Good afternoon, everyone. Welcome to Emera's 2024 Investor Day. I'm Dave Bezanson, Vice President of Investor Relations, and I'm happy to see so many of you joining us here in the room and on the live webcast. Before we get started, a couple of housekeeping items. For those in the room, please take a minute and place your cell phones on silent. Also, washrooms are located out the main entrance and to the left, following the signs. In the unlikely event of an emergency, please remain calm and follow instructions of staff who will be identified with armbands and hard hats. Exit the venue through the corridor in the main entrance or through the exit on the right of the stage. Staff will direct you to the stairwells to await further instruction from building security.
During our Q&A session, for questions in the room, we ask that you please use the mics provided in order to ensure all participants can hear your questions. For those on the webcast, you can enter your questions at any time during the presentation. Select the messaging tab on the left of your screen and enter your question into the text box provided. We will do our best to answer all questions received, but if we run out of time, please follow up with me or any of the Investor Relations team, and we will be more than happy to help you. The recording and transcript of today's events will be available shortly after today's presentation on the Investor Relations section of our website. Turning to slide two, I'd like to make note of our safe harbor related to forward-looking information and non-GAAP measures.
Today's discussion will include forward-looking information, which is subject to the cautionary statement contained in the supporting slide. Today's discussion and presentation will also include references to non-GAAP financial measures. Please refer to our most recent MD&A for definitional information and reconciliations of historical non-GAAP measures to the closest GAAP financial measure. Before we begin today's proceedings, we acknowledge that the land we are meeting on is the traditional territory of many nations, including the Mississaugas of the Credit, the Anishinabek, the Chippewa, the Haudenosaunee, and the Wendat peoples, and is now home to more diverse First Nations, Inuit, and Métis people. We also acknowledge that Toronto is covered by Treaty 13 signed with the Mississaugas of the Credit. At Emera, we focus on building strong, mutually beneficial partnerships with Indigenous communities wherever we operate.
For example, Nova Scotia Power recently announced a Canadian-first and equity partnership with the WMA, the Economic Development Agency representing all 13 Mi'kmaq communities in Nova Scotia, allowing all to own an equity stake in a new grid-scale battery project. Turning to the agenda, before we get into today's presentations, we will start with a few introductory remarks from Scott Balfour, our President and CEO, and a briefing on the results of the Tampa rate case hearing that was held yesterday from Archie Collins, President and CEO of Tampa Electric. We will follow that with two presentations before the first Q&A, followed by a short break. Following the break, we will have another panel outlining the growth potential, which will be followed by Greg's presentation detailing our financial outlook and five-year capital plan. At the end of Greg's remarks, we will hold our final Q&A session.
Once we have answered all of your questions, Scott will wrap up the day with his closing remarks. Before I turn things over to Scott to kick us off, we have a short video that showcases more about Emera and who we are.
In a world where energy sparks innovation, we're at the center of an unprecedented transformation. Every day, everywhere, people rely on electricity and natural gas to power their homes and offices, ignite new solutions, and light the path from today to tomorrow. At Emera, we're here to ensure our operating companies have the resources they need to deliver this energy safely, reliably, and sustainably to customers everywhere we operate. This takes planning, investment, and discipline. And by staying focused on customers, we're delivering long-term value to shareholders. Demand for energy is growing quickly. We're committed to meeting this demand and delivering reliable energy customers can depend on. We're modernizing our systems and integrating smart technologies. We're investing even more in managing vegetation and upgrading equipment to better withstand increasingly severe weather conditions. And we're enhancing our pipeline systems to keep natural gas flowing at all times.
New technologies like large-scale battery storage support reliability while also enabling more renewables. This helps reduce emissions and exposure to volatile fuel costs. Natural gas fired generation across our utilities is building resilience and providing a reliable, fast-acting backup source of energy alongside renewables. We're integrating smart grid technology to give customers more control over their energy use as we build the digital grid of the future. And we do all of this while working to minimize the impact on costs for customers. We support those in need through financial assistance programs and efficiency upgrades to help conserve energy and reduce costs. Across our operations, we're committed to respecting and protecting the environment in everything we do. As we manage evolving risks, we make sure the safety of our teams and communities always comes first. We know our people are our greatest asset.
We work hard to be an employer of choice, providing competitive rewards and opportunities to grow. We care about our communities, and we're proud to give back through our community investment programs and the strong spirit of volunteerism that unites our teams. All of this forms the foundation of who we are. We're looking ahead and working together to shape a bright energy future, one that's resilient, sustainable, and rooted in care for customers, communities, and the environment. After all, it's energy that will drive growth, power innovation, and redefine what's possible. Together, we're energizing modern life.
And so for those of you that were at a certain breakfast this morning, did you see how careful I was stepping up onto stage? Inside joke. So sincerely, thank you all for being here today. It's wonderful to see so many familiar faces, a few new ones as well. I know this is a really busy time of year, and weather, of course, is not terrific scheduling for this year's Investor Day, as you would have had a sense of from yesterday, really looking to schedule it after the decision from the Florida Public Service Commission yesterday, which is why we've pushed the timing of our Investor Day today, which means the last time we were together, last time we had Investor Day was the spring of 2023. And looking back, it really does almost feel like a lifetime ago.
So much has changed in the past year and a half, has been transformative within the industry, but also for our business. And we are truly navigating what is a pivotal time for the energy sector, driven by economic, demographic, political, technological, and environmental trends within the industry. And electric and gas utilities alike, and like ours, are really at the forefront of a lot of this transformation. As you've heard Gregg and I say many times, we have a portfolio of premium assets in high-quality, high-growth jurisdictions with a thoughtful approach to risk, a robust capital investment strategy, and profile that, of course, you hear a little bit more about from Gregg later. And I think really Emera is uniquely positioned to be able to capitalize on these trends.
So before we dive into our discussion, I want to highlight some of the strategic moves that we made in 2024. I know, very familiar to many of you, but they really have been important milestones for us as part of our ambitious plan to drive growth, enhance shareholder value. Of course, earlier in the year and as the year progressed, we successfully executed our plan to strategically reallocate capital into our highest growth markets that included divesting of our interest in the Labrador Island Link and, of course, reaching an agreement to sell New Mexico Gas Company. We adjusted our dividend growth rate to provide us with more flexibility in terms of financing the robust capital profile that we've got in front of us, but also while continuing to deliver on our promise of growing dividends for our investors.
We introduced for the very first time earnings per share growth over a three-year period, an earnings per share growth profile on average of 5% to 7% over the next three years. We worked with both levels of government, federal and provincial, in Nova Scotia to securitize more than CAD 600 million of under-recovered fuel costs, deferred fuel costs at Nova Scotia Power, which is great news for customers. It decreases the rate impact from the recovery of those costs from customers, but also has a very positive impact for the business, reducing debt at Nova Scotia Power and in turn Emera and obviously helping with credit metrics and improving the financial strength of the company. January 1st of 2024 implemented new rates at Peoples Gas, and then October 1st of 2024 implemented new rates at New Mexico Gas.
And of course, just yesterday, as Dave mentioned, a decision from the Florida Public Service Commission supporting and voting to approve Tampa Electric's new revenue requirements in line with essentially 100% of the capital profile that Tampa Electric had put forward with a midpoint ROE for rate-making purposes of 10.5%. And Archie will join me in a few minutes and we'll talk our way through some of that and look forward to that discussion. So all told, we really have accomplished a lot this year. We had an ambitious plan and pleased that we've been able to execute solidly on all of it, all with a view to actions to confidently execute and deliver on growth for the company and execute on our growth plan.
We have immense confidence on the plan that's in front of us, on the plan for growth, delivering value for customers, delivering value for our shareholders, and immense confidence in how the business is now set up to be able to deliver on that sustainable ongoing growth and value creation for both customers and investors, which is what brings us to today. Over the next few hours, we're looking to provide you with a little more color in how we work for our customers and shareholders, like how we're evolving the grid to meet changing dynamics and customer demands, taking a look at the growth drivers specifically within each of our utilities, and of course, outlining our capital and funding plans, which Greg will walk you through.
I'm confident that through this, that you will similarly see that we are on a very good path and that the opportunity in front of Emera is as good as it gets in our sector. What you'll hear today is that utilities are more important than ever in this pivotal time of change across the economy and with the demand for electricity and natural gas both surging. And within that, I believe Emera is very well positioned to meet this moment. Our portfolio anchored by strong, well-run utilities in some of the most attractive jurisdictions in North America. And after a significant year of change, our balance sheet is positioned to support the investments needed to seize the growth opportunities ahead.
We're actively modernizing and enhancing our infrastructure across our utilities to fulfill and meet reliability expectations and our own reliability goals for our customers, but also our long-term responsibility to deliver value for our shareholders. And we'll talk more about what all of that looks like in a few minutes. One of the things I'm often asked is what makes Emera unique. And today, we're going to try and showcase a little bit of that, showing our strengths and demonstrating why we're a company of choice within our sector. And of course, a key part of our success comes from the team, comes from the leaders that I'm privileged to lead and work with, an extraordinarily talented team of people that are committed to the mission of delivering for our customers and delivering for our investors.
You're going to meet, of course, a number of those today, many of them familiar, some that you'll be meeting for the first time. Now, this year's Investor Day, we're going to take a slightly different approach. We're not going to stand up here with sort of one-on-one PowerPoint presentations. We're going to instead share and dig into some of the details within our operating companies, but focus on some of the strategic themes that are happening across the sector and that are supporting the growth proposition that we've got in front of us. We'll discuss how those themes play out within each of our operating companies and how they are creating and driving growth and creating value.
And then you'll hear about some of the innovations that are happening and the investments that we're making in grid modernization to stay ahead of the curve, to meet the explosion in demand that we're seeing, to leverage cutting-edge technology and utilizing our existing infrastructure to maximum advantage and to ensure that we continue to deliver reliable outcomes for customers in this changing dynamic. We'll, of course, talk about the strength of our financial position and how that framework and balance sheet is now positioned in order to support and drive the strategic investments that we have in front of us and in that drive growth. And our hope is, my hope is that at the end of the day, that you'll leave with a better understanding of what makes Emera unique, maybe a little bit special.
You'll see that we've got individual operations with distinct operating realities, but where everyone across Emera is working to a single strategy and rowing in the same direction in order to, of course, deliver for our customers and deliver value for our shareholders. It is really an exciting time in this sector for the industry, for the business, but I'm also excited about the future that's in front of us. So with that, before we start with our first session, because of the news of yesterday, I'll ask Archie Collins to come to join me on stage and talk through a little bit of an overview of the recent decision from the FPSC yesterday. Archie.
Testing one, two, three. Good afternoon. Great to see everybody. If I could, Scott, maybe before I just kind of jump into what I see up on the screens here that sort of are the nuts and bolts of yesterday's decision, I just wanted to maybe start by acknowledging a couple of truths. The first truth is I'm grateful that the process is over. I mean, a rate case is a heavy, heavy lift, not just for the team that I'm privileged to work with, but for the commission staff, for the commissioners, for all of those who have standing in our case.
And I just want to say a big thank you to everyone who is involved, and especially the team of employees at Tampa Electric, who just worked so tirelessly over the last year to achieve this outcome, which we consider to be very fair and very balanced. Secondly, let's be honest about this. We take no pleasure in seeking a rate increase, but we have an obligation, obviously, to thoughtfully invest capital to keep up with the outsized pace of growth that we're enjoying in West Central Florida. And we have a duty to innovate and to look forward and to prepare for a different tomorrow as we work through the energy transition. And all of that requires us to thoughtfully and prudently deploy capital to create better outcomes. And shareholders have a right to earn a return on that investment.
And so, as a result, while rate cases are uncomfortable, they are necessary. I will say, as we reflect on the decision that was rendered yesterday, we really feel it is a reflection of the confidence that the Florida Public Service Commission has in the way that we run our business. We aim to run our business in a manner that prioritizes customer value creation. And I think what the decision yesterday tells us is that the commissioners see that in how we run the business. They have a confidence in what we're doing and how we're investing, and therefore they saw fit to render the decision yesterday. I'd also say that yesterday's decision is a reflection of the overall rationale and the need that underpinned our need to increase rates. It's a testament to the strength of the business cases that constituted our overall ask.
It's a testament to the credibility and the preparation and the believability and trustworthiness of all of the witnesses that we brought to bear in this case, and as I've already said, it's a testament to just the day-to-day operating results we deliver as a company, which together all combined to result in the decision that was rendered yesterday, so what was the decision, and Scott, you certainly covered some of the highlights. The high points of it certainly would be that the commission awarded a 10.5% ROE, which would be up from the 10.2% ROE that's in place today. They maintained the 54% equity thickness that we have been operating with for the last number of years.
They approved virtually 100% of the capital additions that we were seeking to include in rate base with one small exception, which I will speak to: approval of the subsequent year adjustment in 2026. For the most part, they elected to walk by the subsequent year adjustment that we requested in 2027, again with one small exception. It wasn't that the commissioners or the commission staff felt that those projects were unnecessary or imprudent. They simply felt that when you get that far out the curve, there's a bit of clearly incremental risk associated with project execution, and their feedback to us was, as you undertake these projects in due course, simply bring them in a future rate proceeding and request recovery, and they felt that was a better way than simply awarding subsequent year adjustment after subsequent year adjustment.
