Good morning, everyone. Thank you very much for joining the call, especially short notice.
I hope you're all well. I'm joined today at the Easington Gas Processing Plant in East Yorkshire by Martin Scargill, he's the Managing Director of Centrica Storage Limited. I'm really excited that we've announced this morning that Rough is now operational as a gas storage facility again. So much so that I thought it'd be worth providing a bit more color to the announcement. I'm going to spend about 10 minutes going through the current status and also touch upon the potential longer-term future for Rough as a hydrogen storage facility. Martin and I would then be delighted to take any questions that you may have.
Obviously, the more difficult ones for Martin and the easier ones for me. How have we got to where we are today?
No doubt you'll recall that until 2017, Rough was by far the U.K.'s largest gas storage facility, making up around 70% of total U.K. capacity of about 200 billion cubic feet. However, having identified well integrity issues and after assessing the economics of seasonal gas storage, we concluded that it would not be economic to make the significant investment required to continue to operate Rough as a gas storage asset at similar levels of capacity.
We were granted permission to produce all recoverable reserves, and we've been operating Rough as a gas production facility for the past 5 years. It hasn't been mothballed at any point at all. It's been fully operational, fully staffed, and working all the way through. Now, for the past couple of years, we've been investigating the possibility of extending the life of Rough, essentially by repurposing it as a hydrogen storage facility.
That would require reopening it first as a methane natural gas storage facility and then converting to hydrogen over time. In July, we were granted a 10-year storage license by the North Sea Transition Authority. At the end of August, we were given all necessary permissions to resume storage operations at the site. Rough's going to provide around 30 billion cubic feet of gas storage capacity this winter, which is around 9 LNG tankers worth.
We've had an extended commissioning period for the facility, and we've currently got well over 20 billion cubic feet of gas in the field. Now, that includes around 14 billion cubic feet of indigenous reserves that were still in the field at the end of June.
Rough immediately becomes the U.K.'s largest gas storage facility once again, and it adds more than 50% to the country's previous capacity of around 60 billion cubic feet. Rough will play an important role this winter in the U.K. It will help to balance the U.K.'s gas market. We've got enough visibility of gas prices over this coming winter to be able to run Rough with no need for a regulatory support model.
We'll add value through injecting gas when prices are low, like they are today, and then withdrawing that gas when the prices are higher, as we expect them to be in the coming months as it gets colder. However, our long-term aim remains to turn Rough into Europe's largest long-duration energy storage facility.
Initially, storing methane and subsequently converting to hydrogen storage, helping the U.K. reach a net zero electricity system by 2035 and the decarbonization of the U.K.'s industrial clusters, including the Humber region, by 2040. We intend to make Rough the largest hydrogen storage facility in the world. Now, as we said back at our interim results in July, we need to spend around GBP 150 million to increase the storage capacity to around 60 billion cubic feet for next winter.
The total project, including the cost of converting Rough to store hydrogen, would cost in the region of GBP 2 billion. I'll reiterate that we would be highly unlikely to invest such sums on a merchant basis, given that it's impossible to predict future commodity prices and more importantly, seasonal spreads with any certainty. Any future investment is dependent on a regulated return model.
We're not looking for government money. We don't want it, we haven't asked for it, we don't need it. We can fund this either ourselves or with partners. We're simply looking for a model such as that which is used for existing strategic U.K. energy assets, like the interconnectors to boost U.K. energy security. The chart you see here shows the daily injection withdrawal volume since we started our commissioning operations.
We've gradually built up to injection levels averaging over 200 million cubic feet or 2 million therms a day, and we also tested the asset's withdrawal capability during September. After all, we want to make sure we can get the gas out of the ground, having put it in there.
Rough being back on means we've been able to buy gas from the spot market while selling it forward for later in the winter, capturing price spread and creating significant value both for UK energy consumers by helping to balance supply and demand at peak times and obviously for Centrica shareholders. Running Rough as a storage asset this winter also provides the optionality to do the same again for the next winter with a similar level of potential capacity without the need for additional investment.
However, we don't know at this stage whether this is going to make economic sense. That's why we've been in discussions about a regulated return model. We've included a couple of slides with some detail on the history of Rough and Easington. Both of which have been part of the Centrica family since 2002. We own 100% of these assets.
Also on the unique characteristics of Rough, which makes it the only proven large gas storage facility in the UK. They're freely available on the Centrica website. I won't go through them in too much detail, but there are a couple of points to highlight on this slide.
