Good morning, ladies and gentlemen. I'm Barbara Chapman, Chair of the board of Genesis Energy Limited. On behalf of my fellow directors, our Chief Executive and his team, and all Genesis employees around New Zealand, welcome to our 2022 Annual Shareholder Meeting. Following the lifting of COVID restrictions, it's gratifying to once again be able to hold this meeting in person. Our thanks to those shareholders who have made the effort to be here. Our online streaming facility will continue for those unable to attend, and we thank you for taking the time to be present virtually. Just some quick housekeeping before we start. The bathrooms and fire exits are to my right. If we hear a fire alarm and a request to evacuate, staff will help us down the exit stairs and assemble outside the Wildfire Restaurant or below the Saint Alice restaurant.
For those joining online, today's meeting is being held via the Computershare online meetings platform. This enables you to read the company documents associated with the meeting, and shareholders and proxies may ask questions and submit votes through the platform. For those online, if you have a question to submit during the meeting, please select the Q&A tab on the right half of your screen at any time. Type your question into the field and press Send. Your question will be immediately submitted. Should you require any assistance, you can type your query and one of the Computershare team will assist through the chat function. Alternatively, you can call Computershare on 0800 650 034. Please note that while you can submit questions from now on, I will not address them until the relevant time in the meeting.
Please also note that your questions may be moderated or, if we receive multiple questions on one topic, amalgamated. Finally, due to time constraints, we may run out of time to answer all your questions. If this happens, we'll answer them in due course via email. For those present during question time later, simply raise your hand and one of our attendants will bring a microphone to you. You will be able to vote on today's resolutions either in person or, for those online, using the Computershare platform. I will refer to the instructions on how to vote when we get to that point in today's meeting. Bryce Henderson of Deloitte is with us here today as our company's auditor on behalf of the Auditor-General. Notice of the meeting has been duly given to shareholders, and we have the required quorum.
I now declare the 2022 annual shareholders' meeting of Genesis Energy Limited officially open. Thank you for joining us here today. I will quickly run through the agenda for this morning. Firstly, I will provide a brief overview of the board's key highlights for the year. Genesis Energy's Chief Executive Officer, Marc England, will then provide you with a more detailed overview of our company performance and priorities. There will then be an opportunity for you to ask questions of the board and the executive. Finally, we will move to the formal business of today's meeting. At that point, I will outline the process for the discussion and voting on the five resolutions in the agenda. Shareholders will be then provided with an opportunity to raise any items of general business that may lawfully be put to the meeting.
If there are any additional discussion points that you feel haven't been covered in today's meeting, please reach out to our investor relations team at the email address investorrelations@genesisenergy.co.nz. To begin, let me introduce your board of directors. Hinerangi Raumati-Tu'ua. There she is. Hinerangi joined the board in March this year. She is a member of the Audit and Risk Committee. Hinerangi is Chair of Tainui Group Holdings and brings extensive governance experience, having chaired and served on various sector boards including iwi boards, water, fisheries, and local government. In addition to her strong commercial investment and corporate governance background, Hinerangi was named Māori Woman Business Leader of the Year in 2016 and served on the Cullen Tax Working Group in 2019. Hinerangi is presenting herself for election today. Thank you for joining us, Hinerangi. Warwick Hunt. We welcome Warwick to our board from this month.
He brings over 30 years leadership and governance experience. As a partner and then managing partner of PwC in New Zealand, Middle East, and Africa, and U.K., Warwick has worked across a range of sectors, including energy, professional services, agribusiness, and aviation. He is a Fellow of Chartered Accountants Australia and New Zealand and an Honorary Fellow of King's College London. Warwick is also a member of the New Zealand Order of Merit for services to business. Warwick presents himself for election today. Thank you for joining us here, Warwick. Tim Miles. Tim is unable to join us today and sends his apologies. Tim joined our board in 2016, coming to us from his previous role as Chief Executive of Spark Digital. He is Chairman of the Human Resources and Remuneration Committee and the Nominations Committee.
Tim has had a long career in customer and technology-focused roles at the most senior levels, both in New Zealand and internationally, and applies that insight and scrutiny to all of the board's work. Tim is presenting himself for re-election today. Paul Zealand. Paul joined our board also in 2016. He is a member of the company's Human Resources and Remuneration Committee and the Nominations Committee. Paul has over 40 years’ experience in the oil and gas sector, including senior executive and chief executive roles at Shell and Origin Energy. In particular, he brings strong expertise around health and safety and environmental management and advice around operational risk. Paul is presenting himself for re-election today. Thanks for joining us, Paul. Catherine Drayton. Catherine joined the Genesis board in March 2019 and is the Chair of the company's Audit and Risk Committee.
Catherine is a former Senior Partner at PwC, specializing in mergers and acquisitions, culminating in her leading the assurance and advisory divisions in Central and Eastern Europe. Her extensive cross-sector governance experience includes multiple directorships across the healthcare, infrastructure, and energy sectors. Catherine is presenting herself for re-election today. Thank you for joining us, Catherine. James Moulder. James joined the board in 2018 and is a member of the company's Audit and Risk Committee. James has strong governance experience, having held a number of non-executive board and advisory board positions in the electricity sector. James brings strong industry experience in carbon and energy asset management and data analysis experience to your board. His background advising the electricity industry's regulatory bodies also strengthens our governance. Thank you for joining us today. Also on the platform with us today is Paul Gellard, our Assistant Company Secretary.