If you take everything that happened yesterday and if you normalize, sort of you adjust the decision on an ROE basis, so if you take into account the 100 basis point differential between the 11.5% ROE we requested, the 10.5% ROE we were granted, effectively what we've received here is new revenues in 2025 that are 81% of our request and in 2026, 87% of our request. Over the two years, it's 83% of the total request that we had made, so clearly a strong outcome, and again, from my perspective, just evidence of the commissioners' feeling that it was a compelling, convincing thesis and really attribute to the team at Tampa Electric that put it all together.
Yeah, I think so. Thank you for unpacking that, Archie, and I agree with you, and I think one of the things it's easy to underestimate within our sector is how much work goes into the process of the regulatory process in seeking new rates, and not something that, as you say, you do lightly. It's not something you take pleasure in, but an obligation to invest on behalf of customers and to ensure there's an appropriate rate of return. I thought you said all that really nicely. One of the things that is a bit unique about this, though, is often the sort of revenues beyond the test year, that sort of subsequent year, those things usually happen through settlements.
Whereas you took a unique approach somewhat this time in saying there's some capital that's already in flight as part of the test year and sought subsequent year rates to reflect that capital that was in flight during the test year. So I thought that was unique. And it's nice to see that the commission agreed that that was appropriate, those investments, obviously appropriate, but also that because of the in-flight nature of that capital, that a subsequent year rate adjustment was also appropriate. So I thought that was very positive.
Agreed, and I think I'm safe to say that was unprecedented. I think that is the first time in the history of the Florida Public Service Commission that they have granted a subsequent year adjustment through a fully litigated rate case, so we are pleased, as you just said, that they saw the merits in the investments that we're making and saw fit to grant the 2026 subsequent year adjustment.
Perfect. So with that, thank you. I know we'll hear a little bit more about that from Greg in the financial update. But with that, I'll invite Helen Wesley and Chris Smith to the stage. Helen is president of Peoples Gas and Chris Smith is executive vice president of finance, sorry, Chris, at Nova Scotia Power. Peter Gregg, I will say, really wanted to be here. We're blessed to have Chris join us. Peter is celebrating his 25th wedding anniversary. So when we adjusted the date of this session, Peter is enjoying his time in Vienna at the moment, or it might be Budapest, but so we miss him, but thankful, Chris, that you were able to join us. So as I said, we're going to do things a little bit differently with this meeting. And rather than sort of podium-type speeches, it's a bit more of a panel conversation.
And with this first panel, really looking to get into a little bit about what I was saying, some of the part about Emera that's a bit unique, perhaps, in terms of how we're set up, the Emera way, if you will. And I'd say at Emera, I think our approach to strategy, to governance, to structure is a little bit different. And we're not a traditional holding company that sort of buys and holds assets. But we're also not a single homogenized company where decisions are centralized at the core. Instead, we're a bit more of a dynamic ecosystem of companies where we have a shared vision and unified by that, but we're also empowered as it relates to operational autonomy.
And think of it in the context of one strategy and one team, but not one size fits all, sort of allowing operating companies to leverage the group-wide experience and capabilities, but also maintaining operational independence and agility to innovate in order to meet customer needs and community needs more locally. So in that way, we look to create incremental value through intentional collaboration. We look to be a catalyst, centralizing specialized expertise, providing comprehensive oversight, some governance discipline, creating platforms like a strategic council where we can collect and utilize strategic insights, but turn that into competitive advantage across our operations. And so in that sense, we don't really just own companies. We look to try and cultivate an environment where knowledge flows, where best practices are shared, and where each of our operating companies can amplify their own potential through this interconnected network.
And I'd say that happens across all of our operating companies. Certainly our utilities, Chris, Helen, and Archie here representing our three largest operating businesses, but also at Emera Energy. And Judy Steele, I know, is here and is familiar to many of you. But Emera Energy is our marketing and trading business. And this business is, of course, different than our core utilities, but it does help contribute to Emera's success beyond just its financial contributions. It brings its own unique commercial skills, its own understanding of the market to the table that's been a terrific source of competitive experience and also commercial talent that's been utilized across the operation over the years. So again, another example of how we try and share some of that talent, expertise, collaborate, and take the best parts of Emera and make sure that we're sharing that across the organization.
Broadly, I'd say our commitment is clear, and that's to build a framework that empowers the operating companies, our operating companies to excel, helping them to navigate complex challenges, providing strategic guidance, sharing resources, and a broader industry perspective, but preserving each of their own operational distinct DNA. So Chris, within that, as we accelerate our energy transition journey, particularly in Nova Scotia, where it has its own complexity to it, maybe unpack for us a little bit sort of how this collaborative model has helped you, has enabled your company not just to meet some of the challenging requirements that have been in place in terms of transition targets, but in many ways also to exceed them.
Well, thanks, Scott. You're right. I mean, we started the energy transition about 20 years ago at Nova Scotia Power. And it wasn't just Nova Scotia Power working on its own. It was in collaboration with Emera at the time. And we had some significant renewable energy targets to achieve and put in place by government policy. And we were happy to try to lean into how we would accomplish that. And so beginning with our own direct investment in wind infrastructure, 200 megawatts of our own facilities in Nova Scotia, but also combined with independent power producers, we've been able to bring on stream between 2005 and 2015, roughly 600 megawatts of wind, which is a huge percentage of our generation capacity. And all the lessons that go along with integrating that wind into our system.
But at the same time, in that collaboration that we talk about with Emera, who is also seeking other opportunities to invest in the renewable sector, that's when the evolution of the Maritime Link started to take place. And that has now grown into quite a successful asset for Emera, and also Nova Scotia Power is benefiting from that connectivity, if you will, between the two organizations. And as a result, the collective of that, we've been able to increase our renewable energy contribution to our generation or to our generation fleet from roughly 11% in 2005 to over 43% in 2023, and with the potential to increase that to 60% as more energy flows across the Maritime Link from the Muskrat Falls project. And so the interesting learnings that we've had through that collaborative effort have obviously benefited Nova Scotia Power.
We've learned how to integrate all of that wind and those renewable energy resources into our system. And we've been able to share that with Tampa Electric as they've commenced their renewable energy transition, not necessarily with wind, but with solar. And so quite a dynamic program in Florida. But the lessons learned between our organizations by participating together and collaborating together have made some tangible benefits there.
It's not just a one-way street between Nova Scotia Power to Tampa Electric, but also back to Nova Scotia Power because some of the unique things that have happened through the various regulatory processes that Tampa Electric has introduced. We're starting to lean into those types of ideas, particularly around the recovery of the revenue requirement associated with some of those renewable energy projects, which helps with transparency in terms of what customers are actually paying for, but also removes those types of revenue requirements from base rates, which is also something that we're interested in doing. So the collaboration goes back and forth between up and down the East Coast, if you will, between the two entities and with beneficial results for both. You know.
We're happy to, obviously, share all those learnings with Nova Scotia Power. We're grateful for the lessons learned and the best practices that we were able to extract from Nova Scotia Power's forays into wind, largely. You're saying you're at 43% of your energy sales. We're not quite there, Chris. I just want you to know we're not quite at 43%.
That's a very impressive performance.
But we are sitting with, we've got 1,252 megawatts of solar on our grid today. I think it is very safe to say that if not for the work that Nova Scotia Power did a decade ago, Tampa Electric may not be as far along in the clean energy transition as we are. So we're certainly grateful for that. And we're on a path. We're continuing to invest in capital every year. A big part of the rate case decision includes approval for more solar. And we're on a path over the next five years to get up to 2,100 megawatts. So that's a great example of the collaboration, the regulatory mechanisms that are in place in Florida to the extent you're able to lift and shift any of those. Obviously, we'll do everything we can to help with that.
Having said all that, I would just say this collaboration and the sharing of best practices that we're talking about has certainly been helpful on the generation side of the house, on the clean energy transition, but it goes well beyond that. And we've seen it in storm preparation or grid resilience or planning for the grid of the future, which obviously is the next panel which is going to be up on the podium here, sharing safety best practices. There are any number of examples where the utilities have come together to really put their heads together and try to learn from each other and try to collaborate. And the objective of the approach really is to do what we do in a way that the total is greater than the sum of the parts. That's really what the objective of the whole exercise is.
On this whole thing around strategy, one of the things I'm sort of the most proud of when I sort of reflect on how we do what we do is that for us, strategy is not just something that we do and it sits on a shelf and it gathers dust. We, in this company, have a real bias for action. We're very driven to take a strategy and then convert it into all of the activities that will result in better outcomes for our customers. And I think that's something that I think distinguishes us from our drive, our relentless pursuit for value creation, I just think is something that this company, this group of companies does really, really well and which Emera helps to facilitate and ensure that that information is being shared across affiliates.
Great. Helen, as I sort of think about Peoples Gas and think back to until 2016 and before that, Peoples Gas has really gone through its own quite dramatic transformation, actually, in terms of the execution of its strategy, as Peoples Gas was really just part of Tampa Electric and now has been separated out and an amazing growth profile that you and the team have delivered over the last number of years. Maybe share your perspective on that in the context of this sort of collaborative strategic cooperation.
Yeah. I actually think the story of Peoples Gas is a great example of Emera having a vision for something and then providing support and enabling a part of the company to grow and fulfill that vision. And for us, it's not that long ago that Peoples Gas was spending about $100 million a year in capital. And now we are north of $350 million a year. And this year we hit our 500,000th, that's really hard to say, customer, 500,000 customers this year. So significant growth over the last few years. As really what's happened is we've been able to serve the demand for natural gas in Florida from customers. And when I think about how have we been able to do that successfully and part of this conversation we're having, there's a couple of areas for me.
There's an area that relates to governance and systems and processes. And then there's an area that relates to people. And when it comes to governance, we have a local board. And that's similar to other Emera affiliates where the company believes that those utilities are best stewarded by having local constituents. And our board members are representatives of the business and other parts of the community around the state of Florida. So we get really good insights from all over the state. In addition to that, though, when I think about how we've benefited, we have been able to take capital management processes that exist either in Nova Scotia Power or they exist in Tampa Electric and pick them up and put them into Peoples Gas and then leverage them in the way that suits us best. We didn't have to build from scratch.
So when you think about what it takes to build a company rapidly and then make sure that it's sustainable, that it is doing things safely, reliably, managing capital effectively, managing your finances effectively, there's a lot of infrastructure that's needed to do that properly. We've been able to pick up from other parts of the organization and then just fit them as need be. Safety is another example of that. Archie mentioned that. We have a safety council that all of the operating companies participate in. We come to that. We listen, we learn, we contribute, and then we're able to keep growing in a way that I think is accelerated and more efficient than if we had been left to our own devices and just had some capital gifted to us and asked to do what we will with it.
One example I think is really good in that respect is that we share IT systems. And as everybody knows, IT is expensive. And so for a smaller growing company to be able to participate in a larger company's IT systems makes it more cost-efficient. But it also means that we get to ride on the coattails a little bit of organizations that are a little bit more mature. They might be a little bit more advanced in their ability to do something like experiment in generative AI. And as Peoples Gas, we get to watch that. We get to do smaller pilots. We get to experiment, benefit from all the learning without having to make all of that infrastructure investment ourselves.
The last part that, from my perspective, is really valuable in the way Emera does things is just how we manage talent and how we manage people around the organization and the culture that's embedded across the organization, a culture of learning, a culture of sharing, a culture of nobody's saying "not invented here." Everybody wants to understand how do you get the best widget fastest. And there's a network of people around the organization that will pick up the phone and talk with one another about what they've learned and help one another out. And I can't really put a price tag on that, but it shows up every day in how we do what we do.
Yeah, so let me pick up sort of a theme from that last point, Helen, and tying back to the previous conversation around some of this sharing, and not just as it relates to strategy, Archie and Chris were chatting about that, but even into the realm of operational excellence. And I think one of the things that was shared and you made reference to it, Archie, is that the journey for Nova Scotia Power trying to meet legislative requirements around the transformation of its generation mix, but doing that within an economic environment where affordability is a critical challenge. One of the themes that really came from that strategy, something we called Fuel to Assets.
I know some businesses called it fuel to steel, but we referred to it as Fuel to Steel and really recognizing that sort of taking those dollars that were being spent towards fuel and in some cases operating costs of some of these old thermal units and redirecting it in order to come with sort of better customer-focused outcomes, managing that transition in a customer-focused way. And so, Archie, the journey that you've made at Tampa Electric into solar and now more recently, things like the work that's being done at Bayside in terms of upgrading and modernizing those plants through their advanced gas project, of course, the work that's been done at Big Bend, and even some of the work that's being done around the exploration of carbon capture and storage. Maybe give some perspective around how that all fits together for you in terms of the transformation.
Sure. So I said earlier that one of the things that we take pride in is the fact that we have this bias for action. And associated with that is we hold ourselves accountable to outcomes, better outcomes. And so certainly the investments that we have made on the generation side of the ledger have yielded better outcomes for customers. So as we've worked through that fuel to assets transition, as we've invested in solar, as we invested in the modernization of Big Bend, which had the effect of improving the thermal efficiency of that asset by 40%, of the Advanced Gas Path upgrades that you're referring to at our Bayside power station, all of that collectively has resulted in over the past five years, our combined fleet efficiency has improved by more than 20%. Say that differently.
