Hello, I'm Liv Garfield, Chief Executive of Severn Trent, and welcome to the 2024 interim presentation. I'm out and about today in Coventry, and as part of the presentation this morning, I'm also going to be fitting a smart meter. Now, why are smart meters so exciting? They help customers get much better access to data. It also typically helps them reduce consumption, which means, of course, that a little bit of reduction on their bill, and they help us with leakage, a long-standing systemic issue across the sector. Now, we're going to be fitting 157,000 smart meters over the next couple of years as part of the Green Recovery investment, and a whopping extra 1 million over the course of the following AMP through to 2030.
Now, before we get going, let's first of all just talk about the highlights from the last six months. It's been a strong six months. Firstly, I'm delighted to share that we're on track for our fifth ever consecutive year of four-star EPA status, the highest accolade that the Environment Agency hands out and a real testament to the hard work of every colleague. Secondly, we're running at around 80% green on all of our performance metrics, and that means we're delivering against the things that customers truly care about most. And that, of course, leads into being strong on our position for at least GBP 50 million worth of ODI return this year, and that would make us GBP 250 million ODI rewards so far this amp.
Now, we also want to get going for the next AMP, and that's why we're accelerating GBP 400 million into years 4 and 5 of AMP8 future spend. And that will allow us to get ahead and to begin to really feel confident about being an ODI outperforming delivery company in the next AMP, as this period. And of course, in the same six months, we've submitted our boldest, our best price view to date, and we're excited to begin to discuss that with the regulator and, of course, begin to get on with delivering it. Now, I need to go down the road now and find the exact address to where I'm going to fit the first of my smart meters this morning. So I'll hand over to Helen to take you through the financials.
Thank you, Liv. I'm really pleased to share with you a robust set of financial results, managing the challenges of the macroeconomic environment and setting us up perfectly for growth. Our financial performance for the H1 of the year is in line with our expectations, and there are strong indicators for the future. Firstly, I'm pleased to share that we continue to expect EPS growth for the full year, even after accounting for the 46.5 million additional shares issued in October. Secondly, we are on course to invest GBP 1 billion this year as we continue to ramp up our capital investment program. At the half year, we are up over 75% year-on-year, and this is a wonderful demonstration of being a growing company with our highest investment year ever.
Next is that even with a step up in investment, we expect our regulatory gearing to remain one of the lowest in the sector, and I'm pleased with the strength of our balance sheet at the half year, with shadow gearing of 60.6%. And finally, our interim dividend for this year is 46.74 pence, in line with our policy. If you take a look at the slide, there are three key drivers of our half year PBIT, which are revenue growth, scaling up investment for the future, and inflationary impacts. And if I start with revenue, we're seeing inflation flow through, as the impact of our hard-earned ODIs from previous periods, increasing revenue in total by GBP 95 million. Our bad debt charge remains at around 2% of revenue.
I'm really pleased to have agreed a two-year pay deal for our people, giving us cost certainty both this year and next. We are pushing forward as we continue to invest for future growth. Specifically, there is an increase of GBP 14.5 million of OpEx spend, which consists of an increase in green recovery activity, as the majority of around GBP 10 million of transition costs for our strategic program to in-source critical waste operational activity. This is a significant business change, which we know will give us a good return. Now, of course, like others, we have experienced above average inflation increases in costs, such as power, which reflect 2022 prices, power pass-through costs, chemicals, which are also heavily correlated to power, and other fixed costs, such as business rates and regulatory fees.
The big picture here, though, is we are moving forward at pace, and as we continue to grow, we will do so efficiently, keeping our cost base under control, at the same time as making the right TotEx investments to maintain our sector-leading operational performance. Our Business Services division is a valuable differentiator for us, providing an important contribution to net zero, cash generation, and energy cost mitigation. Green Power is a fast-growing business and the UK's largest producer of renewable energy from food waste. We work with over 65 local authorities and 100 major commercial customers right across the UK. The acquisition of 2 new food plant sites with digestion, as the benefits from investment in the expansion of our existing footprint, will increase generation capacity and Green Power by 30% on an annualized basis.
And while this is brilliant for future earnings growth, the acquisition did result in one-off costs of just under GBP 4 million in this half year, which, coupled with steady turnover and an increase in some operating costs, such as labor, resulted in a reduction in EBITDA year-on-year. Operating Services continues to perform well and is able to drive up income from existing contracts because of the consistent, reliable, and valued performance they deliver. Our Property Development division has generated GBP 53 million of PBIT since 2017, remaining well on track with our target to deliver GBP 150 million of PBIT by 2032.