I'd like to finish this section by thanking former director Doug McKay for his eight years' service with Genesis. Doug stepped down from our board last month to pursue new endeavors. We appreciate the expertise and guidance he shared during his time with us and wish him all the very best. Joining me in this presentation is Genesis CEO Marc England, who will speak shortly. This is Marc's last presentation to you as Chief Executive. He leaves today to take up a new role as Chief Executive of New South Wales lines company, Ausgrid. I wish to acknowledge the significant value Marc has brought to Genesis over the past six years. He has overseen considerable transformation and growth in the business during a critical period for the sector. He leaves us having positioned the company for the future as a more sustainable, inclusive, and customer-focused business.
Thank you, Marc, for your energy, leadership, and efforts on behalf of Genesis. We wish you all the best. Our Chief Customer Officer, Tracey Hickman, who I'm going to ask to stand up and wave, Tracey, has generously agreed to be our Interim CEO from today until our new Chief Executive, Malcolm Johns, joins us in March. I wish to thank you, Tracey, for stepping up to maintain the company's steady course until Malcolm comes on board. My presentation will touch on a number of matters that Marc will discuss in more detail. You will have the opportunity to ask questions towards the latter part of this meeting. Behind me is an image of our board skills matrix, a summary of the skills necessary for the company's success, and an assessment of the skills held by directors.
The matrix shows an excellent spread of expertise and secondary skills among our directors. The importance of good governance has been highlighted by the series of challenges presented by COVID-19 over the past two years and a half. Responding to heightened regulatory scrutiny of the sector in the wake of the August 2019 power disruptions and the vision required to help New Zealand transition to a lower carbon future are other demands that drew on the experience and skills of your board. I'm very proud to lead a strong and capable board of directors, each of whom gives generously of their time, providing their extensive expertise and skill sets for the benefit of the company, our staff, our stakeholders, and the wider community. Genesis has a meaningful purpose to empower New Zealand's sustainable future.
We work with our customers to inspire sustainable choices and with the sector and the government to be an active enabler of New Zealand's energy transition. To achieve all of this, we need to be a top-performing company. This year, our EBITDA was NZD 440 million, an increase on last year's NZD 355 million, which was negatively impacted by an arbitration decision and use of the carbon fixed price option. Net profit after tax was NZD 222 million, up from NZD 32 million in FY 2021. This marked increase was due largely to the revaluation of financial contracts, which were impacted by market conditions beyond Genesis' control. Dividends grew for the eighth year in a row. The full-year dividend was NZD 0.176 per share, representing an 8.8% gross dividend yield.
This year's financial result underlines what Genesis represents today, a business with momentum that is focused, disciplined, and delivers on our commitments. For context, six years ago, when Marc became the CEO, we had an EBITDA of NZD 335 million. We've lifted that more than 30% to NZD 440 million in FY 2022, while delivering an annualized total shareholder return over the period of 10.3%. Looking ahead, our FY 2023 EBITDA is expected to be around NZD 500 million. This is an upgrade released this morning, which Marc will speak to. These positive results are pleasing considering the challenges and opportunities faced by management and the board this year. The issues the board dealt with were reflective both of the current environment and our ongoing focus on our future.
Our customers are at the center of our business, and the importance of taking care of them has never been more apparent than during this pandemic. Our customer care team delivered superbly, and as a testament to their commitment, Genesis received our highest ever net promoter score during a year made difficult by COVID. This score measures customers' willingness to recommend Genesis based on an interaction with a member of our team or through one of our digital channels. Our score increased from 47 to 51 this financial year, continuing its upward trajectory from 39 in FY 2020. Customer churn also reduced from 15.9% in FY 2021 to 12.8% this year, well below our target of 15.3%.
As patron of the New Zealand Rainbow Excellence Awards, I was extremely proud of Genesis attaining the Rainbow Tick accreditation this year. Rainbow Tick shows our employees, customers, and the community that Genesis is a progressive, inclusive, and dynamic organization that reflects the people of New Zealand. A diverse and inclusive workplace where everyone feels valued leads to an enhanced ability to recruit and retain good people, increased employee engagement, boosted productivity, and better connection with our customers and our communities. Our ongoing attention to our pay equity gap saw it close from 1.7% - 1.3% this year, and we continue to work hard on closing our gender pay gap. It was wonderful to see our executive team become gender balanced this year, and Marc will talk more about the promotions that made that possible.
Our business is only as strong as our people. This year, that meant caring for them through the pandemic so they could continue to serve our customers, operate our generation sites, and fulfill our promise of empowering New Zealand's sustainable future. The backbone of our response was a comprehensive PCR and RAT testing program and the development and rollout of a simple, safe, effective workplace plan designed with and for our people. We provided tools to help them and their families navigate the challenging period, supported them when they had to work from home, avoided any recordable workplace transmission, and as a result, saw limited business interruption. Our support of our staff through COVID was reflected in an increase in our employee net promoter score from 67.5% in FY 2021 to a record 69% this year.
The release of the government's emission reduction plan set the direction for climate action for the next 15 years, with targets that impact every sector of the economy. We're pleased to see the ERP reflect the electricity sector's call to abandon the target of 100% renewable electricity by 2030 and instead focus on a 50% renewable energy target. A 50% renewable energy system represents much less carbon than a 100% renewable electricity system on its own. Significant funding for decarbonization of transport and industry accompanied the ERP, both of which create opportunities for Genesis. A transition plan for gas is also under development to ensure its supply for industry and electricity generation is maintained as the economy decarbonizes. This is in line with our belief that gas has an important role to play during the energy transition.