What that really means is all things being equal, customers are paying 20% less on their fuel bill than they otherwise would had we not made these investments. And that's hard, tangible savings for customers. That's real value creation. This year alone, through the things that we have undertaken over the last five years, our fuel bill is in the neighborhood of about $60 million lower than it otherwise would have been if not for these efficiency improvements. So that is clearly something that we take a lot of pride in. We're proud to make the investments, but we're more proud of these outcomes. We see the same thing on ours as we convert fuel to assets, we're not just seeing an improvement in thermal efficiency. We're seeing improvements in our emissions. And you're right.
You said, Scott, that Nova Scotia and Florida are different in that Nova Scotia has a regulatory requirement to decarbonize. We don't have that in Florida. Every investment that we make has to be economically justified. But based upon all of the work that has been done really over the last two decades at Tampa Electric, our emissions, our carbon, our greenhouse gas emissions today are about 56%-57% lower than they were 25 years ago. And that's despite the fact that over that same period of time, the demand for electricity has increased by about 25%. So there's a very positive story that the company is able to tell on as it's worked through the transition, as it's improved its thermal efficiency, as it's driven down the emissions, it's all been done in a way that really hasn't caused a meaningful increase in electricity rates.
And it has largely to do with the pace at which we've undertaken those activities. Our view on things like carbon reduction, Carbon Capture and Storage, which you mentioned, these are activities that we do not because we have a regulatory requirement to do them, but they're activities that we're doing because they are insulating. There are actions we're taking today that we believe are insulating our customers from a bad day tomorrow, a day where there may be a carbon tax or a carbon mandate or something that would compel us to act at a time where it'll be more costly to do so. So we're taking these actions today and customers are benefiting from it. And it's not just on the generation side of the house. We're seeing a similar good story to tell on the wire side.
Over the past five years, the electric reliability of Tampa Electric has improved 31% and is now at or very close to the best in class in the United States when stacked up against our peers. And that's clearly something that the company and the employees involved take a lot of pride in.
And on the operational excellence side of the equation at Nova Scotia Power, we're also very conscious on the affordability lens and also the fact that we are operating units today that are scheduled to retire by 2030. So the dollars that are going into sustaining those, that we can maintain the network that we need and to manage the intermittent wind and other sources of renewables, we need to make sure that we're minimizing or optimizing the capital that's being invested to sustain those assets so we're not burdening customers later on, as Archie just said, beyond 2030 when they're no longer operating the same way they are today. So we're very conscious of that on a daily basis and it goes back into the affordability message that Scott referenced.
I want to pick up, Helen. Earlier you mentioned safety. So I just want to pick up on that theme for a little bit. And no surprise, of course, that safety within our industry. We work in an industry where there's high energy states. There are dangers, of course, in our sector. And so for us, our goal is to be world-class at safety, to be in a place where the work that gets done can be done predictably safe. And these aren't just words on a page. These are things that we all hold ourselves accountable to. And within that, my observation, having spent almost two decades in the construction sector, would be that safety is a bit of a harbinger for good operating performance, for good financial performance. It's a sort of reflection of all of this.
So, Helen, interested as we continue to learn and grow and continue to drive our own focus around safety, some perspective from you in terms of that journey at Peoples Gas, particularly as it relates to those things that we don't directly control with our own forces?
Sure. So I think starting on the basis that safety is our number one priority and what you said in terms of a safe company is a well-run company. At Peoples Gas, one of the most interesting transitions I think we've made over the last few years that really came about as a result of the collaboration across Emera and as a result of the work that we all do, putting our heads together on safety and making sure that we are learning from one another and behaving consistently, is we went through a real transition in how we manage our contractors. And as people are probably aware, in gas LDCs, it's very common to have most of your high-risk work done by contractors. So your contractor workforce is incredibly important. We have half a dozen, let's say, strategic contractors that we have relationships with.
In late 2020, early 2021, Peoples Gas had a contractor safety incident that was very, very severe. In addition, a couple of the other Emera affiliates had some serious contractor safety incidents. And collectively, under Scott's leadership, we sat back and looked at what we were doing with respect to contractors and evaluated whether or not we were looking at safety the right way with respect to that relationship. We had a little bit more of an arm's length relationship than might have felt comfortable at that point. And so under Scott's leadership, we shifted gears pretty significantly, pretty dramatically. And at Peoples Gas, that translated to taking six actions over the course of 2021 to dramatically change the way we worked with contractors. And I won't go through them all, but to suffice it to say, what we effectively did was requalify our strategic contractors.
We had them come in, present to us, take us through their safety credos, their performance management plans, their training, evaluate their philosophy, their culture, et cetera, and then we got into a regular quarterly review with those contractors to make sure that all of that was being upheld. The result of all of that was a lot more sharing of incidents, a lot more learning across that contractor base, a lot more learning across the Emera affiliates because all of the affiliates took a different stance toward contractors, a lot more very sort of humble review of things we did, things our contractors did, all in the spirit of getting to a place where people could go home safely and we avoided those tragic outcomes that nobody wants to be a party to.
So it was very interesting for me because working in this ecosystem of companies where ultimately you want to be aligned around the things that really matter. Scott, as leader and us as the leadership team, took a strong stance on something and changed the way we were doing something. And we did it, per your comment, Archie, we did it with a bias to action. We did it quickly and we just made it happen. And I think our organization saw that as well and said, okay, this is a company that is doing what it says it's going to do. It's doing the right thing. It's standing up for what matters. And that means it needs to matter to us as individuals on the front lines. So that to me is a really good example of it, Scott.
I don't know if the investor audience considers this question, but if I were sitting, I would say, so what? Why does this really matter? And my answer to that would be that all of the things that we do to manage safety effectively are things that there's an analog in how we manage our finances. There's an analog in how we perform from an operational excellence perspective. There's an analog in how we manage talent because at the backbone of all of it is a discipline, a performance mindset, and a consistency of behavior that to me is what a good company does.
Yeah. Also, if I could just kind of, this is a subject I feel really, really strongly about. One of the things that I love about Emera is that, and quite frankly, it's one of the things that has kept me with this company for the last 30 years, is that our commitment to safety is so authentic. It is really rooted in employees. We genuinely, we care deeply about the well-being of our employees. And I just love that. And I know I just said love twice, but it just kind of goes to show how passionately I feel about this subject. And as part of that safety commitment, it is a priority for us to promote leaders who can get the best out of their employees, who can generate followership, earn the trust and respect of their employees, get employees to speak up, to get involved.
And ultimately, those are all of the ingredients that manifest themselves in safety success. But to the point that you're both making, it goes way beyond safety success. Those are the same ingredients that yield business success. And so our commitment to safety, no question, is rooted in a caring for our employees, but there's also a selfish aspect to it as well that we recognize that it yields better results as a company.
Yeah. No, I think nothing I can add to that that wasn't said perfectly well. So.
You could say love again, though.
I could say love again, and I love that you love it, so that's good. Sort of picking up a similar theme, though, around this care for team and employees, of course, one of the other areas that I think is a little bit unique is our approach to leadership development and talent mobility and really trying to be part of that sort of culture, that sort of unique culture and ecosystem that we're talking about, and so, Archie, in your case, you've traversed a number of the operations within Emera, of course, starting in Nova Scotia Power, at some time in Emera Energy during that time when we had, of course, some competitive gas plants in New England, down into the Caribbean, and most recently with Tampa Electric.
So just interested in your perspective around sort of the value and the contribution of that sort of talent mobility and how that helps Emera's overall performance?
Yeah. I said earlier that one of our goals is to, when we collaborate, is to achieve outcomes that are greater than the sum of the parts. And I think the same principle applies when it comes to talent management. We are all the result of the diverse set of experiences that we've accumulated along the way. And that certainly has been my experience. And you covered it. I spent 20 years in Nova Scotia Power with a very operational mindset, very disciplined, focused on risk identification and mitigation, focused on cost control, focused on workplace safety, and then flipped to Emera Energy where suddenly both ends of the income statement matter. And it's less about cost control and more about manageable margin and the pursuit of business opportunities.
The Caribbean for me was really an exercise in a different culture, a lesson in humility, an opportunity, a time to be patient. Ultimately, you take that entire collection of diverse experiences, and now I get the benefit of sort of mixing that cocktail and doing what I do down in Florida, and at the end of the day, I am better off. I'm a better leader, better able to serve the customers of the company by virtue of the opportunities that have been provided to me because of the diversity of the Emera portfolio.
Great. Chris, anything for you to add on this topic? Your career has, before you joined Emera, a storied career, but since then you've been with Nova Scotia Power the whole time, but you've seen some of this. What have you observed as you've joined the team and seen some of this dynamic?
It's a wonderful opportunity. A lot of the people that come to work at Nova Scotia Power through the talent acquisition activity, they look to the fact that they can see other opportunities that could happen for them beyond Nova Scotia Power being part of the Emera family, whether that's at Emera at the holding company level or in other parts of the organization. So there's a vibrancy to that, to what Emera offers people from not just a job, but a career and a lifestyle that I think is attractive to people, and people can see that from the outside, but I can see it myself from being in a competitive situation against Nova Scotia Power.
One of the attractiveness parts of what drew me personally to the Emera family was the talent that exists within this organization, one of the smartest and most caring people that you'll ever be a part of, and it's a powerful message from an attraction perspective, and I think you see it in virtually all the leaders that you see around the Nova Scotia Power team and also the Emera team, so it's tremendous, and I think it bleeds through everything that we do from a leadership development perspective at Emera. Well, I know that's an Emera-led thing that all of the leaders go through, so it instilled the culture and values in a consistent fashion from the grassroots, so there's an awful lot to the mixture that makes it a wonderful place to be.
Chris, Peter's not here, so why don't you join Helen and I down front? Come on down Yeah. He's getting pulled for now. So look, so thank you all for helping unpack that. I'm blessed in my role, of course, where I get to be engaged with each of you, obviously on the boards for each of you and myself. Karen, who serves on some of our boards too, is chair. Part of our role is helping to make those connections. A lot of it happens on its own, but every once in a while, when you see something come up, is to help to make some of those connections. So thank you for unpacking some of that for us today as we sort of talk about what's a little bit unique and special about the way we work. I thought that was great.
Next up, I'm going to introduce Karen Hutt, and she's going to take over this chair and introduce the next panel that Archie gave a bit of a tease of in terms of the grid of the future. Karen.
Okay. Thank you. All right.
All right.
Good afternoon, everyone. It's great to see you all here. The last several years, you've heard us talk a lot about the 3Ds megatrends: Decarbonization, Decentralization, and Digitalization. Not surprisingly, you've heard us talk mostly about Decarbonization. That has been the focus of the business. Certainly, that has been the lion's share of our investing. Today, we're going to do a deep dive into grid modernization, which is really the pairing of the two other Ds. Think of it as matching Decentralization with Digitalization. Investing in our grids is an increasingly important focus area of the business, and it's an increasingly important area of investment planning. Greg's going to talk to you more about that later. The question is, why? The world's energy needs are changing, and technology development is unlocking new potential.
Generation fleets are becoming increasingly decentralized with more and more localized sources such as solar and wind. And this really underscores the importance to modernize our approach to grid planning. Keeping the lights on has always been hard. But add to this, our objectives grow even more ambitious. And one of the really exciting things about this panel is you are going to hear from the absolute experts in this business who are leading this work. And I think you're going to agree with me at the end of this when I say, at Emera, our teams are on it. We are purpose-building the modern grid to deliver on our customer expectations and their needs, not just for today, but also scaling for tomorrow. And a new planning approach creates opportunities to invest in the business, deliver a better experience for our customers, and create value for our investors.
So what we're going to do is we're going to share some of our thinking. We're going to give you a glimpse into some of the work that is actually happening right now. You're going to hear from these folks. And we're really going to try to define from our perspective what grid modernization means to us. So joining me here today is Chip Whitworth, David Lusick, both from Tampa Electric, and Lia MacDonald from Nova Scotia Power. Before we dive into the conversation, let's just step back for a moment and look at how we got here. The grid modernization journey really began in earnest in 2018. We set up a multi-year discovery team. We involved over 100 leaders from across the business. And their job was to forecast what the electrical grid demands would be in 2035 and out of that, develop a roadmap for required investments.
That team quickly understood that there was a renaissance moment in the making for energy. When you look at all of the forces that are coming together, the expected future load growth, the increasing focus on electrification, back in 2018, no one was talking about the prolific impact of data centers. So add that to the mix. And fast forward to today, and we're looking at forecasts of electricity consumption doubling by 2050. Add to that new capacity that is born from technological innovation and the importance of integrating both intermittent renewable generation with our baseload resources. All of those factors combined is really what we're solving for. So we set three objectives for the grid modernization strategy. First of all, always on, ensuring our customers always receive the energy they need when they need it. Secondly, future-enabled adaptable grid, evolving our infrastructure to meet the new operating challenges.
Third, maximize performance, being at the forefront of the opportunities to efficiently and effectively operate. You're going to hear lots of talk about systems and technology, but at its core, these objectives are all about serving customers. It's all about responding to the changing demands in our operating environments. What is grid of the future? In essence, it's a grid with a much more advanced brain. It's a grid that generates and utilizes more data, a grid that can talk about itself and its problems. It's a grid that can even self-diagnose and self-heal. These capabilities are here now or soon to arrive.