The Easington gas terminal remains an important part of infrastructure for both Rough and the UK as a whole. It's capable of processing 1.6 billion cubic feet of gas per day, equivalent to approximately half an LNG tanker or around 20% of average UK daily gas demand. Our management team, including Martin, who's here with me today, has a long and proven track record in gas infrastructure development and safe operations. They know what they're doing. They've been doing it for decades. Future of Rough is in very safe hands.
These are some of the facts and the unique characteristics of Rough. We call it the Goldilocks reservoir. It meets all of the requirements and temperature. It's not too hot. It's not too cold. It's just right, both for methane, but more importantly for hydrogen. It's got the right requirements and dryness and size on proximity to land. It's very close to the coast.
It's a really nice size, and we don't have water or other liquids in there. It remains the only proven offshore gas storage reservoir in the U.K. It's these characteristics that also mean that Rough is well-placed to play a role in a hydrogen future, and it does support the U.K.'s hydrogen strategy, which in April this year, doubled the target for hydrogen production from 5 gigawatts to 10 gigawatts by the end of this decade, in the next eight years.
Again, there's further detail on this slide, but the key takeaway is that the doubling of the capacity is the thing that should mean that Rough is required. It is, in our view, impossible that this heightened target for hydrogen production can be met without hydrogen storage capacity. We believe Rough is the only meaningful material option available.
Once you start to use hydrogen, you must have an uninterruptible supply, and that means you must have storage. Rough is also incredibly well located, given the proximity to the combined East Coast Cluster, which is responsible for around half of the UK's industrial CO2 emissions. Rough's got the potential to play an incredibly important role in the decarbonization of the Humber region and by extension, the UK. Before I move to any questions you may have for Martin and I, let me briefly summarize.
Having been granted a license to store gas at Rough again, we've got around 30 BCF of potential capacity this winter. Given that we've been injecting gas in September, we've currently got well over 20 billion cubic feet in the field already. The visibility of prices means that we don't require a regulatory support model for this winter.
However, longer term, we will require the right regulation to be confident enough to invest the material capital in this project that we would like to invest, to create thousands of jobs in the U.K., to reduce prices for consumers, and to help deliver the U.K.'s hydrogen targets. We'll continue discussions with the U.K. government. We're not asking for any government investment, just the appropriate regulatory framework. Everyone I speak to, whether in government, in opposition, in NGOs, everyone agrees that we need Rough.
I'm really hopeful that we'll be able to rely upon a regulatory framework which underpins the investment needed to materially boost the U.K.'s energy security, keep consumer prices down, enable the U.K.'s hydrogen economy and return us once again to a country which is a net exporter of energy, which in my view would transform the U.K. economy.
I'd just like to say thanks very much for your time, and we're now happy to take any questions that you might have. Timo, if you could let us know about the questions that we've got, please.
Ladies and gentlemen, if you wish to ask a question, please press star followed by one on your telephone keypad.
If you change your mind and wish to remove your question, please press star followed by two. When preparing to ask a question, please ensure that your phone is unmuted locally. To confirm, that's star followed by one to ask a question.
The first question is from the line of Mark Freshney with Credit Suisse. Your question, please.
Hello. Thank you for taking my question.
Morning, Mark.
Hey, morning. Chris, if we do the math, if we look at sort of the National Grid long-term storage, we can see what you've been injecting.
We can work out that you can fill up this storage facility at 150 pence per therm and take it out in Q1 at 370. We can work back through the math and get to some very, very high numbers. My question to you is that right?
Why would you not make order of magnitude GBP 400-500 million of post-tax profits from this injection trade? Secondly, what is your revenue recognition policy?
Which years will you recognize? Will you have to mark-to-market the gas as at December 31 or the profits? How should we think about revenue and profit recognition?
Mark, how you doing? Kate and I spoke about whether Kate could be on the call. She said probably not too many finance questions. Kate's not on the call, so she'll be. If she's listening to this, she'll be going absolutely mad if she thinks I'm going to answer a mark-to-market question. Look, as long as you understand what will happen is we will recognize the revenue when we withdraw the gas.
I think it's covered by what's called the own use exemption. Now, remember I'm about 15 years out of date on this stuff. I don't think we'd recognize it's issued. You recognize when you withdraw it.