The government has undertaken to develop a national energy strategy, which we have consistently raised as crucial to avoid unintended consequences through the transition to a low carbon future. In the meantime, we acknowledge that public and private sectors must work together to ensure the best outcome for New Zealand. This year, Genesis partnered with a number of other market participants to commission an independent study to provide a constructive whole sector view on how to best decarbonize New Zealand's economy, a roadmap to a low carbon energy future. This study has been led by the Boston Consulting Group, and their report will be released towards the end of this month. Genesis looks forward to BCG's recommendations and in working with our sector partners and the government on the next steps.
In conclusion, along with my fellow directors and our Genesis Energy team, I'd like to thank you for your support of our company over the past year. I have every confidence that your board, overseeing our strong executive team, will position the company as an essential and profitable part of New Zealand's energy future, while at the same time living up to the company's purpose and vision. It's now my pleasure to invite your Chief Executive, Marc England, to make his final speech to our shareholders. Welcome, Marc.
Kia ora, everyone, and thank you, Barbara, for the kind introduction and for providing an overview of some of the challenges and opportunities the company has faced in what has been a demanding year. As this is my last opportunity to speak with you before I leave Genesis after six years, my comments will be somewhat reflective, as well as forward-looking. I'm pleased my last shareholder meeting is in person after two years of virtual presentations. It's good to see some of the many New Zealanders who have remained invested in our company. As we exit the last restrictions of the pandemic, I want to say how proud I am of how our staff have adapted over the past two and a half years to continue to support our customers and keep our sites operational, which is really important.
In August, we were among the first companies to initiate PCR saliva testing and then joined 25 other companies in successfully calling on the government to allow us to import rapid antigen tests. We're at the forefront of trialing those and became colloquially known as RATs. In liaison with the Ministry of Health, we helped pave the way for RATs to be rolled out to other businesses in New Zealand. Our contact centers and LPG drivers were the most impacted by COVID-19, but they remained steadfast in their flexibility and commitment to our customers throughout. My address today has four main elements. First of all, our financial performance for the 2022 financial year and the role Genesis can play with our customers to empower New Zealand's sustainable future through innovation and technology.
Huntly's importance in providing security through the transition and the need for a collective market response to share that responsibility, and then some parting reflections. First, an overview of the numbers, which reflect not only our financial performance success, but also our achievements in operations, sustainability, and support of communities around Genesis' assets. Genesis' FY 2022 EBITDA was NZD 440 million, up 6% on last year on a normalized basis, and net profit after tax was NZD 222 million, up 30% from NZD 32 million, largely due to the revaluation of swaptions and power purchase agreement contracts, which, as we know, can be very volatile.
In fact, despite some populist media recently commenting and calling out our NPAT increase as excessive, NPAT has fallen six times in the last 10 years, even when EBITDA has risen, which to me is evidence enough that the volatility can be misleading. Across the year, Genesis grew shareholder value. The full-year dividend increased for the 8th consecutive year to NZD 0.176 per share, up 1.15% on last year, and last year, NZD 0.174 cents per share, representing an 8.8% gross yield. FY 2023 EBITDA guidance has been upgraded this morning to around NZD 500 million, as Barbara mentioned, which is subject to normal hydrological conditions, any one-off material expenses and any other unforeseen circumstances.
This is the result of a great first quarter when Genesis was able to turn off our thermal plant and purchase lower priced renewables off the spot market. Really important dynamic for Genesis. For a detailed breakdown of our FY 2022 performance, please visit Genesis' website's Investor Center to view our FY 2022 investor presentation. There you'll see our Chief Financial Officer, James Spence, who's here in the audience too, and I talk in detail about the company's financial performance, as well as the broader underlying themes of our business. Today I'll touch on, in terms of operational achievements, we were pleased to see customer churn fall during what was a difficult year for many. The churn rate, 12.8%, was down on the 15.9% in FY 2021 and is down further for the first quarter of this year.
This, together with our record net promoter score mentioned by Barbara earlier, is a reflection of the dedication of our customer care teams, our strong brands, and the increasingly innovative ways we're engaging our customers, which some of you might have seen outside on the way in. Our greenhouse gas emissions reduced by more than 843,000 tons of CO2 from the 2020 base year. We're using our Science-Based Targets to drive us to those outcomes. By 2025, we aim to remove 1.2 million tons of carbon emissions tied to the internationally recognized benchmark, which limits global warming to below one and a half degrees of pre-industrial temperatures. This supports New Zealand's commitments under the 2015 Paris Agreement.
We're well on track to meet that target, and among our social metrics, we also ran Powershop gifting campaign this year, whereby customers who receive free hours of power could choose to gift them to households in need. More than 15,000 customers gifted over 62,000 Powershop hours, and Genesis then matched that total to round it up to 130,000 free hours of power and gifted them to customers who are struggling financially as we approach winter. Further, our Creating Pathways program continues to support young people in our power schemes, communities and nurturing a pipeline of talent. This year, we provided 21 apprenticeships, internships, and work experience and opportunities. In addition to the other activities, now undertakes to encourage young people into careers in our sector.
Finally, the 50/50 number on this slide is a very satisfying one for me to see. I've long championed gender balance in the business, so it gave me great pleasure to promote two of our talented women into executive this year. I'll introduce them and the rest of the executive a bit later. When I joined Genesis six years ago, with a focus on retail customers, innovation and technology. I'd like to just circle back and look at the role Genesis can play in partnering with our customers to empower New Zealand's sustainable future, considering how far we've come with innovation and technology in that time. In 2018, we launched the Energy IQ app to provide information, insights and tools for customers to make informed decisions about how to manage their energy consumption and reduce their emissions.