But before diving into talk about the future and highlighting the work across the business, let's step back and spend a moment talking about the limitations that the current type of grid that we and virtually every other utility have operated in for decades. Chip, can you walk us through the limitations of today's grid?
Unidirectional is the word I would use to describe the grid of today and of yesterday, meaning that it traditionally has power that flows from a centralized generating unit all the way to a customer's house in one direction. Same for data and information going one way from a centralized location to the customer. And tomorrow's grid really reverses all of that. And when I mean that, I mean that literally. We're looking at the grid is now having reverse power flows due to DERs, distributed energy resources. And those two-way power flows are something we need to manage. And on top of that, it comes along with the data that comes along with that.
All of our AMI infrastructure and all the smart devices we're putting out have information that we're going to be sending to it, and it's also going to be coming back to us. Through that, to manage all that, we're installing right now at Tampa Electric a private cellular network to manage all of that information coming back to us, improving and upgrading our back office systems to render that data and information into something useful for our operators to make actionable decisions on out in the field. That's the grid of the future. It's really that bidirectional flow of electricity and a tremendous amount of data that's going to be created today, and we're bringing it back and using that in a way to help us manage the grid as efficiently and as safely as possible.
Thanks, Chip. Lia, can you walk us through what modernization looks like in practice?
Absolutely. So as we've been talking about today, Karen talked about the 3Ds, the big trends. Well, really, it's all about solving the energy trilemma, balancing the decarbonization or the greening of the grid with resource adequacy, ongoing needs for reliability and resiliency, and in a way that is affordable for our customers. So we know that that's the fundamental backdrop of all of this. In terms of modernization in practice and what we're talking about this afternoon, we've been making investments along the way for several years now on the foundational systems, the computer systems, think of it, that are purpose-built for outage management, for geographic information systems, for energy management systems.
All of those systems now, each of which have been in place for some time now to do their jobs. Well, they can now be connected together across our assets, but then back out into our customers' assets as well more and more. This is what we call a distributed energy resource management system or DERMS. DERMS is really going to be how this all comes together and really takes us to a different level soon, in some cases already, and absolutely into the future.
So for example, when it comes to outages, the most sort of basic way to think about how this comes together, more and more, not only can we know the status of the power or the location of the power situation, but in some cases, our assets and the way that data can talk to one another, we can avoid needing a person or a truck to go to fix the outage. We can just switch things around remotely because of how these systems are integrated today. Or our engineers or our technicians can access the data through these systems to more proactively make decisions about asset investments, to better target where the capital should go next and whatnot.
So really, it's about, Karen, bringing together these systems that have been invested in already and adding to them so that they can connect to one another differently to really target investments and involve our employees and our customers more and more in how to use these tools.
Thanks, Lia. This really shows how grid modernization is about a host of individual projects and innovations that add up to much more than a sum of their parts, each one representing new value for customers and new investment opportunities. David, I'd like to ask you to drill down into something that Lia touched on and talk about our advanced distribution infrastructure.
Yeah, thank you, Karen. So our Advanced Distribution Infrastructure, it really started as a series of grid modernization projects. And several of those have either been developed or piloted currently throughout Tampa Electric Company. And when we looked at the magnitude of the actual work going on, we took a step back and said, "Okay, what is the most effective way to deploy capital? And how do we maximize the benefits of these projects?" So we really took a deep dive into this. What came out of that work was the Advanced Distribution Infrastructure or the ADI initiative. So what is the ADI initiative? It's really a culmination of over 40-plus projects, just under $1 billion over the next several years. And they boil down to three basic buckets of work. The first is a state-of-the-art communication system, industry-leading, which is really the backbone of the efforts.
On top of that, you're going to overlay a series of smart devices out in the field to help with the automation Chip referred to. And then you're going to have a replacement of several back-office systems, which is absolutely critical to manage all these. The driver of this, customers continue to expect more. And whether it's through reliability or they want greater choices as they select electric vehicles, rooftops, solar, it really puts, as Chris said, or as Chip said, complexity onto the grid, dealing with two-way power flows and two-way data flows. So from that, this is the best way to kind of package it, find a way to sequentially deploy it, and really leverage all that work simultaneously. And the benefits you'll see, you'll see reduced probably the most effective way to deploy the capital, in addition to increased implementation times.
You're going to have earnings benefits. You're going to reduce regulatory lag. And then there's going to be a series of customer benefits that are derived at the end of this.
So let's dive into one of the exciting aspects that I know you are fully immersed on.
Excellent. PLTE?
Yeah.
Okay. So one of the backbones, as I talked about, is the state-of-the-art communication system. And it's Private LTE or PLTE. And in essence, it's a cellular network owned by the utility. So your smartphones operate on what's LTE, which is Long-Term Evolution. We're going to build our own network. The question is, why? Our existing network, as most, are a hybrid of networks. It's radio-controlled for the field devices to communicate back to the control systems. And then fiber that communicates from the substations back to the control systems. There's inherent problems with that setup as you continue to move with greater expectations on what you want the grid to do. So the first is capacity. We're running out of capacity on the grid. So every time we add a new device, we have to take a device off. And that starts leaving blind spots in your operations.
The second is speed. Because of the automation, you have to have near real-time communications back and forth between the devices and the control room in order to make those real-time decisions. You can't expand the existing network due to, number one, it's extremely expensive. As you continue to put more devices out there, it potentially opens up to increased cyber risk. And then you have a bunch of third parties that have to come into play that make it a little more complex. So the answer is, just like a telecommunication company, we're acquiring spectrum and ultimately going to build our own network.
So I love this because it's an excellent example of the work that Tampa Electric is doing that's great for customers. But this is the first of its kind.
Yes, it is.
It's excellent.
Yes.
Chip, can you expand a bit on how ADI integrates with our work with advanced meters and other intelligent field devices?
Advanced Distribution Infrastructure and how that impacts operations is very important, and I'm going to give you some examples of what it means to us, and it really starts with safety, so on the safety perspective, we are now going to experience, and we are experiencing, these bidirectional flows on the distribution grid. Our line workers need to know which direction the power is coming from so they can properly isolate the energy and work on the equipment and things in the field safely. Another one, voltage support, so we have to maintain a level of voltage so that everybody gets the same quality power, and when you have a concentrated segment of Distributed Energy Resources that's injecting generation onto the grid, it can destabilize that voltage, and we need to really maintain that, and that's really a very important piece of grid resiliency.
It's very similar to when you turn on your water faucet at your house, water comes out. Well, they're maintaining a certain level of pressure on the pipeline so that that always happens and it's a consistent pressure. Voltage is the same thing for a distribution grid. It provides that stable quality power that we all expect and need. Line losses is another one. So when I say line loss, what do I mean by managing line losses? Well, when we have distributed energy resources injecting on the grid, it's important that we're able to detect that, understand it, and then even be able to be aware of it and respond to it. And the cellular system and a lot of the smart devices we're going to be deploying are going to help us do that. So what does that have to do with line losses?
If we know when those renewable resources are injecting onto the grid, then we can back down traditional fossil fuel generation to utilize that renewable resource, which then reduces fuel costs for our customers. It's a long-term play in the affordability piece of what we do. Very important for us. I would say detection. Detection is another one where we have, with all the advanced devices in the field, we're going to be able to detect when an energized wire goes down and be able to respond to that from our dispatching center before a customer calls in or before we have to send a vehicle out to respond to it. That's very important to us from a customer safety standpoint and from our own safety standpoint. A big one that comes with all this is automation. David talked about it a little bit.
Lia talked about it. But the automation piece is where we're really going to impact reliability. And ADI is going to give the grid a brain to where when there's an outage, the grid is going to detect it. It can automatically reroute the power to energize as many customers as possible prior to human intervention. We'll know where that fault happened, and we can directly dispatch a vehicle and a line worker to that location to make a quick repair. So that's a big piece of ADI.
Then lastly, on the detection side, we're going to be able to see the behavior and understand how the equipment is working and operating on the grid, where if we see an anomaly, we're going to be able to proactively make an equipment repair replacement prior to an outage, again, helping customer reliability and really forwarding that seamless interaction of our customers and how they utilize energy.
Thanks, Chip. So what you're really talking about is a win, win, win.
Absolutely.
Better service for our customers, more efficiency for your teams, and reduces costs for the business.
Correct.
That's awesome. Lia, can you talk about some of the other things that we're doing with distributed intelligence?
Yeah. So distributed intelligence and all the practical applications that come with that, we're actually starting to give that its own new acronym in the business called DIApps. There's an app for everything these days. People are used to it with their phones more and more. And well, what Chip and David are talking about is really apps enabled both inside our business for our employees, either on their phones or tablets or in the control rooms, in the computer rooms, where we're creating very targeted, user-friendly apps so that our employees can do all the things that Chip and David have been talking about in terms of seeing really specific issues or problems in advance visually in terms of where they are on the grid. So that's locational awareness. There's EV awareness and solar generation awareness.
So the more that customers have equipment in their homes that is electrified and is inherently both generating and consuming electricity, like an EV battery or like solar generation paired with storage, we have apps and are developing apps that will enable us, our employees, but also those customers themselves more and more in the future to be able to participate in what that means and how to change behavior based on what's going on in real time with their electricity usage. So we're developing some apps for that.
And then, of course, on the more maintenance side of things, active transformer monitoring, that would be an application where we can now take the data sources, both the data flows and the electrons and the asset health parameters, and understand what's going on on a pole-top transformer for the overhead system or what's going on behind the fence and some of the larger substation transformers that you see off the highway. And all of that taken together is how this distributed intelligence and the practical application, the DI apps, are more and more becoming what we're focused on toward the future. And this is involving employees and customers together. In fact, for some of these apps, we understand to be industry-leading, certainly North American-leading in how we're developing some of these programs.
And where there's going to be an opportunity to have proprietary rights to some of that, we will look to monetize that and develop other services. So it's really an exciting time, Karen, and it's different.
Well, it is very exciting, particularly exciting for us as operators. But I appreciate that it can be a bit abstract if you don't live in this every day. So I want to ask each of you to speak about how these innovations become meaningful to customers. Chip, let's start with you.
Reliability. Improving reliability would be number one from these advancements. And just based on the automation I described and how the grid is going to operate in the future, that is an expected outcome, and we're very much looking forward to that. Additionally, the reduced operating costs as well by being able to have less truck rolls, more precise truck rolls, being able to restore power in an automated way lowers our long-term O&M cost. And I'm very excited about that for us and our customers.
That's great. David?
Yeah. I would point to operational efficiencies. So as you have greater insight and visibility into the status of the grid and the health of the equipment, that you can start moving from a reactive to a proactive replacement, which reduces long-term O&M cost. The next I would point to would be demand-side management, is the ability to, again, to have visibility to customers' consumption patterns or what's actually happening on their generation systems. And as Chip said, to better actively manage that grid, again, is a benefit both to the customers and the shareholders. And then the last one would be the customer bill savings. So as you continue to drive operational efficiencies, that's O&M reductions, you can better dispatch generation, which, of course, reduces fuel burn, along with, again, load balancing on the lines and those types of items also produce direct fuel savings.
Thank you, and Lia, you have a particularly exciting project happening in Nova Scotia with one of your large customers.
Yes. So we've been talking a lot about advancements for residential and commercial customers this afternoon. But we have an example in Nova Scotia right now. It's a project with one of our largest customers, Michelin. And it's about providing voltage stability in a different way for one of their operations in Nova Scotia. They are one of our largest customers, and they're one of the largest employers in Nova Scotia. So we've been collaborating with them for many years, of course. And as their operations have become increasingly electrified and digitized, their sensitivity to issues on the system that wouldn't have caused a problem in the past have been causing more of an issue in recent years. And that's about the voltage stability Chip talked about, the water pressure analogy.
So when lightning storms, as an example, pass through, that can cause issues that are in the millisecond in duration, so don't cause a power outage per se to other typical operations, but can cause sensitivity to industrial operations at certain places, like at one of our Michelin plants. So our engineers and theirs, along with equipment suppliers, worked together over several years to determine what could be a solution to this issue. And we're actually in the middle of commissioning that project this year, whereby we are installing a world-first at-the-grid scale at-the-transmission-level voltage to provide this voltage support at that plant. So it's really an exciting development for us. And it's one of these examples about grid mod that's really particular to a certain industry, but that we see really being part of the innovative leading edge of something that's going to be important to the business.
That's great, all of you. I'll echo what you've heard from our panelists, that the grid of the future really is about continuing to deliver on our core mission. And that's to ensure that we're there for our customers. And by doing this, we're unlocking new solutions to problems, new efficiencies, and new areas of investment opportunities and new ways to reduce costs. So I'd like to ask each of you to touch on a few of the issues that utility operators will have to confront as we continue to evolve in this journey. Chip?
Cybersecurity. That's an issue today, and that is going to be an issue going forward. It's going to get more complex as we go forward. And something from an operating side, we're going to have to continue to work and figure out how to invest and manage that piece of it. I would also say the proliferation of distributed energy resources, particularly the renewable ones, the customer-sided solar, even utility-scale solar, hydro, wind, the intermittency of those creates challenges for us on the grid. And being able to detect that and understand when it's injecting and where it's injecting is going to be very important for us to manage a stable grid and a resilient grid and to make sure we're installing these smart devices in the right places at the right time to help us manage that. That's a big one. And then lastly, I'll say AI.