You can see from the chart on the left, we are extremely well-placed in our financing costs versus the rest of the sector, with 3% lower costs of finance, and we expect to continue outperforming the sector into the future. You can see our cash cost of interest has increased to 3.4% due to the impact of higher interest rates on recent debt issues, although we've beaten the iBoxx by 18 basis points on average this AMP. While inflation hasn't reduced as we expected, the decrease we have seen has reduced our effective cost of interest to 5.6%. We will, of course, see the benefit of higher inflation in financing outperformance and RCV growth. Our chosen debt, debt mix continues to serve us well.
At 27%, we hold considerably less index-linked debt than others, which has been beneficial during the recent period of high inflation. It's worth remembering, too, that our high level of fixed debt, together with the iBoxx true-up mechanism, provide protection against the high interest rates we've continued to see. You will all know we have an experienced treasury team, which has consistently delivered financing outperformance in both high and low inflationary environments. Backed by our strong liquidity position and broad access to global markets, we've got the flexibility to go to market at the point that's most advantageous to us. As the advantage that gives us, we want to go further, and a great example of that is the work we've done on the EU Taxonomy alignment over the last six months.
As a reminder, we shared our eligibility assessment for the first time at year-end, and I'm delighted to be able to share with you today our alignment assessment. This is something we believe makes us more attractive to both debt and equity investors and is yet another example of how we are differentiated from others in the sector. I'm really pleased that the majority of our financial flows align to the EU criteria, with CapEx being the highest at 62% and being the most important of the three. From the analysis we've done, we believe we can get even better, and as you would expect, work is already underway to improve further, and we'll update you on our progress at year-end. As we think about the future, it's also worth reflecting on the growth journey we are on.
We're forecasting 43% nominal RCV growth across AMP7, which equates to a compound annual growth rate of over 7%. In AMP8, we anticipate a significant step-up in real RCV growth, with forecast nominal growth at over 40%, again, as we deliver huge benefits to customers and the environment. That all means that in the ten-year period, from the start of AMP7 to the end of AMP8, we're projecting that we will have doubled the value of our RCV. But we couldn't do that at this scale without the capital injection we have had, and so I want to take this opportunity to thank all of our investors for their outstanding support of us and our plan, covering our book nearly 4 times over. It really is a game changer.
It has meant not only could we submit a financiable, bold and ambitious plan, we have also been able to expedite AMP8 activity and all the benefits that brings, at the same time as reducing financing costs and maintaining our financial resilience and credit ratings. So thank you. So finally from me, let's review our outlook and guidance, which is unchanged since our last update. Due to lower interest costs in the year, we continue to expect year-on-year adjusted EPS growth at the full year, and that's after the additional shares issued as part of the equity raise. We're reiterating our guidance on ODIs, with at least GBP 50 million of reward anticipated this year, plus GBP 40 million-GBP 50 million of end of AMP ODIs on top of any rewards that we earn in year five.
You will see the impact of energy prices in this year's TotEx, but even taking account of that, we expect to continue seeing strong average RoRE performance for AMP7. I'll now hand you back over to Liv to see how she's getting on with the metering team.
So I found the right customer, number 47. I've got the boundary box, which is perfect. Now, did you know that all of the leakage that happens on the network is actually split between our side of the network, which is this side of the boundary box, and customer side of the owned network, which is this side of the boundary box? And actually, a third of all leakage in the U.K. is actually on the customer-owned pipes, and that's where smart meters really come into their own. They can pinpoint leaks much faster, helping us identify them much quicker and be able to make real progress. Now, leakage is a very stretching target, and we're delighted to have hit the target for the first three years of the AMP and are well on track again this year.
Now, before we begin work, let's go and talk to the customer and check they're okay for us to begin to do that activity. So good news, the customer's happy for us to do the work on the smart meter. Before I do that, though, let me just cover off operational performance for the last six months. It's been a strong period of time. As I said, 80% of the metrics are green, and we're on track for at least GBP 50 million worth of ODI reward, taking us above that GBP 250 million AMP to date, which is great. Now, in terms of which of the metrics that are shining, leakage, as I said, also some excellent performance on blockages, a 30% reduction so far this AMP.