Engagement has grown every year since then. In FY 2022, there were nearly 22 million interactions with Energy IQ features. More than 270,000 unique users used the app. That was more than 206,000 views of billing insights and tool, and more than 300,000 energy saving tips were provided. This year, we refreshed the platform, which I hope you saw outside, giving it a facelift and a new functionality to provide more granular data for our customers. Through it, we launched our latest innovation, EVerywhere, a New Zealand first. EVerywhere provides an energy roaming facility for electric vehicle drivers, making it cheaper and easier to charge EVs on the road. EVerywhere lets EV owners use ChargeNet's 280 fast charging hubs throughout New Zealand for the same rate they pay at home.
This can save drivers up to 70% on the cost of charging their car, eliminating that variability of public charging rates. Charge costs are added to the customer's regular power bill and visible immediately through Energy IQ. EVerywhere has changed the way Genesis operates from the inside out and is perceived from the outside in. Its development enhanced our internal capability of innovation and increased our confidence in selecting the right partners for complex projects. We created something EV drivers didn't know they needed, positioning Genesis ahead of the curve in EV billing technology. This example of partnering for the transition speaks to our purpose of empowering New Zealand's sustainable future.
Yes, our customers love this innovation, and we're attracting new customers with it, but we believe innovations like EVerywhere will also encourage EV uptake among the wider population, and so contribute to New Zealand's emissions reduction, a proof point of our purpose to empower New Zealand's sustainable future. If anyone's interested in signing up after this, the team have got a great deal for you outside. We're promoting these technologies through our new marketing campaign featuring the sassy and endearing George. Hopefully, some of you have caught her and seen her. She is the face of our refreshed brand, which is aligned with our purpose. The re-refresh involved three major work streams, internal brand pride, a new external brand, and a new website.
George observes her family's energy use and is quick to get into parents or siblings who are not as energy efficient as they could be. It's fun and effective way to bring to life our new retail vision of together inspiring millions of sustainable choices. At the same time, we also updated the technology behind our website, along with the design and approach to content to engage our wider range of stakeholders outside of retail customers. We relaunched Energy Online as Frank Energy, an affordable, no-contract offering for customers who want an energy provider that sells it to you straight. Frank's entry into the market with a series of tongue-in-cheek ads featuring the big green asterisk was well-received. Its customer relationship net promoter score improved, churn reduced, and the ease of the digital sign-up journey saw digital sales increase from 38%-55%.
I'm very proud of how much our retail brands have evolved, thanks to the innovation of our talented in-house team, who partner with the best in the business to position Genesis as a leader in empowering customers to play their part in New Zealand's sustainable future. I'll now turn to the wholesale side of the business. After signing power purchase agreements for new wind and geothermal generation earlier in this financial year, we are focused on progressing our commitment to build up to 500 MW of large-scale solar generation in New Zealand. We conducted a process to find the right joint venture partner and selected FRV, a globally recognized developer. We're now identifying and conducting due diligence on potential sites for these solar farms.
While it's a competitive environment with a number of new participants, we're looking forward to confirming our first sites for development during FY 2023. Increased solar capacity will add to New Zealand's renewable electricity supply, already one of the highest in the world, with approximately 82% of our supply coming from hydro, wind, or geothermal. Our own analysis shows us that commitments by those in the sector to build more renewables will lift the level of renewable electricity generation to between 96% and 98% by 2030. As we also know, the country's supply is at risk when the wind doesn't blow, the rain doesn't fall, and the sun doesn't shine. Huntly Power Station was built to provide backup for that highly renewable electricity generation that we have.
We believe it can still do that and is a more effective and economic option for the country than the proposed Lake Onslow pumped hydro scheme. More so, if we can find a reliable source of a more sustainable fuel to replace coal. Supply chain issues have prevented us from running a biomass trial stockpile this year with the specific type of wood pellets that we need, not locally available. We continue to work hard to make the trial happen as soon as possible. The security that Huntly provides to the market needs to be shared by other participants too, and we believe Genesis cannot and should not be expected to subsidize the market with backup generation. Wholesale price stability, though, is a factor. Today in New Zealand, energy markets sit against a backdrop of changing dynamics in the international energy and fuel markets.
It is important to consider how changes in international markets will impact New Zealand if they persist over time. The cost of coal, for example, on the international market has skyrocketed since the start of the Ukraine war. As geopolitics unfold in Europe, coal and gas prices are expected to remain high as a new normal. Electricity prices in New Zealand have been cushioned to date, thanks in large part to the coal stockpile that Huntly holds. That will change when we need to replace it at current market prices. Until this year, a collective approach to security of supply and price stability was facilitated through supply contracts we call swaptions. When little interest was shown in renewing them earlier this year, we designed a new insurance-type product called Market Security Options.
These MSOs, as we call them, will provide generators, retailers, and major energy users if they want the opportunity to secure electricity supply from the Rankine units at Huntly with stable pricing, and in doing so, support security of supply and market price stability in New Zealand. We received a number of expressions of interest in the MSOs and are now working through contractual agreements with those participants. In the meantime, we continue to invest in other generation assets to maximize their output. Three of our biggest projects this year involved upgrades at Tekapo B, Tuai, at Lake Waikaremoana, and Kupe. A NZD 15+ million upgrade at Tekapo B Power Station delivers substantial efficiency gains and future-proofing installation of new turbine runners and refurbishing generators, headgates, and transformers. The work involved five years of planning and design and manufacture and will improve operational flexibility and annual maintenance costs.