It's amazing how that technology has come along already. We expect that to advance dramatically. And how we incorporate that in our operations going forward is something we're thinking about and remains a challenge for us. We're looking forward to it.
A big one for us in Nova Scotia, and I know across the Emera affiliates, would be about customer education, bringing our customers along with us for what this all means to them, whether it's a residential home, a commercial business, or a large industrial customer, like I mentioned a minute ago. With the deployment of more and more of these smart devices on our infrastructure and then with data-enabled flows back to our systems, think about the AMI meters that we deployed across all of the homes and businesses in our companies over the last number of years. That has now enabled us to deploy software tools or customer portals on our websites or on phones with the apps that enable customers to monitor how they're using energy and what that means to them.
And so if those tools are user-friendly and with a well-thought-through rollout program, our customers can understand the so what for them and how to use those tools. And then we take feedback from them, depending on if something is or isn't straightforward enough to get the benefit that was intended. We're really deliberately with a customer lens, a customer point of view, thinking about how to make these technical solutions more available and more consumable for our customers. So we've got a tool called MyEnergy Insights in Nova Scotia. It's the portal that we integrated with our smart meters. And all of our customers in Nova Scotia can now use that if they like.
They can do that if they're just monitoring for interest's sake at their home or more and more as businesses or those with rooftop solar and other sort of more complicated situations are really able to use those tools to make their own choices. And so that's an example, Karen, of bringing customers along to educate for the sake of, but also to help them do things differently with the electricity system.
That's great.
My perspective is people. Like every industry, you have to have the right skill sets in the right positions, so as we're moving forward and the industry is evolving, we are continuing to look at what does talent acquisition and retention look like? Because we continue to move forward with items such as artificial intelligence, machine learning, analytics, and they're not typical skill sets that utilities are inherently used to trying to acquire, and there's several different ways to approach this. One, you have to look at comp and retention type protocol, and the second is really trying to find a way to develop that pipeline of talent within your organization.
Innovative ideas like partnering with universities or learning institutions and really developing those kind of unique programs and bringing them in early and kind of going to let them grow within your industry, bringing that skill set with them. The other piece on top of that is culture. Not only do you have to have the right people, but you also have to really continue to evolve the culture. Because as things are continuing to change at a fast-paced rate and the grid is evolving, you've got to create an environment to where you want innovation, you challenge status quo. There's a continuous learning methodology within the organization. So it's not only about requiring the right kind of talent and upskilling the employees you have, it's also creating the culture to allow them to be successful.
So clearly no shortage of things to work on. But what I hear you all saying is that the modernization work that we're doing now is really setting us up to be able to do more in the future. So we're investing in infrastructure and the critical components surrounding, such as cybersecurity and talent capacity that will give us optionality as new demands arise and as new opportunities and technologies emerge. So as we look to wrap up this section, I'd like to ask each of you to talk about what's next with Grid of the Future and what is particularly exciting to each of you. So Leah, I'm going to start with you.
An exciting one in Nova Scotia for sure, and we touched on this earlier, is all about renewables integration so moving back up the grid away from the frontline customer and to the bulk system itself, but really resource adequacy and ensuring that our grid is ready at the transmission level and even the distribution level to integrate this variable generation. In Nova Scotia's case, it's wind and how that wind moves around on the system differently than traditional generation resources and what that means. We need to invest on the transmission system in order to be able to follow that wind, having the control systems to understand what that's going to mean to the equipment and to the ability to provide reliable, robust service and so integrating new equipment like batteries and the control systems that go with batteries, grid-scale batteries is what I mean in this case.
We're really excited about investing more in that type of equipment, as well as, of course, interties, increased interties with the neighboring jurisdictions that goes with balancing more wind onto the grid in Nova Scotia. And we really are leading edge on that because of the percent of variable generation that we have on our relatively small-sized system in Nova Scotia. We're really learning from the world leaders about how to best integrate that resource. And then what does that mean for the future path of investments on the bulk system?
Gentlemen?
I'm most excited about this because these investments are all customer-centric. And they're agnostic to any political winds or other things outside of our business that we might think might influence it one way or another. These are customer-centric investments. They're going to improve reliability and ultimately reduce our long-term O&M costs. And I'm very excited about that for the business and our customers.
David, bring us home.
Yeah. Chip hit on some of the points. But from my perspective, ever-increasing customer expectations. Customers, when you look at electricity as becoming such a critical part of everybody's life, you charge everything from cell phones all the way to electric vehicles. And it's really important that we find that balance of affordability and reliability. And to me, that is a very exciting challenge, which we continue to pursue.
The audience takeaway, we hope, is that you're as excited about the future as we certainly are. It really is an exciting time for the sector. The mission for meeting reliability and resource adequacy needs has really never been more important. Considerable investment will be required and the growing demand for electricity and therefore value creation for our customers and our shareholders. One of the points I want to make is that grid modernization opportunities is really an evolution of the work that our operating companies are doing today and they have been doing for years. Certainly, there are aspects of this that are new, the technology is new, but the complexity of the planning, the managing, and the operating, no one does this better. It's what our teams do best. Of course, we're going to work together in the future with stakeholders.
We'll work with our regulators, with policymakers, with our peers. And of course, our customers will share information, will share best practices. And I think, as you can tell from listening to these three folks, you can bet we're going to be looking for ways to lead. So I want to thank you for your attention. And I really want to thank David, Leah, and Chip for your leadership. And I'd like to finish off where we started. You're going to hear a lot more about grid modernization as we lay out our capital investment plans. Meeting and exceeding our customer expectations now and in the future remains at the core of what we do. And we're going to accomplish this by investing in new technologies and developing new and more efficient ways to deliver service. So with that, thank you all. Thank you.
Thank you.
Thank you, Karen.
Thanks, everyone.
Thank you all. That was very, very interesting, and maybe don't go too far away because we're going to enter into our first Q&A. So I'll ask Scott to come back to the front of the room. For those of you in the room, if you'd like to ask a question, just put your hand up and we'll get a mic to you so that folks online can actually hear the questions. For those of you online, feel free to enter it in the messaging tab, and we'll have Arianne read the question into the room for you, so with that, I will turn things over to Scott. I will say, please hold your financial questions for Greg's model to the end after Greg has presented it, so I know some of you will jump into that right away, but over to you, Scott.
You hear me? Richard Sunderland, J.P. Morgan Thank you. If it's allowed, I'd ask a Tampa rate case question. The litigated outcome versus a settlement, you hit on some of the key points around the revenue authorized versus your ask. I'm curious how you think about the historical earned ROE trend out of prior settlements versus the possibility out of this latest rate outcome. Do you see a different trajectory to earned ROE on a two-year rate plan? And in this outcome, as it stands today, and any considerations around the O&M that was highlighted in this slide and the two exceptions that you referenced in your remarks? I think one was capital and one was on 2026 or 2027 projects. Thank you.
Yeah. So, I'll get to Archie can come up. But maybe sort of start with this aspect, Rich, to your question that with a settlement traditionally has also included some length of time for a stay-out. And one of the things that we've experienced in the last couple of years is in a time particularly where cost of capital was changing quite a bit, being locked in, for example, to a three-year stay-out was really hard. And so, of course, through this litigated outcome and the same, I would say, with Peoples Gas and New Mexico Gas, there is no stay-out as part of that. But Archie, you want to tackle the rest of that question?
I can. I'll try to. And if I don't get it, make sure you hold us accountable to get the answer you're looking for. So first of all, let me say that if we had felt that there was a path to a settlement which mirrored the litigated outcome that we've achieved, we would have pursued that aggressively. We would always pursue a settlement because it's quieter. It doesn't result in the media attention that is otherwise drawn to a litigated case. It tends to be more cordial. But a settlement is generally that, a settlement. You're settling for a series of things. There's a whole series of gives and takes. A litigated case clearly comes with some risk, not really controlling it because now you're going before commissioners and it's the will of the commissioners.
You have to believe in your case and in the strategy and the rationale that underpin the things that you're doing. If you believe, then you're willing to go before the commissioners and take your chances. The strength of the outcome that's been delivered, I think, is a testament to we were right to believe and the commissioners believe in us. In fact, I am 100% confident that we would not have been able to achieve a settlement that was as robust as this litigated case if for no other reason than the myriad of interveners who had standing in our case were a bit divided amongst themselves on what were important outcomes to each of them. In order to achieve an outcome, a settled outcome, you have to have each party has to be united. There was too much division, quite frankly, amongst the interveners.
It stood in our way of being able to achieve a settlement that we would have been satisfied with, that we would have felt was market-based and that we were deserving.
Fair to say, Archie, too, in that one of them, what we've referred to as 4CP, 12CP. But sort of this issue of how the revenue requirement is allocated between customer classes was something that was difficult for Tampa Electric to adjudicate. There was a difference of opinion between stakeholders in that. And that really needed the commission to adjudicate an answer.
Yeah. Very contentious issue amongst the consumer parties, and we completely understand that.
Right.
Rich, are you good? Okay. Great.
Hi. Rob Hope, Scotiabank. I believe Chris mentioned the potential that riders could be implemented at Nova Scotia Power. When you think about the step-up in capital plan there as well as the significant investment required there, how do you think about earned ROEs, and if there's no new rates or no riders, could a bunch of that capital be viewed as discretionary?
Yeah. So I'll start. Chris, so correct me if you've got a different view or something to add. But I think there is a reality that Nova Scotia Power needs rate support, of course. And there was a period of time because of Bill 212, it was unable to do that. So the team is sort of working their way through that logic. But in the meantime, of course, we do have a benefit of some riders. Fuel has long been there. But more recently, a storm rider, which just this week, the UARB, the Utility and Review Board, did approve Nova Scotia Power's filing as it relates to a rider for storm costs incurred over the past period of time.
And I think that reference around riders and sort of some of what we've seen in other jurisdictions, including in Florida as well as New Mexico, frankly, can be part of the solution to navigating a path back to Nova Scotia Power earning its allowed ROE. That is a critical thing, of course, for the team, obviously, for both debt and equity investors. And it's something the team's working very hard on. And we are making some progress, but still some work to do. And obviously, needing new rates is going to be part of that journey. Chris, anything you want to add to that?
In 2024, we'll talk a little bit more later on about the fuel securitization, both the recoveries of those who were effectively riders through the process. So they won't be in base rates. But that's where I'm referencing. We're starting to introduce those sorts of things. But to Scott's point, as we look for the larger infrastructure type projects that will advance, we'll look to recover the cost of those through riders as well. But that's still to be determined. The new legislation that the government introduced last year allowed for that type of arrangement. So we'll look to deploy it.
Yeah. It's a good point. So the battery energy storage project, for example, that is set up through an SPV, through a special purpose vehicle with some third-party funding and really the legislation enabling that to be treated separately as it relates to the requirement for rate support over time.
Not the battery project, but the potential next project that would more likely be the battery project will have to be in base rates.
The intertie.
Yeah. The intertie would be more, yeah.
Thanks, Rob.
Hi. It's Ben Pham of BMO Capital Markets. In terms of your CapEx allocation to Florida, very high percentage, and just think about the 2029 rate base. It looks like the Florida earnings is going to be something like 90% of your business, give or take around there. How do you think about where that business or that business is going? Just think about diversification, your cash flows. You're so confident around that business. Things look great right now. High ROEs. Equity is very high. But you're putting, to some extent, one egg in one basket in a sense. Is that where you want to take the business going forward, 90% Florida by 2029?
Yeah. So I think we're ways away from 90%, Ben. And when Greg has his presentation, you'll see some of that. But look, concentration risk is something we do think about that the board thinks about and we reflect on. Fortunately, right now, yes, the majority of our business is in Florida today. That's going to be even more true over the future based upon that CapEx profile. And frankly, that is okay with us, right? The Florida business for us is a great place to be. It's an environment that's encouraging investment. We're keen to invest on behalf of customers and continue to drive growth in that market. But yes, we do think about the concentration risk. But if we're going to be concentrated anywhere across our portfolio, I'm pretty comfortable with the idea that the majority of our business is in the state of Florida.
It looks like a great place to be the next few years, of course. And then related to that, we've seen some companies in the past, as U.S. dollar exposure goes up, they think about U.S. indices, inclusions, and change in head offices and change in reporting. Where do you stand on that in terms of transitioning or thinking about that on a go-forward basis?
To me, we'll get you to park that question. And Greg can address it as part of his discussion, if that's okay with you, Greg.
Hi. Maurice Choy from RBC Capital Markets. I've got one quick follow-up and a new question. My quick follow-up is back to NSPI. Is your view that riders sit outside of the PC Party's proposed price increase cap? That's the follow-up question. And a new question, if you don't mind me just asking right now, and it's probably a question for the Tampa team, Archie or Chip, perhaps. You've obviously had a fairly disruptive hurricane season, to say the least. You saw some weakness in Emera's share price leading into the hurricane season. But every hurricane is different. And moving forward, there will be more storms to come.