Now obviously, on the capacity, on the prices and the like, we need to see where prices are when we withdraw this. As I've long been allergic to any kind of profit forecast, and I wouldn't be anywhere near as good as you are at your job in doing that. I'm sure you'll come to the right number.
If I could just follow up with a question for your CSL manager. On the hydrogen, you mentioned 10 terawatt-hours of hydrogen storage, which I believe is about GBP 2 billion of CapEx. But when I look at Rough storing methane, on my math, and I've got a cheat sheet in front of me, actually, so it's not really my math, but 180 BCF of gas, Rough stores 54 terawatt-hours.
You're talking about GBP 2 billion of CapEx to only store 10 terawatt-hours of hydrogen. Is it correct that there's a fairly big de-rating in the energy content that Rough could store moving to hydrogen?
Yeah, morning, Mark. It's Martin, and thanks for the question. The first thing you need to add to your cheat sheet is that the energy density of hydrogen is a third of that of methane.
Anybody storing hydrogen, their store got two-thirds smaller overnight by changing the fluid. The other number probably to add to your cheat sheet is the number we're putting out there in terms of 10 terawatt-hours for Rough is utilizing 120 billion cubic feet of its working capacity. Which could go higher, it could go to 200, but we pitched it in around the 120. We think that's a good sweet spot for what we see needed in the market, but could go higher.
Mark, that's a way of saying that your cheat sheet is probably quite right. I learned a lot that engineers tend to be quite conservative. I tend to round up something the engineers tend to round down. By and large, I think that's saying if you take your one-third energy density and you go from 120 to 180, and which is probably, if we're being honest, go from 100 to 200, then you've got just about the right number. 10 versus 54. Your numbers are pretty much right.
Not often the case, but thank you very much.
You're being modest. Thanks, Mark. Thanks for the questions.
The next question is from the line of Martin Young with Investec. Your question, please.
Yeah, good morning to everybody.
Hi, Martin.
Just got a couple of questions. Hi there. You mentioned GBP 150 million in respect of dealing with the methane storage side of things. How much of that has already been spent to take you up to 30 BCF? Given the comments around the lack of visibility for next winter, would you be prepared to spend the balance on a merchant basis, or are your comments about regulatory support applicable to the second Phase of the methane spend?
Then the second question is look, well, we live in sort of some strange times at the moment, and we have an ever-changing government that is doing very strange things.
You could argue that some of those strange things fly in the face of dealing with the much needed energy security that this country has got. Can you rule out the possibility of government getting interested in a grab of spread profits from storage facilities like Rough?
There's a number of questions. The GBP 150 million, Martin, that is all for the increase in capacity for next year. I mean, you, but that's a lot of money. What we are looking for in Rough, what we think is the right thing to do is to have a long-term deal to bring this thing back for 40 years. Let's talk about the next 40 years, not the next 40 weeks.
The likelihood of us spending GBP 150 million on spec to increase capacity from 30 to 55, 60 or so is quite limited. We do need government backup. We've already invested a reasonable amount.
In terms of commenting on, excuse me, the likelihood of government doing stuff that's. I don't want to get drawn on that at all. I mean, it's really for government to decide, what it is that they do.
The thing I would always come back to is, governments who decide to take profits from companies in good times may well scare away investment. So as my view, I've been very open to this. My view is that, to transform the UK energy system, we could have, Contracts for Difference. That could achieve something which is an energy market that can work for the consumer.
I do worry about the idea of governments doing this, because what that would suggest to you is that governments are going to go after, are they going to go after all the energy traders? What about the energy traders in the UK market but are not in the UK? I mean, you know this better than I do, having worked in Ofgem. I think that what the current situation calls for is cool heads.
Whenever I have any conversation with government, what I always say is if we think about what we're trying to achieve, then let's try and find the best way of achieving the objectives rather than instantly run to talking about top slice and revenue and the like. We're actively engaged with this.
I hope the government does the right thing. I wouldn't want to be drawn on what they may or may not be considering. That is, that's been proven to be a fool's errand over the past while, so.
Okay. Thank you.
Thanks, Martin.
The next question is from the line of Dominic Nash with Barclays. Your question please.
Good morning, Chris and
Hey, Dominic.
Hi there. I've got a couple of questions, please. One sort of technical, which is, Rough used to have or did have a lot of cushion gas in it. When you decided to decommission it, you remember you kind of said, "Well, we're going to run it down as a normal gas producing field, going forward." What sort of cushion gas do we need to put back in, or have you put back in to Rough, and how does that get put on the accounting?