It follows the completion of a two-year, NZD 26.5 million project to install a new intake gate at Tekapo A. The first of Tuai's three 90-year-old generators, can you believe that? 90-year-old, were replaced this year, with the other two to follow over the next two years. A NZD 32 million project will potentially boost Tuai's capacity by 6 MW. Nearby, PurePower is partway through its own NZD 7.7 million overhaul of its two generators, which were first commissioned in 1943. The work will increase their efficiency by up to 3.3%. All these small increases make a difference to the overall efficiency of the hydro system in New Zealand.
Along with our Kupe joint venture partners, Beach Energy and New Zealand Oil & Gas, a NZD 72 million inlet compression project was also completed in the last year, which was to increase production at Kupe. The Kupe field delivers the equivalent of approximately 15% of New Zealand's daily natural gas demand, and the total FY 2022 production target was achieved. Opportunities to increase well productivity and production rates at Kupe are being assessed and include in wellbore intervention activities and development well drilling as well. Kupe remains a high-quality asset and will continue to play a key role in New Zealand's energy transition in the future. None of the achievements Barbara and I have outlined today would be possible without our people, led by a strong and capable leadership team.
This year, we went through another kind of transition as people who had been in the executive for a number of years made natural progressions to new challenges elsewhere. Want to give my thanks to Chris Jewell, James Magill, Nigel Clark, and Nicola Richardson for their service to Genesis over the years. The need for a refresh around the executive table gave me the opportunity to promote three of our talented staff, and as a fortunate result, the exec became gender-balanced. Pauline Martin, here in the front row, is our Chief Trading Officer. Rebecca Larking, who can't be with us today, is our Chief Operations Officer. Peter Kennedy here in the front row too, is our Chief Digital Officer. We also welcome James Spence to become our Chief Financial Officer, who moved across from Australia.
It will be up to my successor, Malcolm, to replace Nicola Richardson with a Chief People Officer. I'm delighted with the energy and vision I see in this new team and a new chief executive at the helm. I shall watch with interest where they take Genesis from here. Earlier this year, I announced my decision to step down as chief executive. It's been a privilege to lead Genesis over the last six years. I'm very proud of what we've achieved.
We're a different company now with the sustainability at the core of what we do, and our people are highly engaged, and our growing customer numbers show that our approach to it is resonating with New Zealanders. Throughout my time, I've been impressed by the way our people have accepted the challenges that Genesis faces and the attitude, commitment, and innovation shown on a daily basis in finding solutions that work for the country, our customers, and the company. The progress we have made and the path the business is on as a result of that. It has been a collective effort, and I'm sincerely grateful for the support of our people, board members, shareholders, business partners, and fellow executive team members throughout my time.
To me, empowering New Zealand's sustainable future also means not sugarcoating the challenges that New Zealand faces as the electricity system becomes even more renewable and electricity plays a key role in decarbonizing energy more broadly. The physical realities of generation that depends on the weather cannot be ignored, and the future can't be designed on technologies that either don't exist yet or where the costs are so high they just aren't viable. I feel strongly that New Zealand has one of the best opportunities in the world to decarbonize its energy systems cost effectively and reliably with renewable electricity. The risks of stumbling along the way are high if some of the physical and economic realities aren't acknowledged.
For my part, alongside many others in the sector, I've done my bit to communicate these loud and clear, and it'll be up to others to map out the pathway to a low carbon future for New Zealand. I know Genesis will continue to play an active and important role in that going forward. Thank you for your support over the years, and I'll now hand back to Barbara to introduce you to our next CEO. Kia ora.
Thank you, Marc England. We all appreciate all you've achieved for Genesis during your time and the good heart in which you leave the business. As you will have heard, we've appointed Malcolm Johns as our new Chief Executive. He will start with us in mid-March next year after finishing up as the Chief Executive of Christchurch International Airport. Malcolm brings experience in leading large organizations through transformational change while delivering value for shareholders. He has shown considerable leadership in sustainability, is committed to action on climate change, and has a proven track record in decarbonizing organizations. Malcolm has been the Chief Executive of Christchurch Airport since January 2014. He has previously been Chief Executive of InterCity Group and has held several governance roles within New Zealand's transport and tourism sectors.
He is a founding signatory of the Climate Leaders Coalition Steering Group and chair of the APEC Business Advisory Council Climate Leadership for Businesses task force. Malcolm is a graduate of the University of Waikato and Northwestern University. He has completed executive leadership programs at the University of Cambridge and The Wharton School. We very much look forward to welcoming Malcolm to our team. He will be well-supported by an executive with many decades of experience in the energy sector in New Zealand and internationally. We now have an opportunity to take questions on the company's financial statements and reports for the year ended 30 June 2022 and on the company's performance and management. Questions from the floor are now open. Please indicate by raising your hand if you have a question.
Please also remember that this meeting is being webcast, so you need to be heard by a remote audience. Please wait for the microphone to be passed to you before speaking. Those shareholders attending online today may also submit questions, and I will address those after we have addressed the questions from the floor. Before asking your question, please state your name and if you are a shareholder or a proxyholder or a shareholder representative. Are there any questions from the floor? One here. Thanks .
Muhammad Naqi, shareholder, longtime shareholder. You showed that you donated NZD 130,000 donations to different people, maybe. I've got no objection for donating to needy people at all, no objection whatsoever. Could you tell me on what basis did you see that who was in need? Was it schools? Was it a rest home, or who was it? How did you base that on?