For someone viewing from the outside and seeing all these headlines, can you speak to two or three data points or indicators that we can look at as a hurricane approaches so that we can get a better feel as to what that means for Tampa Electric, for the share price, and whatnot?
Yeah. So I'll tackle the first question. I'll start a little bit with a second. But Archie, we'll let you reflect on that as well so you can respond. Look, right now, there is no rate cap in place for Nova Scotia Power. So that rate cap period effectively now is over. But I would say that the utility, Chris, and the team at Nova Scotia Power have been working arm in arm with the province very collaboratively to navigate a path forward that keeps the rate pressure as low as possible. And there is full alignment between the government and the utility as it relates to the sensitivity to rates and making sure that the rate needs of the business, the rate impacts for customers are kept as low as possible on a trajectory that is as affordable as possible.
So I think that's the best answer I can have. Whether riders, fuel recovery, base rates, of course, from customer's perspective, it all matters in terms of the impact on rates. And the team is very sensitive about that. And as I say, working collaboratively with the province in order to navigate that best path forward. In terms of sort of the hurricane, sort of the signals and the signs, I'll share my perspective with it, Archie, and you can add yours. Look, I think as it relates to a hurricane event, the reality is utilities like ours are very used to navigating the challenges of high winds. And there's an element of predictability, even modeling capability as to the impact to the system and outage profile based upon the wind speeds and the duration of that wind that is coming.
Where things start to get a little bit different and some things that obviously we learned through the combination of Helene and Milton, one is storm surge is a relevant challenge in Tampa Bay and one that, of course, we are focused on. And we learned some things from Helene in terms of the impact of what a 10- to 11-foot surge has in terms of our service territory. And therefore, sort of that degree of anticipated storm surge is one thing to watch. And the other that was unique with Milton, while we didn't see any storm surge, we saw a lot of rain that followed a lot of rain from Helene together with strong winds, which would be another sign. Certainly, whenever you see Archie on CNBC or MSNBC, there's a sign there's probably something going on in Tampa, which would have been true at the time.
But how do you think you should sort of gauge investors' sort of lens around sort of thinking about what to watch for with these storm events?
So what to watch for is a difficult one to answer, Maurice, so the 2024 hurricane season was active for the west coast of peninsular Florida, make no mistake about it, and very different storms, as Scott says. Helene was a storm surge, 11-foot record storm surge in Tampa Bay, and then followed up, whatever, 10 days later by Milton, which was the biggest hurricane to hit Tampa since 1921, and that one was more of 18 inches of rainfall and hurricane-force winds, and I think what I would say, so first of all, as that system, as Milton was approaching peninsular Florida and Emera's share price went down, so too did the share prices of other utilities in Florida, so we weren't alone in the anxiety that sort of was hanging over the investment community.
What I would say is investors should take confidence in the fact that you had these two record-setting storms so close to one another. And very quickly, we were able to get power restored, get the economy up and running, and everything is back to normal. We haven't seen any erosion in sales or anything else that would cause us concern. Could either one of those have been worse? Sure. Absolutely, they could have been worse. But they were both record-setting storms. And the team and our infrastructure held up remarkably well. We were restored from Helene in about 36 hours. David was our incident commander on that one. And on Milton, Chip was incident commander on that one. That one was a much bigger effort. Took us about six days, which was consistent with how FPL and Duke and other utilities had to deal with it.
I will just leave you with this. The level of determination and the resolve that exists in the state of Florida that starts with the governor of Florida on down to do whatever you need to do to, as quickly and as quickly as possible, bring normalcy back to this state. It is remarkable how everybody comes together and says, "We're going to get this economy up and running really, really quickly." So I don't know what the two or three data points are. I would just simply say we've been through two bad ones, and the business is no worse off than it was prior to either of them.
I think the thing I'd add to that, Archie, that was good, but is one of the other things that actually has been important contributed to that quick restoration and something that is important to keep doing and maybe one of the signs to watch for, Maurice, but is the Storm Protection Plan. The investment that's being made, you heard about some of it in the context of the grid of the future. But even just sort of vegetation management and undergrounding and all those things are helping to deal with not just climate change, but climate adaptation. The Big Bend modernization work, flood walls are at a level that's higher to provide more protection.
So these are all things that are sort of very much in focus for your team, for other teams too, in terms of sort of protecting the system against this sort of increased frequency of more severe storms.
Yeah.
With that, we're going to have another Q&A at the end. So I do want to kind of keep us on time as best we can. So we'll wrap, take a 10, let's call it a 10-minute break. Be back here at the top of the hour. We'll continue into our second half. Thanks very much.
I was enjoying the lack of strobe light.
Okay. Okay, so welcome back. Obviously, welcome to Chris and Helen and Archie back to the stage. And we've covered a lot today, a little bit about a bit of the uniqueness about Emera in terms of governance and leadership and structure and strategy. And then the panel that Karen led, hopefully, you know that was helpful, sort of diving in a little bit to grid of the future and the things that are happening there that's really exciting. And obviously, no one better to tell those stories than David, Chip, and Lia. Now we're going to talk a little bit about growth before transition over to Greg for a financial update. And as I said earlier, it is a transformational time. It's an exciting time with a lot of transformation happening within our sector.
And so in the next 40 minutes, we'll unpack that a little bit and share some insights about that transformation, some broader key strategic themes, and then dig into what that means and looks like from an operating perspective and the opportunities for growth across Emera. But if I start sort of big picture for a minute, of course, one of the biggest significant shifts that we're seeing is just the underlying growth in demand and starting to hear across the industry sort of the focus and challenges around resource adequacy. If I take sort of a global lens to that for a second, the International Energy Agency expects that global energy demand will double between now and 2050, rising to 50,000 terawatt hours per year. From 2023 to 2035 alone, demand's expected to grow by about 1,000 terawatts.
To put that in perspective, that's about the annual energy consumption of Japan. So this is a big number. In the United States, Goldman Sachs, with apologies to all of our other U.S. banking friends, has projected that demand will rise by 2.4% annually over the next eight years, which marks the most significant increase in electricity demand in a generation. You know, if you think about it, it wasn't that long ago where industry talk was, geez, are we into a death spiral? And we're going to see sort of the role of utility and electricity demand through the utility model start to erode. But it's actually the opposite of that. And it's underscoring the urgency of investment and the opportunity for growth.
A little closer to home where we are now in Canada, the Canadian Climate Institute estimates that electricity generation will grow by 2.2 or upwards of 3.4 times what it is today to meet the residential, commercial, and industrial consumption requirements in Canada by 2050. Those are massive numbers, of course, and as you know, there's many sort of fundamental drivers of that growth. And we'll discuss sort of the implications of that and the opportunity set for that as it relates to the Emera operations, but let me sort of focus first on some of those sort of more fundamental shifts across the sector within society versus the short-term trends.
And so, of course, one of them we know is just driven by the amount of digitalization that is happening around the expansion of artificial intelligence, the expansion of off-premises IT computing, sort of the cloud-based computing that is requiring this massive build-out of data centers to support. And it's expected to continue to grow for some time, sort of reflecting this broader trend that is not expected to reverse. And what's interesting, we all understand that sort of the energy intensity of these data centers is immense. It requires, of course, around the clock, 24/7, always on power. And just for some context, the amount of energy required for an artificial intelligence query, sort of using these large language models for a ChatGPT-type query, is about 10 times the energy required for just a regular Google search.
It's just a huge amount of relative incremental energy that is required to support these new technologies. So as these continue to expand, McKinsey estimates that by 2030, data center power demand is expected to grow by 160% and consuming up to 12% of total U.S. power supply demand over that period. The trends in Canada are similar and starting to catch up. The Canadian Energy Regulator reports that data center is a significant and growing source of electricity demand nationwide. We're seeing it across the country, obviously. Here in Ontario, the IESO, the Ontario Independent Electricity System Operator, highlights data center electricity demand growth as a key driver in the commercial sector today. Hydro-Québec is anticipating an increase of 4.1 terawatt hours in data center demand between now and 2032.
The AESO, the Alberta Electric System Operator, sees higher electricity demand from data centers in its high electrification scenario, and closer to home, Nova Scotia, some of you may know, is positioning itself as a regional tech hub, and as part of that, is looking for growing investment in tech, including in AI, and this is all contributing to growth of energy demand. Electrification, of course, is another key driver: advances in battery technology, lower production costs, favorable government incentives accelerating the adoption of EVs, which, of course, is driving electricity consumption globally. Whether it's regulatory pressures, technological advances, shifting consumer preferences, many automakers are increasingly releasing more and more electric-based platforms and phasing out internal combustion engines. The model choice is continuing to grow and grow every year with ambitious production and sales targets.
Florida, interestingly, is the second largest penetration of EVs in the U.S., continues to grow, and we've all been seeing and hearing that EV adoption rates, sort of the acceleration is tempering in the U.S. and perhaps a little bit in Canada too, but even within that context, EV sales are 10% higher year over year, so still growing, just not growing perhaps quite as fast in North America as what we've seen in other jurisdictions. Along with EV adoption, of course, comes a need for EV charging, and that infrastructure investment is also on the rise and continues to actually represent an opportunity for helping to build smarter, more resilient energy systems. Increasing EV load is good, of course, but as you would have heard referenced earlier, it also adds these newer large loads that are adding to reliability challenges as well.
And so utilities, including ours, Tampa Electric and Nova Scotia Power, are already investing in grid upgrades, as that last panel would have unveiled to some degree, that are looking to meet and support this growing need, demand, and impacts on the system. Innovations like V2G, vehicle-to-grid technology is exciting in its opportunity to continue to enhance energy management and actually support grid stabilization, particularly during peak periods. And then in industrial settings, of course, as we're looking to electrify to decarbonize the broader economy, electrification in industrial shift from fossil fuel-based heating systems to electric systems, including heat pumps, industrial heat pumps, and electric boilers, enhancing efficiency, reducing emissions, in many cases becoming a compelling choice for many industries as they're looking to improve their operational control and their environmental footprint. Electric machinery is continuing to get more traction to enhance efficiency, but also actually to reduce maintenance costs.
In residential and commercial buildings, electric heat pumps, of course, water heaters, induction stoves becoming increasingly popular in many jurisdictions supported by new building codes and incentives to encourage the use of those new technologies. Of course, public policy has an important role to play in all of this in driving electrification and decarbonization in some markets, and particularly in sectors like transportation and buildings. For example, in Nova Scotia, the provincial government has adopted their Sustainable Development Goals Act, which targets a 53% reduction in GHG emissions by 2030 from the broader economy, with a significant focus on transitioning to renewable energy sources and electrifying transportation. And so as more and more of these energy sources are being brought, like wind and solar are being integrated into the grid, as we heard from Chip described so well, we can see incremental power quality and reliability issues.
We saw some of the early parts of that with Michelin as Leah unpacked that story. And we're going to see more of that, just the power quality challenges around that with sensitive loads. Again, creating need, opportunity to continue to invest, to upgrade infrastructure, to accommodate these variable power sources. And of course, energy storage technology is an important part of the solution set as well, particularly during hours of peak demands. And then finally, smart grid technologies are revolutionary. You know what I mean? Dramatically impacting the flow of energy and advanced metering and smart meters, enabling real-time awareness and monitoring of consumption and pricing, not just for customers, but for utilities too, to better understand.
It wasn't that long ago that Nova Scotia Power, with a manual meter reading system, would only have an understanding of how much energy our customers were using six moments a year, those six moments when meters were read. Now we have moments every minute where we know how much energy is being used, and so digitalization of the grid is helping us to enhance reliability, to focus on areas, and better manage the growing complexity of the energy landscape. Those are just a few of sort of the broad trends that are, of course, impacting the sector and impacting the focus of the team as we look for our own investments on behalf of customers, so it also helps to drive growth in both the near and the long term.
And so if I bring it closer to home now and turn to this esteemed panel once again and think about some of the specific growth opportunities within our three largest businesses, Peoples Gas, Nova Scotia Power, and Tampa Electric. And this time we will go one at a time. And so, Chris, start with you. Think about these overarching shifts in energy demand. How is that playing out in Nova Scotia?
Well, Scott, I'm glad to be here today to be able to talk about the fact that things are growing in Nova Scotia. The population itself is growing. And Scott asked a question today about living in Nova Scotia and being attracted there. So certainly, Scott's part of the sales mission to bring more Nova Scotians or more people to Nova Scotia. And the facts are that we are growing, which is a more recent phenomenon.
We haven't seen the level of growth that has occurred over the last couple of years. The targeted growth by the province has actually been exceeded, and so we've passed over a million Nova Scotians, and the interesting thing about that is that the government has also advanced an aspirational objective of doubling the population of Nova Scotia by 2060. So the level of growth that we've seen over the last couple of years would be maintained on a sustained basis to 2060, which is obviously an aspirational target, but indicates that there are plans for that growth to continue, so what does that mean for us from a load perspective, and we're also seeing the consistency of that growth from a population basis. We're also seeing that level of growth on an annual basis in terms of our load.
And that's being driven by the fact that there are more people in Nova Scotia. So we're adding to our customer base. But it's also based on customer behavior, where we've seen customers wanting to electrify their homes and utilize energy more of it. And what's primarily been driving that has been a conversion of oil-based heating to heat pumps, which are a more efficient way of heating their homes. But also the fact about heat pumps, they also offer the added benefit of cooling as well. So we've seen a huge shift in that over the last several years. The expectation is that will continue. The trend continues, as still only 40% of homes in Nova Scotia are either heated by oil or through wood. And so there's still that potential for additional growth.