And quite nice to see one of last year's red metrics turn green again, which is mains bursts. Now, that said, there's always more we can do and more improvements. If we look at two metrics where we know we want to keep getting better, supply interruptions, whilst we're not yet at the Ofwat numbers, we are actually pleased to have had our best six months to date. And if we look at another metric, external sewer flooding, still in penalty, but very pleasing to see that we are the frontier company in our sector on that metric, which again, will stand us in good shape for the future, even if it is a penalty metric for today. Now, looking forward, we want to be the ODI winner next AMP as this AMP.
We were pleased to see around 72% of our metrics are either in upper quartile already or literally touching distance to that upper quartile mark of the AMP8 measures. And that's given us renewed confidence to begin investing in some of the key metrics that we're confident we can be successful in heading into the next AMP period. Namely, investing in the Zero Spills Hub to bring down CSO spills for the future and creating our very own ODI Centre of Excellence, the first task of which is to focus on PCC. We know that PCC is a consumption metric. By really helping by installing smart meters, we know that has a really strong impact. It's part of our armory. So let's crack on. Let's install one smart meter together right now. Okay, so now I'm at the boundary box.
I'm about to take the lid off in a second, turn the water off temporarily, and fit the smart meter. Before I do, let me just explain why reduced consumption is so important to the environment. By having reduced consumption and having reduced leakage through smart metering, you end up where we take less water to the environment, and extracting less water, of course, is environmentally excellent, and we love being the environmental leaders of the sector. We're delighted to be on track for five years in a row of four-star status with zero serious pollutions year to date, which is really, really good. But actually, wider across the environmental metrics, we're delighted to be on track for our 10,000 hectares of land commitment as part of biodiversity, and that would make up 2% of the whole nation's nature recovery network.
If you look at the other actually big environmental ODI, it's around Farming for Water. We're working with 5,000 farmers, 98% of which would recommend working with us, all on track to, again, continue to make our river water quality even better. So with that, let's begin to take off the lid. Okay, that was easy. Take out the inner plug, also easy, and now I want to get ready to turn the water off just for a couple of seconds while we fit that meter. Okay, a quick quarter turn, and we're all good. Okay, so first thing, take off the lid, spray the chlorine. Make sure you do it away from your face. Okay, nice and clean. Spray down here to make sure the connector's lovely . Beautiful. Right. So then in a second, I literally just fit this.
That's as simple as that, a two-second job. This is just one example towards the easier end of the scale capital investments we're making during the course of this AMP and going into the next. Now, colleagues have been working across the business on a whole range of different capital investments, and we thought we'd bring to life just a couple of examples of the bigger capital investments now in the course of the video. But first, let me just fit this. Okay, put it in, turn it around. Job's a good 'un.
This year, we're investing more than ever before to enhance our network, lowering leaks, reducing our use of CSOs, protecting our environment, and making our water supplies more resilient. All in all, we're investing around GBP 1 billion this financial year all around our region to make a difference to our customers and the environment. Let's take a look at what we've been spending it on. One of our key targets for the next few years is to reduce our CSO usage. The Stroud Flood Alleviation Project is a GBP 25 million infrastructure investment in our waste network to reduce the risk of flooding and pollution in the Gloucester area. As part of that, we're installing a new storm tank that will temporarily store an additional 7,400 cubic meters of wastewater during periods of heavy rainfall, storing it until we're able to treat it safely.
We're also building 1 kilometer of sewer network specifically to capture rainfall, reducing the volume of rain that gets into our sewers in order to reduce the burden on our network and the risk of flooding to our customers. Altogether, this will reduce Wallbridge CSO spills by 86%.
Hi, I'm Matt Bingham from Severn Trent. I'm the program lead for the Decarbonizing Water project, of which Wychbury's Water Treatment Works, that you can see behind me, is part of. So this is part of the Green Recovery Program, GBP 565 million worth of work that we're going full steam ahead on. Once this project's complete, it will deliver up to 89 million liters a day of drinking water to our customers. That's approximately 250,000 domestic properties. So this is Wychbury's Water Treatment Works pilot plant, which is a mini version of the full-scale works that we've just been over at. The main processes that we're piloting here are the ceramic membranes, the advanced, in-line coagulation that's upstream of that in the process, we're piloting that also, GAC pesticide filters, and also UV disinfection system.
This project will be a real game-changer in terms of reducing chemical consumption and providing a sustainable solution for our future. At Wychbury's Shard Lake, we've built 31 wetlands to act as the first stage of the water treatment process, which is a new concept in the UK. By pre-treating the water, we minimize the use of chemicals in the treatment process. The reed beds absorb contaminants, and they also provide habitat for wildlife.