Thank you. Thank you for the question. Tracey is actually well-versed in this, so we'll hand over to Tracey to answer. Thank you.
Thank you. We partner with some budget agencies and use through their expertise certain criteria to identify aspects of vulnerability. That may be on the basis of financial hardship or age or disability. That is assessed by us, by agencies who specialize in that sort of work.
What you call it where there's some category of the price available for. Yeah. Well, can you give a couple of examples?
For those of you online, we're just being asked to provide a couple of examples.
Give it in, like
No. We identify customers who sometimes suffer short-term hardship. Examples of that can be through health reasons, through loss of jobs, through family situations where for a short amount of time they struggle to pay their bills. A number of those customers have very much appreciated the support from Genesis and other customers just to help them through those tough times, get them back on board, and then they're back into paying as per normal.
Tracey, if I can add also, our Power Shout program, many of our customers donated hours to vulnerable customers, and that was matched by the business. Our customers have become involved in this process as well, which I think is great to see. Thank you. Any other questions from the floor? If there are no other questions from the floor, are there any questions online? Paul Gellard will read these for us.
Right. A question from Oliver and Hildegard Crollmann: Would you consider offering sustainably sourced or carbon neutral LPG?
Marc, do you want to take this?
I feel a bit remiss. Is my microphone on? Yeah. I feel a bit remiss we didn't introduce Cam, who is stepping in behind Tracey to run the retail business, and previously he used to run our LPG business. Cam, for a while, Cam Jardine was Chair of the LPG Association, and that association has been working for a couple of years now with the wider gas industry to look at biofuels as alternatives to the existing carbon emitting gas and LPG. It's not yet flowing through the pipes or being pumped through bottles to people's homes, but there is a possibility in the future that New Zealand can supply a more sustainable type of gas. Genesis would consider that.
That'll be for others to decide, and the cost-effectiveness of that will obviously be a factor as well as the carbon intensity of it. So yes, simple answer.
Thanks, Marc. Any other questions online, Paul?
Another question from Oliver and Hildegard Crollmann. How do you recover the cost of the discounted EV charging that the EVerywhere program provides? Who subsidizes this?
Well, from my experience, there's certainly a range of costs in the market and prices in the market for charging EVs, but Marc, you will have more detail.
Yeah. I would say it's an introductory offer, the EVerywhere product, at this stage. It is a pretty good deal if you have an EV, and we're trying to encourage more customers onto EVs and position Genesis as leading with EV charging. But when we offer a discount overnight, be aware that the wholesale price of electricity overnight is much lower than the wholesale price of electricity during the day. If customers who have EVs shift their consumption to 9:00 P.M. till 7:00 A.M., that reduces the cost Genesis incurs in providing that, and therefore we can also pass some of that through. We're increasingly gonna see in New Zealand, we're advocating for this network cost differentials too, where the networks start to reduce the cost during low demand periods.
The more we can encourage demand to be shifted to those low demand periods, the more cost effective it is, and that's what partly allows us to offer the discount.
Thank you, Marc. I'm being told that there are no more questions online, so thank you very much for your questions. We will continue with the business parts of this meeting. I now move to the formal part of the meeting. This year we have five resolutions on which to vote. For those present, if you do not have a pen or a voting paper and would like one, please raise your hand and our Computershare representatives will help you. For those online, you may cast your votes. Sorry, there's one person over here who'd like some assistance. One there. For those online, you may cast your votes through the Computershare platform under the Vote tab. Once voting has opened, the resolutions will allow votes to be submitted. To vote, simply select your voting direction from the options shown on the screen.
You can vote for all resolutions at once or by each resolution. Your vote has been cast when the tick appears. To change your vote, simply select Change Your Vote. You may change your vote until the time I declare voting closed. I now declare voting open on all items of business. The resolutions will now be open in the Vote tab. Please submit your votes at any time. I will give you a warning before I move to close voting. You will be able to raise questions before I formally put each resolution forward for voting. Those present in person, please raise your hand and a microphone will be brought to you if you wish to speak to a resolution. Resolution one proposes that Tim Miles, who is eligible for re-election, be re-elected as a director of the company.
The board has confirmed that Tim is standing as an independent director. The board recommends Tim to you as a director of Genesis Energy Limited and unanimously supports his re-election. As noted earlier, Tim can't be with us today. He's asked me to read out this message on his behalf. This is Tim's message, which will be read in my voice. Kia ora koutou. I'm sorry to be indisposed and therefore unable to be with you in person, and thank the Chair for presenting this on my behalf. It has been my privilege to represent shareholders over the past six years as a director and a member of the Nominations Committee, and from this year, Chair of the HR and Rem Committee. I enjoy working with the other directors and members of the Genesis team.
During that time, your company has made real progress in its financial performance and has shown significant aspiration in its goals to contribute towards a better Aotearoa New Zealand. My background in technology and customer-focused organizations leads me to have a special interest in those areas at Genesis. The Genesis team have developed our customer franchise and proposition and are making innovative use of technology. This is undoubtedly supporting our results. As always, we have only partly realized the total opportunity, and there is much more that can be done to create shareholder value and a better society. I would be very grateful for your support in continuing this work on your behalf. Is there any discussion on this resolution? There appears to be no discussion. I now put to the vote the ordinary resolution that Tim Miles be re-elected as a director of the company.
We will give you a moment to mark your voting form or vote via Computershare portal in relation to this resolution. Resolution 2 proposes that Paul Zealand, who is eligible for re-election, be re-elected as a director of the company. The Board has confirmed that Paul is standing as an independent director. The Board recommends Paul to you as a director of Genesis Energy Limited and unanimously supports his re-election. I now invite Paul to address the meeting.