And we expect that the level of growth that we've been seeing to be maintained to at least 2030. And 85% of all new homes that are coming on the system are also benefiting from a heat pump. So the trends are happening from a conversion basis, but also in terms of new residential development. The other part that Scott references is EVs and the objectives of the province in terms of increasing the level of EV penetration, getting to the point where 30% of all light-duty vehicles will hit the market with a zero-emission target. So that's an increase, obviously, from where we are today. And what that means for us is that we need to make sure that the infrastructure is in place. And Scott touched on that in his remarks.
And we are actively doing that, adding to our network to make sure that there are charging stations across the province to accommodate that growth. And finally, there is the investment attraction activity of the province. Scott referenced the targets that the province does have to try to increase or attract new investment into the province, primarily with technology-rich organizations. And so that obviously will add to the not just to the residential aspect of Nova Scotia, but to the commercial and industrial sector.
It's interesting, Chris. I mean, it's a staggering fact to me that still 40% of the homes in Nova Scotia are using either oil or wood for heat. I remember when I moved to Nova Scotia not far from here 12 years ago, I'd never heard of a heat pump before. We're used to a natural gas furnace and an air conditioner. Moved to Nova Scotia, was told, well, you don't need an air conditioner. Well, you need an air conditioner in the summertime. And so these heat pumps, just the math is hugely compelling to convert from oil to electric heat pumps. They're hugely efficient, including efficient down to very low temperatures. So perfect for the climate in Nova Scotia. Now, one of the other sort of challenges we've been working through, Chris, is meeting government mandates around the energy transition.
What does that look like from a capital investment perspective?
Yeah, well, we've talked a little bit about it already today. But it's important to recognize that we are on a significant energy transition. And we've made tremendous progress to date. The targets that the governments have set, both the federal and provincial governments, and we have responded to them. As I said earlier today, we've moved from 11%-43% renewable over the last several years. That's a 60% reduction in coal utilization since 2005. And we are leading the transition in Canada. And Scott spoke a little bit about that this morning in his remarks. So a significant achievement by Nova Scotia Power. But to those targets that we've achieved, there's significant work to be done as part of the Nova Scotia government's Clean Power Plan. And we'll play a significant role in that.
However, the way that we'll be doing that is a little bit different than what we traditionally have done. The sources of the additional generation that will come on the system will primarily be by other investors, by independent power producers. And our focus will be to continue to invest in the T&D infrastructure. So a little bit of a shift in terms of our focus, which will de-risk our operations, but also improve financial performance over that period of time.
So the types of projects that we'll be investing in, we've touched on a little bit today, but the first of which will come on stream starting in 2025, which is a battery storage project at three locations across Nova Scotia, three 50-megawatt battery storage facilities, which will help to improve the stability and reliability of the grid and provide some backup for the intermittent levels of wind that will continue to be coming onto the system. The interesting thing about that, I just wanted to reinforce how proud we are of the fact that we were able to have the Mi'kmaw communities of Nova Scotia as a part of that program. And we expect to replicate that or hope to replicate that type of a program on a go-forward basis.
The second major thing that will, well, major project that we're bringing onto the system is the Nova Scotia-New Brunswick intertie, the reliability tie with all of the additional wind that will be coming on the system. Again, all about stabilizing and making the grid more reliable between the two provinces, also allowing for more exchange of energy between the two provinces, and also strengthening the regional system, not just Nova Scotia-New Brunswick, but also with Newfoundland, with the Maritime Link, bringing all of that sort of a corridor together. And finally, the last piece, which is building on to the components that were talked about in the last session, the grid modernization investments that are required to also bring innovation, but also to benefit or help stabilize the grid. There's a significant portion of our capital plan that will be dedicated to that on a go-forward basis.
So it's all great, Chris. But I think of that, I think back to Maurice's question earlier, all those investments are important or needed. But of course, how do you address that challenge with the need to invest, the need to invest on behalf of customers, but still managing the impact on affordability?
It's very delicate, Scott. As you know, we've been working very closely or very carefully to address the affordability challenge in Nova Scotia. We will continue to do that. When we go into some of the projects that we've talked about today, going back to the battery project, that was creative financing that we were able to utilize to make that happen. There was direct federal government assistance provided through that process. The investment tax credits that the government has also put in place will support the project. Significantly, the Canada Infrastructure Bank is a significant partner in that project, allowing the project to proceed at lower cost financing, which is important.
So the summation of all of that is a significant project that we're being able to bring to the system and to benefit customers, but at a much lower cost to them. The second project, the intertie, will also benefit from creative financing. And Scott touched on that in a previous answer today. But the Canada Infrastructure Bank is expected to be a part of that project as well, which will also lower costs for customers on a go-forward basis.
The other part, which we're quite proud of, the work that we did in addressing our financial challenge in reference to the unrecovered fuel costs, but with creativity and the support of both the provincial and federal governments, CAD 617 million of the overhang in reference to our fuel recovery, we've addressed our cash flow and financial challenge, but also by being creative for customers by allowing them the ability to repay those fuel costs over a 10-year period for the provincial portion and over 28 years for the federal part of the program. So those are examples of the things that we're trying to do on a macro level to address some of the challenges we have with our financial position, but then also making sure that the customer's interests are in mind. We also are being on a more micro level.
And Leah touched on this a little bit in reference to the data analytics that we're deploying to help customers understand their consumption patterns and perhaps take advantage of demand-side management programs, which can help them reduce their consumption patterns. Also, introducing new rate structures that can allow them to utilize their energy at a different time that may be more attractive for them in terms of lowering the cost of the per unit charge, if you will, for the energy that they're utilizing. And the final piece, which also goes into the grid modernization side, is that we'll continue to be relentless in the pursuit of operational efficiency and driving more value, optimizing the capital program that we're deploying to the benefit of things like AI in reference to our vegetation management programs.
But all of that together demonstrates how we'll continue to address the affordability challenge as we do work towards the eventual return to GRAs, the regulatory process.
That's great. Chris, so maybe just as we wrap up for Nova Scotia Power, what are the key takeaways that you want to leave with the audience today?
Well, I want people to recognize that the province is growing, which is obviously a positive for additional revenue growth. The province is electrifying and at a strong rate on a comparative basis. We'll continue to be focused on the energy transition. But the role that Nova Scotia Power will increasingly play will be on the transmission and distribution side of the equation. As I said, that will de-risk the operation. And then we'll continue to be relentlessly in pursuit of delivering value for customers.
That's great. Thanks, Chris. So as we sort of heard Chris unpack, and we understand sort of the environmental and economic drivers and context for the sort of the journey for Nova Scotia Power, as we think about Tampa Electric, Archie, those sort of the drivers are different than sort of the climate-based policy and some of the socio-economic challenges there. Give us a sense as to how your market is sort of viewing these sort of strategic enablers and growth drivers.
Sure. Happy to do that. And growth in Tampa, similar to Nova Scotia, starts with customers. So let's start there. Certainly, Tampa is the place to be, as evidenced by the significant tailwind of population growth that we've enjoyed over the last 10 years. So like Chris, I'm also going to reflect on the question that the Honorable Lisa Raitt put to you this morning. For those of you who weren't there at the Canadian Club, she asked Scott, would you encourage people to move to Nova Scotia? And Scott did a great job of selling Nova Scotia quite well. Now, as a Nova Scotian, as a very proud Nova Scotian, I'm going to say that if any of you are deliberating and thinking of relocating, Nova Scotia is an option. But have I got a deal for you? And it comes with 350 days of sunshine a year.
It comes with a very favorable tax regime. It comes with an airport that is never congested. It comes with highways that are rarely congested. It comes with excellent sports teams that will never break your heart.
Tampa Bay.
Yes, Tampa Bay, so lots going on, and most importantly, like a state that is really focused on the future, it is a state that celebrates success, and there's a real positivity and a can-do spirit that exists in the state of Florida. If you do elect to relocate to Florida, you're not going to be alone. Florida actually has four of the nine top cities in the U.S. where people are moving to are in Florida, and Tampa is one of those, and you can see in these trends on the graph here just how substantial that population growth has been, and that serves as a real tailwind for the utility because it means we need to continue to invest to keep up with that customer growth.
I think over the past 10 years, the population growth in Hillsborough County, which is where the city of Tampa resides, is somewhere in the neighborhood of 26%. And from an economic perspective, like if you just look at the GDP of the greater Tampa Bay area, over the past five years, the GDP has increased 43%. I mean, it is just a quickly, rapidly growing economy. And as I've already said, it is a state where it really is like economy-forward and business-focused. And if you're the electric utility operating in that jurisdiction, you benefit from that growth, and you benefit from that mindset. And certainly, those factors of population growth, economic growth are certainly serving as significant tailwinds for our business in Tampa.
Yeah, and I think it is interesting. I think you've said this before, RG, but if Florida was its own country, it would be the—depends on which state you look at—the 14th or 15th largest economy in the world, and then within Florida, as you say, Tampa Bay area itself is the fourth largest economy in the region, so a lot of sort of great story to tell as it relates. Florida is great, but Tampa Bay itself has its own great story to tell within Florida. A big part of your growth story has been investing in grid resiliency, and of course, we talked a little bit about that in terms of the value of the storm protection plan and the like, and of course, that was put to the test with the success of hurricanes.
Sort of, what's your view in the sort of reflection of that, the value of those investments and the forward-looking path for the storm protection plan?
So there's no question that as we, first of all, there's no shortage of prudent investments that we could make on behalf of our customers in West Central Florida. But if I was to categorize how do we deploy the bulk of our capital, the grid is a big piece of it. And you heard that from David and Chip when they were up here. And the investments we make in the grid are really in two parts. One is on grid modernization, which they spoke to. And I won't repeat all that. But a lot of that work is industry-leading and is really going to benefit customers. It's already benefiting customers, but they will continue to benefit from it.
You've got the grid modernization part and the grid hardening part, which is largely the $200 million per year investments that we make to harden our grid, sort of moving overhead infrastructure underground, moving away from wooden poles on our transmission infrastructure. We have a very strong and resilient grid today. 52% of our distribution grid is currently underground, which I would say relative to most utilities is a very large percentage. And through the SPP program, we are undergrounding on average about another 100 miles per year. So that ratio, that percentage of very resilient infrastructure to wind damage is increasing.
Through that continued through the SPP program, which is certainly endorsed from a legislative perspective in the state of Florida and is getting push from what just happened in this hurricane season, between that body of work and the significant work we're doing to modernize the grid, we're looking at over the next five-to-seven years well in excess of $1 billion a year that is being invested in this grid. Your specific question was, have the SPP investments, has the hardening of the grid actually made a difference, especially as we reflect on what just happened with Helene and Milton? Absolutely.
As I said when I was responding to, I think it was Maurice earlier, if not for the significant investments we've made, if not for the substantial level of our distribution infrastructure that is underground, the impacts of Milton certainly would have been worse than they were. So customers are certainly being well served by the level and the type of investments that we're making to harden that grid and adapt to an evolving climate.
Yeah. And I think as part of that, RG, and as Chip and Dave unpacked a little bit earlier, sort of that investment in grid of the future, there's a real reliability story around that. And the journey that you've already been on in terms of the reliability impact of the investments already made, but your vision for where that's going, share a little bit about that.
As I said earlier, that we hold ourselves accountable to outcomes. Certainly, from a reliability perspective, our reliability has improved 31% over the last five years. It's that type of data that certainly the commission staff and the commissioners and even the interveners would find quite compelling as they would weigh the merits of the rate case that we just put before them. Our SAIDI, our CAIDI, these are reliability metrics that are widely used in our business. We are best in class in the United States. We are at the top of the heap. I mean, Tampa Electric can hold its own with any other utility in the U.S. when it comes to how reliable our electricity is.
Our vision is to achieve this 30 by 30 through the ADI investments to actually get so that customers on average are only experiencing 30 minutes of outage time annually by the year 2030. To put that in perspective, it's one hour today, give or take. So we're aiming to cut that in half. But the reliability of Tampa Electric is certainly a source of pride for the employees in the company.
Yeah. It should be. It's within the top decile of the top decile right now. It's very impressive. So a lot of that focus has been around the grid. But of course, you've been making significant investments in generation. What does the future look like as it relates to your continued investment in generation?
Right. So I said that if you kind of take all the capital that we are deploying on an annual basis and you were to put it in a series of buckets, you've got buckets on the grid, and not surprisingly, you've got buckets on the generation side of the house. And those are largely intended to improve the reliability of our electric or of our generating stack, our generation stack, sorry, improve the efficiency, meaning we're trying to drive down the fuel bill, or just keeping up with load growth. On an annual basis, our peak demand grows by about 50 megawatts a year, and that just necessitates continuously adding new generation in order to be able to maintain the reserve margins that we are obligated to maintain.
So you will continue to see us adding generation for those three purposes: reliability, efficiency to drive down fuel, or just keeping up with growth.
That's great. We spoke earlier as we kicked us off about a trend that we're seeing across the sector around data centers. Of course, that hasn't been a significant driver of growth for us yet. What are you seeing?