The second question I've got, I think last time we met up, I think you mentioned that you were hoping that there might be fracking coming back onto the table. Obviously, that's obviously been kiboshed in the last few days or so.
What are your thoughts really about the UK government policy on producing indigenous fossil fuels going forward in order to meet the fact that we're still going to be consuming this stuff going forward? Or do you think that was an incorrect policy from government?
Yeah. Dominic, let me take the fracking and then Martin can go with the cushion gas. Remember that any of the gas that we've got in the ground just now isn't going to recognize on the books other than the gas we've bought, other than the cost of developing the asset. Look, on fracking, my view is if you step back from it, gas is a key transition fuel to get to net zero.
Gas is going to be with us, natural gas, for the next 20 years or so. We have to recognize that in order to have the right plans to get to net zero.
The question, which is if you recognize it, you accept you're going to use gas, where's the best place to get the gas from an energy security point of view, from a cost point of view, from an environmental cost point of view? It's probably more expensive to produce shale in the U.K. than it is to produce gas in Qatar or somewhere else.
The environmental cost is probably a bit lower because you're not transporting the gas on ships, so you probably save something there. You've got security supply. Security supply is undoubtedly higher if you produce it domestically. Look, I think that the debate on fracking has far more heat than light. When I see it's not what I would call a particularly well-informed debate. I wouldn't call for.
I'm not in a position to say we should frack. I'm in a position to say my view is that we should have an informed debate about this, and we should have cool heads involved in the debate, and we should make the right decision based on the cost, the security of supply, and the environmental cost. I mean, as fracking is something that's been going on for decades. So what we're talking about really is onshore gas production from shale, from shale rock. That's proven to work. And I think that we've just got to step back and see what is it we're trying to solve. Security supply is important, and the UK has a lot of indigenous gas.
If it becomes the most important thing, I would have thought that the most important thing is to produce domestic gas. again people in government have got so many things on. I don't understand fully the pressures that they're under, and they make what they think are the right decisions. I just want a proper, open, and informed debate about it.
I just don't think we've had that at the moment. With that, look, I'll ask Martin to talk about the cushion gas.
Morning, Dominic. Just conscious of time, a quick answer. The gas that we put in is all stock. We don't need to top up with cushion gas. The slightly longer answer is the way that we're operating the field is much lower down its pressure envelope. We're able to reopen the facility at lower pressure. We don't need the high levels of cushion gas that we had before.
Okay. Thank you.
The next question is from the line of Deepa Venkateswaran with Bernstein. Your question, please.
Hi. Thank you for taking my question. I have two questions.
The first is on the near-term earnings. Do you have a ballpark number for the near-term earnings getting affected by the Rough? The second one is that how long do you think you will operate at 30 BCF capacity? For this winter only or that can continue beyond this winter and the long-term earning impact on this 30 BCF capacity? Thank you very much.
Thanks for the question. On the near-term earnings impact, you guys are very capable of doing that, so I don't want to give you numbers that you plug into your model. In terms of operating at 30 BCF beyond this winter, it really does depend on the economics of it all. We have to wait to see how things look. Obviously, we have far better visibility over this winter's price and spreads and volatility than next winter. As we see physically, we can operate it at 30 BCF for a while, so we can certainly do that physically. Economically will be the question.
Thank you very much. Sorry, another one is on the CapEx. You mentioned for the next year the number of GBP 150 million, and you also mentioned the GBP 2 billion investment over the long term. What is exactly the GBP 2 billion going to get invested? In the hydrogen storage or any other investment?
Yes.
Thank you.
The GBP 150 million is what would be required to double the capacity, more or less double the capacity for next year. The GBP 2 billion is to get it to hydrogen storage. That essentially means that we would redo all of the wells. We would replace the platform. We'd replace the jacket, the legs on which the platform stands. We'd probably replace the pipelines.
Essentially, we replace everything but the reservoir and the onshore processing plant, but we'd have to make some modifications, quite major modifications to the onshore processing plant. GBP 2 billion is a very, very rough estimate of what it is to get to the hydrogen storage.
Thank you very much.
Thank you. Thanks for the question.
The next question is from the line of Sam Arie with UBS. Your question please.
Hi, good morning, everybody.
Morning, Sam.
Thank you. Thanks for this announcement, and congratulations. It's a good development.
Thank you.