Tena koutou katoa. Ko Paul Zealand ahau. It's been my privilege to serve your company with an extremely talented and hardworking management team and board over the last six years. I'm now one of the longest-serving members. During this time, we've delivered a significant increase in shareholder and company performance, and I'm proud to have been a very small part in helping that to happen. My enthusiasm for Genesis is rooted in it having a critical role in the transition of the New Zealand energy system to deliver more renewable energy on the path to net zero carbon. We are stewards of the Huntly Power Station, which is supplied with gas from Kupe and both imported and local coal.
The careful management of these assets to deliver more reliable and cost-effective power to enable a more renewable energy to be brought onto the system is being successfully managed, both from an operational and a societal point of view. I bring to your board a career-long experience in the management of critical energy assets, and I'm passionate about keeping our people and our customers safe in the delivery of energy. I've been a professional director for the last six years, and all of the companies I'm involved in are participating in that energy transition. This enables me to bring a more diverse perspective and an ever-involving governance expertise into the decisions we face as Genesis. I hope you will vote in favor of me continuing as a director of your company. Thank you.
Thank you, Paul. Is there any discussion on this resolution? There appears to be no discussion, so I now put to the vote the ordinary resolution that Paul Zealand be re-elected as a director of the company. We will give you a moment to mark your voting form or vote via the Computershare portal in relation to this resolution. Resolution three proposes that Catherine Drayton, who is eligible for re-election, be re-elected as a director of the company. The Board has confirmed that Catherine is standing as an independent director. The Board recommends Catherine to you as a director of Genesis Energy Limited and unanimously supports her re-election. I now invite Catherine to address the meeting.
Tēnā koutou, tēnā koutou, tēnā koutou katoa. Hello, I'm Catherine Drayton, and I've been a director for Genesis Energy from March 2019, and I currently chair the Audit and Risk Committee, which is a lot more exciting than it sounds. My background is in finance and mergers and acquisition. In all my governance roles, my primary focus is on the interplay of value creation, value preservation, and risk and uncertainty. Genesis' uniquely broad portfolio of fuel sources, and this portfolio continues to create shareholder value for all shareholders, including or stakeholders, including shareholders, customers, and employees. I'm asking you to support my reappointment to this board.
Thank you very much. Cheers.
Thank you, Catherine. Is there any discussion on this resolution? There appears to be no discussion, so I put to the vote the ordinary resolution that Catherine Drayton be re-elected as a director of the company. We will give you a moment to mark your voting form or vote via Computershare portal in relation to this resolution. Resolution four proposes that Hinerangi Raumati-Tu'ua, who is eligible for re-election, be re-elected as a director of the company. The board has confirmed that Hinerangi is standing as an independent director. The board recommends Hinerangi to you as a director of Genesis Energy Limited and unanimously supports her election. I now invite Hinerangi to address the meeting.
Greetings to everyone who is here today, to our shareholders, to our executive team, and to our stakeholders and the board. I have acknowledged the kaitiaki of this whenua, and acknowledge also those who have passed. My name is Hinerangi Raumati-Tu'ua, and my iwi are Ngāti Mutunga, which is North Taranaki and Waikato. Thank you very much, Barbara, for your welcome today. It's a real privilege to be here, and to be in your presence and asking for you to vote for my re-election. I have had the pleasure of being part of the board now for six months and have greatly enjoyed getting to know our team. I am a Fellow of Chartered Accountants Australia and New Zealand and have been a member now for 25 years.
I am member of the Audit and Risk Committee for Genesis. I have more than 20 years of governance experience alongside an executive career which has been mostly financially based. While I have been a governor in a range of sectors, the core theme of my governance career has been in post-settlement entities in the commercial space for iwi. Working hard to rebuild the balance sheets of iwi for the betterment of their members and for New Zealand at large.
I have a deep interest in sustainability in its broadest sense and bring with that interest a very strong Māori worldview, and believe that in corporate New Zealand, there is a real opportunity for us to continue to build on the sustainability work that we do, but bring with it the uniqueness of our position here in Aotearoa, New Zealand. I believe that value can be created for shareholders and our wider communities with the incorporation of a Māori worldview in those economic and commercial activities. I grew up in the Waikato, and so Huntly Power Station has been very much a part of my landscape, in Ngāruawāhia. I really look forward to being able to contribute to its transformation and the future of power generation for New Zealand in a sustainable way.
Thank you very much for the opportunity to contribute to Genesis and I look forward to continuing to participate. Kia ora koutou.
Thank you, Hinerangi. Is there any discussion on this resolution? There appears to be no discussion. I now put to the vote the ordinary resolution that Hinerangi Raumati-Tu'ua be elected as a director of the company. We will give you a moment to mark your voting form or vote via the Computershare portal in relation to this resolution. Resolution five proposes that Warwick Hunt, who is eligible for election, be elected as a director of the company. The board has confirmed that Warwick is standing as an independent director. The board recommends Warwick to you as a director of Genesis Energy Limited and unanimously supports his election. I now invite Warwick to address the meeting.
I'm Warwick Hunt. I'm delighted to speak to my candidacy for election as a director. Now, as the chair indicated earlier, I've been privileged to serve in a number of professional service leadership capacities. For seven years here as Chief Executive of PwC in New Zealand, and then beyond that time in the Middle East, in the U.K., and then across Europe, Middle East, and Africa. That's been at a particularly interesting time in the history of the world.