In addition to our AMP7 programs, we'll be investing around GBP 400 million between now and 2025 to get ahead of our targets for AMP8 and deliver benefits to our customers faster. That includes installing some large resilience pipelines to support our most vulnerable areas against climate change as part of our Water Resources Management Plan, and addressing nearly 400 CSOs as part of our Water Industry National Environment Program, or WINEP. So we're delivering our highest year of investment ever, enhancing our network to give real benefit to customers. We're closing out AMP7 strongly with all of our enhancement projects. On top of that, we've scaled up to deliver our green recovery projects to boost our infrastructure and the environment. Furthermore, we're getting a head start on AMP8 by accelerating at least GBP 400 million of spend into the next 18 months.
All of this means that our capital delivery program is already operating at the level needed for AMP8. So when the next AMP comes around, we'll be ready for it.
So meter fitted, let's turn the customer's water back on, first off. Okay. Okay, good. Now, I hope you all enjoyed the video. I hope it brought to life the scale of investment we're doing right now. It's our largest ever capital year, GBP 1 billion spend this year, which is absolutely brilliant, and puts us in such strong shape for the future. We are so excited to have done the hard yards already on capital investment. We're now at exactly the right run rate we need to be for the whole of the next seven years, and that means that we've done some of the brilliant innovation. We've done digital twins to get ourselves ready for the future.
We've made sure that we've locked in our supply chain, and we've created this really innovative plug-and-play facility, like 3D printing of some of our everyday assets, and we can get quicker into action on our sites and less invasive on-site work for those teams. Now, let me go tell the customer that the water's back on, and they're fully sorted. So as I walk up the drive to tell the customer the good news, their water's back on, and they can have a hot cup of tea, let me tell you all about our AMP8 investment plans. We're talking a colossal GBP 12.9 billion TOTEX program, a 31% real RCV growth, and we stand in perfect shape to be able to deliver it.
Whether that's the 1.2 million smart meters between now and 2030, the net zero ambitions over the same time window, or actually some of the other activities, such as our really, really bold ODI targets we set ourselves because we want customers to have fantastic customer service from ourselves. Now, we know, as getting ourselves in the right shape, we need to make sure that the regulator assesses our plan against the three key conditions, whether it's deliverability, affordability, or financability. On affordability, we feel we're in strong shape with the GBP 550 million support package, which will help around one in six customers that are struggling to afford their bill.
On deliverability, as you can see, we're on the right run rate already for our capital ambitions, and we've got ourselves with a locked-in supply chain and a load of insourced activities, such as our wastewater insourcing, which gives us a really strong opportunity for the future. And on financeability, following the recent equity raise that was supported so strongly by investors, we feel we've got a fantastic balance sheet, and we're in the right position with our ESG credentials to really be a strong investment opportunity for the future. So what I'd like to do now is, after telling the customer the water's back on, I'll introduce you to some of the amazing smart metering team, because it's all about team and talent that will secure our future. An amazing plan needs amazing people to deliver it for it to be a success.
I was joined today by some of the smart metering team who came to train me today, watch me get it wrong, and I think have a little giggle at my expense. Now, I am super excited about the future. I genuinely believe we've got amazing people, and they are the best asset we have. And that means you also need to have the right skills to make sure that you can deliver against that plan. And we've got the academy, which allows us to really train up on brilliant technical skills. We've also got a strong track record in insourcing, and most recently, of course, we did the wastewater networks insourcing, that we again think gives us a bit of a boost for the future.
Now, as making sure that we've got those right skills, right people, we also need to make sure that everyone's engaged and headed in the right direction. And that's why, for the last few weeks, I've been out doing roadshows across the patch, meeting about 3,500 so far of our colleagues, with the remainder between now and Christmas. And I wasn't surprised, having met with colleagues and seen how enthused they are for the next 18 months and for the long-term future of the organization, that our most recent Quest scores were stellar. They were 8.6 out of 10, in the top 3% of utilities globally. And that is such an amazing platform on which we can build and deliver exciting things heading into AMP8.
Let me now give you a quick summary of the first six months of this financial year. So to sum up, we're focused every single day on making sure that we deliver strongly for our customers, and we close out AMP7 strongly. We're really pleased this year to have our greatest investment year yet on capital at the GBP 1 billion run rate. And we start the next AMP with a strong balance sheet, the ability to accelerate money now to make sure that we have a really strong five years between 2025 and 2030. So with that, a big thank you for listening. We look forward to having questions with you on Zoom later, and the whole of the executive team will be joining me to discuss any topic on your mind.