Thanks for your answers. Can I ask a question? Sorry, a follow-up on the cushion gas topic. I'll probably make myself look an idiot 'cause I don't understand these storage facilities very well. But are you able to tell us how much cushion gas you had sold before you stopped selling cushion gas and started reinjecting? I don't know if you can tell us that for this year or maybe total since you started selling the cushion gas, and then we can work out something for this year.
I suppose the next question is, can you tell us how much cushion gas is left in the facility now? Then my kind of question where I might look a fool, but tell me if this is right.
Should we think about you now having a new earnings stream, if you like, which is the spread trade on your injections that you're doing now versus what you pay now versus what you sell for next winter? You have a lost earnings line, if you like, which is whatever you were making from selling off the rest of the cushion gas.
I don't know, but I guess that's a spread trade versus whatever you paid for it many years ago when it went in, or I don't know if it was just in the. If the cushion gas is fundamentally the gas that was there anyway, so it's kinda 100% spread. Anyway, my question is it right to think that you're going to sort of swap one earnings line for the other?
Relative to the question on this earlier, it's not so much how much do you make on the new trade, it's like, what's the net difference between one and the other in the short run?
It's fair to say that since we converted back to production facility, we've produced about 100 BCF. I mean, you could find that if you go back and look at the productions in CSL, which I think we disclose each year. About 100 billion cubic feet that we've produced. On the question about the earnings, that is the right way to think about it in terms of we have got a new revenue stream.
Now, obviously, we were producing and taking out, and we're no longer just storing. The way I think about it, though, is slightly differently, replacing one earnings stream with another.
If I think about it in very simplistic terms, we bought a storeroom, or we've acquired a storeroom that already had some stock in it. The indigenous gas that's in there we'll produce. It's part of the we've got over 20 BCF. That includes 14 BCFs in there at the moment.
We will withdraw that over time. What I would look at, as long as we can if we can see the market signal being there, then we've replaced what is a very much a declining asset with one that should be very stable. If we get the right framework, we'll be here for another 40-odd years.
I do think about it as rather than we stop production and we start storage, we just say we convert to storage, but we already had 14 BCF in the storage at the time. We've added just a bit under 10 BCF to that since.
I'm not sure I totally follow all of that, but I think I get the big picture, and I'll follow up maybe with Martin on the details.
So-
Do you mind if I just throw in a couple other small questions, and then I'll get off the line? On the long-term CapEx of GBP 2 billion, I mean, you pointed out in your presentation, of course, it's 100% owned, Centrica asset. If you got the framework that you wanted and were looking at a GBP 2 billion investment, and that's quite a large investment for you on one asset, is that something you would look to bring a partner on board for?
Look, it.
Have you had any discussions like that?
Look, it depends on the. Remember, it's not GBP 2 billion all in one. I mean, that'd be over several years. It really does depend. I've always been quite clear. I'd like to have more investment opportunities than we have money to invest. I'd love to have that problem. It all comes about in terms of how you defray risk. I wouldn't say I'm jealously guarding the fact that we do this all ourselves.
I wouldn't say that we need third-party money. It really does depend what the overall portfolio is. It depends what the other investment opportunities are and what the returns are on this asset. But on that, Sam, just, I hate to leave you confused.
The last one, you're right in thinking that we now have a revenue stream which is basically built around the spreads on gas. That is absolutely spot on. It does replace the production revenue stream that we had from Centrica Storage Limited. My point is that the gas that we would have produced had we just stayed in production operations, we've got a spread on that gas.
That gas is in the ground at a cost of zero, essentially. You can mark that to market. The way I think about it is the storage room that we've got today has got over 20 billion cubic feet in. Fourteen of it has a zero cost. The other, say 9, so I think we've got about 23. The other nine we bought over the past six weeks.
You can then therefore then blend the cost. The 14 BCF, there was no cost to inject it. That's how I think about it. Hopefully, that's a wee bit clearer.
Yeah, that's very clear. The 14, which is basically the cushion gas that you'll need going forward. I mean, one day you may sell it, but if you do 40 years of running this as a storage asset, it may stay in the ground.
Yeah.
as cushion gas.
To be clear, sorry, that 14 isn't cushion gas.
Okay.
is withdrawable gas. That is, we had about 14 BCF of producible reserves left in the reservoir, not cushion gas. That 14 now becomes accessible storage gas.
How much is the cushion gas that you have left in? Sorry, just to make sure I've got that.
I don't have that number.