If I summed up that experience in a few short observations, it would be around the impact of disruption and the genuine learnings, and the humbling learnings on occasions that I've personally been through in that journey. Whether it was with the impact of the Arab Spring or beyond that, the impact on financial markets of Great Britain's decision to actually exit the European Union, the pandemic, and then most recently, Russia's invasion of Ukraine. All very, very valuable learning experiences in terms of a broader career. In addition to that, I've been privileged to service some of the largest organizations in the world. Organizations that have adjacencies too, and can be compared to parts of the business of Genesis Energy.
Oil and gas majors, where you see the workings of the wholesale market on an international basis that Marc described a little bit earlier very clearly. Major banks like Commonwealth Bank of Australia, and also Lloyds Bank, where you see the dimensions, the opportunities and also the challenges of dealing with substantial retail businesses. Actually in aviation, an organization like Emirates, which has a capital intensity, but at the same time, retail, opportunities and challenges, and also optionality in their business model that is actually very analogous to certain of the elements of Genesis. Now, we've elected as a family to be returning to New Zealand. As a part of that, we're determined to make a contribution to the country.
In doing that, I am very, very committed to attempting to service an organization like Genesis. If you see fit to vote for me as a director, I can commit to you that I will serve as a diligent and collaborative member of the board. I will work to both support and also provide a searching experience to our executive in your interest as shareholders. Most of all, I'll be guided in what actually drives shareholder value. With that, I'd be very grateful if you would vote for me, please. Thank you very much indeed.
Thank you, Warwick. Is there any discussion on this resolution? There appears to be no discussion. I now put to the vote the ordinary resolution that Warwick Hunt be elected as a director of the company. We will give you a moment to mark your voting form or vote via the Computershare portal in relation to this resolution. Ladies and gentlemen, this concludes our discussion on the items of business. In a minute, I will close the voting system. Please ensure that you have cast your vote on all resolutions. I will now pause to allow you time to finalize those votes. Thank you. Voting is now closed. Thank you all for casting your votes. Your votes will now be collected by Computershare, and the full results of the voting will be announced to the market this afternoon.
This next slide, which is for your information, is a summary of the proxies received by the company before voting closed. Is that slide coming up, Paul?
Sorry.
Not coming? Okay. Apologize, that slide which shows all the proxies and the votes is not coming. Shareholders now have an opportunity to raise any items of general business that may lawfully be put to the meeting. Those online may use the Computershare site to do this. Select the Q&A tab, type the item you wish to raise into the box at the bottom of the screen, and press Send. Those present, please raise your hand and the microphone will be brought to you. Thank you. It doesn't look like. Oh, excuse me, there was one question.
I'm Armand, a shareholder. If no one is talking, well, I take the opportunity. Yeah, this is in reference to the venue of this meeting. Now, you've got excellent locations, Ellerslie Events Centre, Alexandra Park, and Eden Park. Now, you chose the most difficult one to get here. I bet a lot of them present here will agree with that, you know, you have to park your car somewhere else, take a train, take a bus to get here. Is there any way in future you could arrange a bit better venue?
Thank you for that comment. For those who didn't hear, the question is in relation to this as a venue for our ASM and how difficult it is to get to. I do apologize if you had difficulty. We actually thought about this venue as being a transport hub, and that it might make things easier for shareholders to get here. Obviously, that hasn't been the case. We also weren't able to get our alternative venue that we normally use at Eden Park for the days that we required it. We'll take that away. Thank you for raising that, and we'll consider where a better place might be to go for next year. Thank you for bringing that to our attention. Are there any other questions? Nothing online, Paul?
No.
Oh, there's one over here. Thank you.
My name is Robert Gray, Shareholder. You have very few people here today, and one of the reasons is a number of AGMs are on at the same time this morning. It is always well attended because of the food they put on. You know, Barramundi is one of Fisher Funds' companies. I think that's, you know. There's a lot of regular people who come to these meetings are not here today. They'll be out there. Being on, say, in the afternoon or something like that or a different day. This is the only morning that any meetings are on at all. I mean, on a different day, I'm sure that, you know, more people would have been here.
Thank you, Mr. Gray. We don't get visibility of when other people's ASMs are on, so we do our best endeavors to have it at a time when it suits people. We're very conscious once we found out that Barramundi was on today, and there are a lot of crossholders of shareholders, obviously. Thank you for raising that. We'll try and make sure that we give ourselves some clear air, but without really understanding other people's schedules at the time we put out our notice of meeting, that's quite difficult to sometimes accommodate anything other than overlaps. I acknowledge your point. Paul, do we get advanced information?
Sorry.
Do we get advanced information?
No.
Okay.
Hi. Derek Tan, Shareholder. I might have missed it earlier on. Was there mention of the outlook or forecast for 2023, please?
The financial forecast?
Yes.
Yes, there was. We've upgraded our financial forecast this morning to around NZD 500 million EBITDA. That's an upgrade of about NZD 50 million based on our first quarter performance and what we're seeing going forward. But that, of course, is subject to normal hydrology, any cost, material cost issues that we may face and other factors that may come along during the year. Are there any other questions? Thank you. I don't think I can see any more questions. To wrap this up, this is my fourth year leading the board as chair. I thank my colleagues on the board for their support and the support and hard work of Marc England and his executive team. I'm proud to lead an organization committed to a more sustainable future for New Zealand.
We have built strong foundations for growth, and I look forward to continuing the good work for you, our shareholders, and for our customers and our wider stakeholders. Thank you, everyone, for joining us here today. This concludes our 2022 annual shareholder meeting. Thank you very much.