don't want to go too deep in the details, because we start with the new year, with that what we have managed and that what we want to manage. So we have a new starting point, and then we will come up. But nevertheless, we are in several countries on the road and work very heavily on all the projects. You see the project pipeline is increasing.
So we are, I think, in a very, very good shape, especially in the times where land is needed, sites are needed, to have the basis for a very good business in the future as well, and that means also projects for next year.
Okay. Thank you very much for taking my questions.
Thank you.
The next question comes from Guido Hoymann, from Metzler. Please go ahead.
Yeah. Good morning, gentlemen. Two questions, please. The first one is on your own generation. How much of your output there, say, next year or the coming years, is already, yeah, sort of locked in via -
PPA?
-whatever, yeah, PPAs or any sort of contracts? That would be the first one. And maybe also at, at, at what level? And the second one is on, you know, again, on your, your timely procurement of transformer stations, cables, the funding, et cetera, which I think, first of all, is, is certainly worth mentioning, you know, given the problems of other major players like, like Ørsted. So I think that was certainly, you know, very well done. But the question is, you know, what happens once you have to buy the new stations or the new cables at then higher prices, and once you're getting then fully exposed to the higher funding costs, you know, once, once your the loans from, from KfW are absorbed, et cetera.
So do you think that in the foreseeable future, margins will come under pressure because selling prices for the projects remain, say, more or less broadly unchanged? Or do you expect prices for projects to move up, sort of in line with rising costs? So what is your expectation here? Margin pressure or, let's say, stable margins and higher prices than in the end, also for the investors.
Yeah. So the cables and the substations, we ordered. So for example, we standardized the transformer station, so we can take them for nearly all projects we have in the range. So that's why we can make the substations for every every power plant we want to deliver for. And we secure with that the next this year, and it goes next year and the middle of the year 2025. So therefore, we are very convinced that we have for cable works and related. And the cable works, we only order three line, three different diameters, and and from from cable line, so we take for all our projects. So we standardize this as well, instead of five or six different meters.
So, so therefore, we are in good shape to, to deliver this, this for the next, I would say, one and a half, one—nearly two years. Yeah. So, but that means also, you're right, we have to order maybe substations, transformer stations, now in the next half year, for the next project afterwards.
Mm-hmm.
But that we will do very, very careful. And, what we see on the other side, if you talk about the situation that we have in that we have now more efficient wind turbines. Yeah? So this is something which a little bit lowers the pressure on the margins due to the fact that with now 170-meter machines, this is the next grade of efficiency. So therefore, this is plus and minus in different ways. The interest rates are important, you are right. So until our projects we start until middle of next year according plan can be delivered with this KfW loans. So therefore we are safe as well.
But nevertheless, it is always important to look for the, to the interest rate, like in every branch. But to be honest, from our side, we think that the interest rates could go down in the next couple of months, but we will see. Related to that, what we get from our input related to PPAs. So as I mentioned before, we have now more than 50% with PPAs secured. So the delivery, so it's everything, every project we get, we can get done for a longer time, minimum 1 year. But we have also projects with 5-year PPAs. And then we are accepting also lower prices, which are always usually on about 20% above that, what we get with an EEG tariff, at minimum.
So therefore, we see, when we see advantages, we try to fix it with PPAs as well. This is another point where we release a little bit of the pressure on prices and economic feasibility. So therefore, we are positive, still positive, and have to do our usual work, and being capable to negotiate these PPAs for us and our customers and the services. We're talking about a 2.8 GW pipeline, where we do and negotiate this. So we have a good impact in the market due to the fact that we have one of the biggest green energy portfolios where we can sell our green energy. This is interesting for a lot of companies, so therefore, we are positive.
The trend is still there, and it's increasing, that everybody wants to secure their purchasing of the energy. All right. Okay. Thank you, Mr. Lesser.
Our next question comes from Karsten Worm von Blumenthal with First Berlin Equity Research. Please go ahead.
Good morning, Markus. This is Karsten. Can you hear me?
Yes, I can hear you. Good morning, Karsten.