It's still quite a large quantum. It's over 100 BCF. Before storage conversion, the plan was to run the field down, produce that remaining 14 BCF and shut in at that point. At that point, there would have been still over 100 BCF left in Rough. It was commercially not viable to extract it. It has a long withdrawal profile, quite a long, skinny production profile.
Right. Okay. I think that's clear. I'm not going to keep digging on this topic.
No, no.
I know other people have questions.
No, no.
Want to get clear answers.
That's fine. Just think of the 14 as being accessible gas. That is, it was still, so it's at zero cost gas that we can withdraw, and it's in the storeroom.
The 14 is what you would have sold if you'd have carried on the current plan.
Yeah.
The net for us is to work out what do we think is the NPV of the new storage activity that you're back into, and then offset against what you would have got from just selling the 14.
Yeah.
on the previous strategy.
Absolutely.
I think that's clear.
Obviously, we believe the NPV of the new strategy is higher than the old strategy, otherwise we wouldn't be doing this.
Of course. Very good.
Thanks, Sam Arie. Thank you.
Hey, thank you.
The next and final question is from Mark Freshney with CS, sorry. Your question, please.
Hi, Mark.
Hi. So me again. Sorry. Quick fire. Firstly, I think. Can you confirm that the CMA removed all like the third-party access requirements so you can trade principal rather than actually just offer capacity into the market? Secondly, I remember you had a bunch of other fields. I think Baird, and I think there were three of them you wanted. Caythorpe.
Three properties you wanted to develop. I was just wondering what your thoughts were. I think one of them was almost ready to go, but TPA was an issue. I just wonder what whether those were still available to you or whether they're gone. Just thirdly, on you know the safety case. I know that when you took it out of service three or four years ago, it was on a safety case, even though it was uneconomic.
I was just wondering where, why the safety case, why you can operate it safely now, but why there were concerns with admittedly previous managers as to why they couldn't operate it safely?
No.
Thank you.
Mark, good question. Baird and Caythorpe gone, no longer for us. We didn't believe those were suitable for storage. Rough is the best game in town, which is why we've kept it. The third-party access, we have an exemption from that for two years. However, if we're not using the access, we do have to offer up to third party. We're not obliged to offer it up. We can use it ourselves.
If we're not using it, we've given an undertaking that we would allow third parties to use it. We expect however to use it. On the safety case, the way to think about it is when this thing was operating at 150 billion cubic feet, it was operating at. What was the bar? What was the pressure?
3,500, so about 250 bar.
250 times atmospheric pressure. Whereas and that puts stresses on wells and on aging bits of kit. It just requires far higher strains on the plant operating at 30 BCF. I mean, essentially the pressure in the National Transmission System pipeline is higher than the pressure in the reservoir.
In order to put gas in the reservoir, what we do is we simply open the tap and we flow it into the reservoir. It's operating at far lower pressures, which means that some of the concerns that we had over some of the wells, for example, are no longer concerns. Now, this is why we can't just, excuse me, ramp the thing back up to 150 BCF.
Because clearly, physically, the cavern can take 150 BCF. But we want to operate this with a very clear margin for error, safety margin. So we're operating at far, far lower pressures.
Thank you. Very clear.
Excellent. Thank you. That was the last question. I'd just like to say thanks again for coming along at such short notice. We will look to have more of these teach-ins and we will give you a bit more notice in the future as we try to bring to life some of the opportunities that we've got in Centrica. Just to close off, obviously, I'm delighted that we've managed to bring the Rough facility back to becoming a storage facility.
I'm delighted for consumers in the UK. It will keep prices down. I'm delighted with the help it can give to the UK because it improves our energy security. It also gives us a clear path on the road to net zero as we develop the UK's hydrogen economy.
You'll all see in terms of the U.K. economy, we need to have more export revenue streams. Rough in mind is a key enabler to allow the U.K. to return to be a net exporter of energy as we embrace hydrogen because of some of the characteristics that there's only two or three countries in Europe that are able to produce hydrogen at the scale that's required.
I see this as being quite a monumental day. Obviously, this is something that I expect could deliver material value to Centrica over the short and the long term. All in all, I think it's a good day. It's good for consumers, it's good for the country, and it's good for shareholders. It's not often you get to have something that's good for everybody.
This is a very good day. It's been a long time coming.
Hopefully, this is the first of many conversations that we'll be having about just how important this asset is to the UK and to our shareholders.
Thanks very much, everybody. I hope you have a great weekend. Thank you.