Perfect. Good morning. So you already mentioned supply chain issues. My question is, the Siemens Gamesa quality problems, which result in a delay for onshore wind turbines. Are you affected by that? Could you tell us how many projects are affected, how many megawatts, and how long the delay might take?
Yeah. So we have we are not really affected by this. So when we heard this, so Siemens informed us about the technical problems. We went in with an independent technical research company, and 8.2, they went through the details of the repair suggestion and about the new changes in the new models, which will come up in the next phase of Siemens. So it is the SG 155 and the SG 170, which are affected by this. We have only one project under construction, where already these repair measures are in. This is Schöninghsdorf with 19.8 MW. So for us, it is no problem.
We don't. We went through the technical details in really in detail, and we see, even with repair or with the new release, we see now no problem. Yeah, so therefore, we are convinced that this is in a good shape, all machines, and so therefore, we are optimistic. So with the SG 170 and the new—this is affected by them as well. As I said before, we have already a partner order project, which close about 60 MW, which we started now, the construction, where we get delivered the machines somewhere end of next year. So, and, there is the—this is the new design, and so therefore, we have no issues to expect.
We have another 36 MW projects with SG 170, and wait for the final signing from Siemens for the contract so that we can start construction. So again, I think this is one of the best looked at designs we will have in the market now with the SG 170, because everybody's careful now.
All right. I'm happy to hear that, the impact is rather minor. Now, this 19.8 megawatt project, do you plan to commission this project this year?
We would like to, yes. It's the target, yes.
Okay. And, what about your-
So, no, sorry, sorry. The 19.8, this project, Schöninghsdorf, is under construction. Yeah, I said 19.8 is under construction. They will be built this year. Yeah.
Commissioned this year, so it should be finished at the end of the year.
I hope so. We according to plan, yes. So, the 66 MW, we want to get a signing done in a very short time, so that we can start construction.
All right, great. My next question is regarding the EU Wind Power Action Plan. Is that helpful for you? Do you think that is relevant change in EU regulation that helps you, or what is your view on that?
Yeah, I think that this is a good, good move. Nevertheless, all these regulations must find their way through, through the government, through the land, jurisdiction, and then to the local, local offices, where you have very small, municipalities with small units. And so therefore, it's—I think it's, there it isn't now. So, and, and we think that it needs some time, and then we will see. In the moment, we don't have any effect.
All right. Looking into 2024, in your view, what is the hugest challenge you have to face as PNE?
The hugest challenge is, I think it is, we have several effects in the moment. As I mentioned before, interest rates is certainly an issue, but also the transport permissions, if you very detailed. Yeah, so there are a lot of points which have to be solved. But, you know, this is the interesting, we see that all of these things are going to be solved sooner or later. And we will see that a lot of interest will come up in the market when the hydrogen business is increasing. And that's what we see just right now, that the investment decision had been done in ThyssenKrupp, example, and others.
Therefore, it's a special time now, but I think we have a lot of, a lot of positive development in front of us.
All right. All right, perhaps, one last question from my side. What is your plan regarding the end of the year, regarding your own plant portfolio? How many megawatts would you like to have in operation?
At the end of the year, we want to finalize another 58.9 MW, so plus that what we have. But we see just right now that it is, that we are on the edge, and maybe some of these megawatts will come in the next years. But the projects, so five projects, we are in the last stage. Yeah, so, optimistically said, we would have 349 MW, 348 MW, plus around about 59 MW at the end of the year. That would be a very positive case, but I think it will be less. Important is that we will have, in any case, 626 MW under construction or in operation in total.
I think this is a very, very good number, having in mind that we started in 2017 with scale up, and we started, and we said we wanted to have 500 MW under construction or in operation. And if this is fulfilled, we have much more than expected in the line, and this is positive.
Yeah. Thank you very much, Markus, for taking my question.
Thank you.
There are no further questions at this time. I hand back to Markus Lesser for closing comments.
Yeah. Thank you again for your interest. I wish you a very successful day. See you soon. See and hear you soon. Bye.