It's certainly changing. If we were sitting here having this conversation a year ago, I think my answer would be there is a party happening, and at this moment, we're not being invited to it. That's simply because in these early days of sort of what's happening with data centers, they're kind of choosing to locate into certain pockets within the country. As the buildout is continuing, and certainly we're starting to experience this over the last six months or so, a lot more interest in the data center community. Whereas Florida may not have been initially viewed as a destination of choice, given the warmer weather and the topography and the storm risk, I think there are a number of factors that are now beginning to converge that are making developers think twice.
And we now have eight different developers that we would be working with, different size data centers, different levels of probability as to whether or not which will land and when will they land. We're certainly not going to land them all. But we are becoming increasingly bullish and increasingly confident that we're going to land some. And if for no other reason, then we have so much going for us. Yes, the weather is something we can't control. And hurricane risk is something we have to adapt to. But our geography extends. People think Tampa Electric is simply the city of Tampa. The service territory that we serve extends all the way to Orlando. And so the geography that we serve sits between two major urban cities, I mean, between Orlando and Tampa. And it's the reason why developers are now knocking on the door.
So lots of action, nothing that we can sort of point to yet, but increasingly confident that we're soon going to get invited to the party.
Great. It's exciting. So any key messages you want to make sure that the audience takes away from the Tampa Electric?
Similar to what Chris said, I mean, we're growing. We're open for business. We're going to continue to be bold and to think big. We're laser-focused on value creation and leading with the customer in mind. We're going to do everything. I love the way you said this at the end, Chris. We're going to do everything we can to maintain the confidence that our customers, that our community, that our regulator, that investors have in what we're doing down in Florida.
That's great. So Helen, RG teed up nicely this sort of great growing state of Florida.
He's putting on notice to compete?
Of course. Of course. Within that, you've got a terrific growth story too. And I think this is still true. Others in the room may have a better sense. But I think of Peoples Gas as one of the, if not the fastest growing utility in the country. You've been seeing double-digit rate base growth as you continue to serve more and more customers. Give us some perspective from Peoples Gas.
Sure. So RG, you were trying to attract people to Tampa. Well, I've got a wider menu of options. I'm not sure I'd be trying to get a lot of people to Jacksonville. But Sarasota, Fort Myers are nice regions. The Miami region is another region we serve. Orlando as well. In fact, we're in all five major metropolitan areas in the state of Florida. So when you look at this graphic here, you can see those blue areas are where Peoples Gas is. And we're nicely located all around the state. We also serve major ports. And ports are. It's probably people think of Florida from a cruise ship perspective. They don't necessarily think of it from a major trade or manufacturing perspective. But increasingly, parts of Florida are turning into those kinds of centers. Jacksonville, for one, is an area where a lot of manufacturing growth is happening.
There's a huge transportation hub there, both on the ground as well as via port. So all that to say, across the state of Florida, Peoples Gas has a very, very good footprint. And there's also still a lot of white space. So when you consider the benefits of Peoples Gas in Florida, one of the things to think about is that three-quarters of the generation, electricity generation in the state of Florida, is fueled by natural gas. So even if there's some more movement towards renewables in due course, that's still a very, very strong platform for natural gas pipeline movement across the state, which is where Peoples Gas comes in. So I think that's kind of the starting point for us is that there's a huge platform from which to grow. And Floridians love natural gas. They love having choice.
Things like Save Our Stoves, which you all heard of over the last year or so, ring true. As more Northeasterners and Midwesterners move to the state of Florida, they bring with them a desire for natural gas. They're used to having their homes heated by natural gas. So they show up in Florida and they talk to builders about wanting to have natural gas. When you think about us and our customers, I struggled to say 500,000th customer earlier, and I had to give it another go. The good majority of those customers are residential customers. That's where if you were to look at our sort of top-line growth in terms of customers, that's where you'll see the majority of our growth. We're growing by about 20,000 customers a year. 3,000 of those are commercial customers.
We have relationships with about 20 national and regional home builders. Those home builders and developers are looking to be in Florida for the long term, and they have multi-year contracts. They have a multi-year build vision, and they come to us and they talk to us about phased developments in which natural gas is a part, and so what we can see as a result of that is a long trajectory of growth ahead of us. At any one time, we've got about 250 contracts in motion, and we've got visibility of houses out to 10 or 15 years at this point, so that's very helpful to us as we think about the system. Because as those residential communities are built, we have to make sure that they are connected to the interstate, and so there's a pipeline expansion that comes in behind all of those residential customers.
Turning to our other customer segments, our commercial and industrial customers, this is where it gets interesting and exciting from my standpoint as we think about the energy transition and we think about the way Peoples Gas is approaching the market. So traditionally, we had been quite sort of traditional in our approach to customers. We approached residential customers with a natural gas solution and commercial customers with a natural gas solution. Strategically, what we're doing now is saying our customers are looking for energy solutions. And if they have sustainability goals, then we're in a place where we can talk to them about compressed natural gas. We can talk to them about renewable natural gas. We can talk to them about distributed energy. And that's how we're now approaching our customers.
And it makes for a much more interesting conversation, let's say, with a port who has fleet vehicles around the port, who has power needs on the port. And so it means that there's a world opening up for gas LDCs in the way that we're approaching our customers here. And I can see some big opportunity here. It also requires us to shift and change the way we work to make those opportunities come to life.
We obviously spoke earlier around sort of the storm impacts with a bit of a focus, of course, on impacts on the electric grid. Talk about sort of the role and importance of natural gas in the context of storms like what we saw last month.
Yeah. And I mean, natural gas LDCs are a very different beast than electric companies. We have to go through the same kind of storm preparedness and storm response as all electric companies have, a bit of a countdown heading into a storm and then a response plan. Similarly, do we, because we do have some above-ground infrastructure that we have to prepare and make sure that our construction sites are tied down and that sort of thing. But through Helene and Milton, through those two major storm events, we had less than 1% of our customers come off the system. And it wasn't because we couldn't supply them gas. It was because their premises were destroyed and they couldn't receive gas. So from a portfolio perspective, we've got $2.5 billion worth of infrastructure underground in the Peoples Gas pipeline system that weathered the storm very effectively.
One of the interesting consequences of storms, though, as people realize that there's potential for a power outage and they look at what are the means that they can protect themselves from that power outage with, or if they're waste management companies with a fleet of trucks that couldn't get access to diesel or to gasoline because ports were closed as a result of the storm, they start thinking about different ways to become more resilient, which is where conversations with us around compressed natural gas vehicles or distributed energy in the form of whole-home generators come in. So we're working hard to make sure that we enable a resilient grid in a different way in the state of Florida.
Similar thread, though, in terms of comparison to electric. What does energy transition mean to a gas LDC?
Yeah. I mean, it's interesting because I guess I think of it from the perspective of sustainability. And we have customers who are increasingly interested in sustainable solutions. And notwithstanding the fact that there isn't an edict for that in Florida, there are national companies that exist in Florida for whom that is really relevant. There are some hotel chains, for instance, who have a sustainability mandate. So I think of it from the perspective of how do we help them if RNG, as opposed to traditional natural gas, will help them meet some emissions targets? What can we do there? And then I also think of it from the perspective of distributed energy. And those are the sort of two ways that I think about energy transition.
On the RNG, CNG, sort of emerging fuels side of things, which is, as I mentioned, a way to help others meet emissions requirements, we're really proud of what we have invested in, and I came into Emera's vision of this sort of halfway through. We had sought and achieved an RNG tariff. We had discovered some RNG projects and worked them into a place to begin investing in them. We now have three RNG projects up and running in the state of Florida, and we were the first ones to do that. We've got another half dozen in motion at various stages of investment opportunity. So what that means ultimately is that we can put renewable natural gas back onto the grid, thereby reducing emissions overall.
If we were to develop all of the RNG projects that we can see in the state of Florida today, we would be able to fulfill the residential customer requirements that we have for natural gas. So there's some nice benefits to investing in that, notwithstanding the fact that they're regulated rate-based investments and earn competitive returns.
Yeah. It's really a great opportunity. So you've been growing at a pace, but you've also been pretty consistently recognized for excellence in customer service and customer satisfaction, J.D. Power award after award in terms of that. How do you manage that? How are you able to sort of continue to deliver excellent customer service at the same time as managing this incredible growth?
It's a great question. And I think it comes down to breaking down what's being measured and what matters to customers. And I would say from a J.D. Power perspective, if we were just to take that one lens, and that isn't the only lens we have, we have other ways of measuring customer satisfaction. But customers are interested in safety, reliability, affordability, and service. What kind of service do they get when they pick up the phone or they go on your website? We benefit from being part of the Emera group of companies. And we share a customer experience service center with Tampa Electric. That means we get access to great infrastructure. Our customers, we have some dual-fuel customers. They have a common platform. That all works very well.
Our service, though, fundamentally, when you think about the safety, reliability side of it, really comes down, in my mind, to reliable operations. And so there's a lot to be said for that. But it also comes down to our people. And we have a very customer-facing set of technicians who are in people's homes. And we attract people for whom customer service is meaningful. And they turn around and do a great job in customers' homes with that. But you can't rest on your laurels. We're growing quickly. We're growing in different directions. And that means we also have to keep training and thinking about customer service in different ways.
So as we make this shift into more integrated market-facing approaches, as I talked about with ports and others, it means either attracting some people with those skills or training and developing our people so that they're able to be more adaptable and more flexible as they face the customers and are able to ask them what they want more. I mean, I think what we've heard on every panel today is the customer plays a much greater role in the delivery of energy than they used to. So we have to have people who listen. We have to have people who ask the right questions and then who listen to the answer and then get innovative and creative about how to deliver it. And so that's a big part of what we're doing.
Makes great sense. So final key messages to leave with the audience about Peoples Gas?
So hopefully you've understood the scale of opportunity from a growth perspective. Hopefully you've got a flavor for the creativity, the different approach that we're taking, really trying to seize those opportunities that will help us as we grow, as we invest capital, make sure that our returns are strong. Hopefully you get a feel for how important people are, not just in Peoples Gas, but I get the last word on this, across all of Emera. And I think you can't replace the focus on people that we have. And I think it's something that from the outside in, it's hard to see. But hopefully our results speak for it because I do think we have outsized results as a result of the focus that we have on our people.
That's great. I agree with that. So really the intent of this panel, hopefully giving you a sense of not only the growth that we've got in front of us and sort of what's driving that, but that those drivers are durable. And there's an element of tying this together with how we'd led off this afternoon about the Emera way around how we're collaborating and sharing best practices that is helping to enable some of this growth, I think a little bit uniquely. So thank you, panel. With that, I'm going to call up Greg Blunden, our Chief Financial Officer, who will give us a financial update. Greg.
Good afternoon, everyone. Unfortunately for all of you, this is not going to be a panel discussion. So you are going to have to tolerate listening to just me for the next half hour. Earlier, we explored the integrated workings of Emera as a cohesive entity and dived into some of the great growth opportunities that lie ahead. I hope you found those discussions that we provided you helpful and provided a deeper understanding of the pivotal role energy will play in our collective futures, the significant challenges that our industry faces, and the strategic resources that we are deploying to seize these growth opportunities. Now I'm excited to present our new capital and funding plans, detailing how we intend to capitalize on these opportunities and drive sustainable growth.
But before doing that, let me turn our attention to our new five-year capital and funding plan. I want to outline our key financial priorities and the strategic actions that we've taken over the past 12 months to optimize our balance sheet and position us to capitalize on these growth opportunities. Our first priority is the effective deployment of capital across our portfolio to drive targeted rate-based growth of 7%-8% through 2029. We have premium operations in high-growth jurisdictions, and against the backdrop of economic and population growth in these areas that we operate, there are significant opportunities to deploy capital to meet the evolving demands of our customers and, most importantly, meet our obligation to deliver reliable energy.
We are focused on managing the pace of our investment to minimize regulatory lag and to best manage the cost impact to customers. Second priority is translating that rate-based growth into earnings growth. We take a disciplined approach to capital allocation, aligning with regulatory cadence to reduce lag. This strategy enables us to convert rate-based growth into growth in earnings and cash flow, delivering long-term shareholder value. Our conviction in translating our competitive rate-based growth into earnings growth empowered us to introduce earnings guidance earlier this year. We remain confident that relative to our June 2024 EPS consensus of $2.96, we will achieve an average of 5%-7% adjusted earnings per share growth over the next three years. Our next priority is continuing on our 18-year track record of consecutive dividend increases.
Emera shareholders can continue to expect dependable and growing dividends underpinned by our prudent financial management and disciplined capital allocation, and while we have moderated dividend growth to balance the increased business investment demands, we remain committed to providing dependable and expected growing dividends, and with our targeted earnings growth well in excess of our updated dividend growth rate, we are on a path to reduce our dividend payout ratio to approximately 80% by the end of 2027. And finally, we are committed to our investment-grade credit rating with stable outlooks and prioritizing achievement of the threshold credit metrics on a sustainable basis. At our last investor day, we articulated a clear path for cash flow and credit metric improvement. At that time, we were confident that if needed, we could pull levers to accelerate achieving our targeted credit metrics.
We did exactly what we said we were going to do. We acted to protect our investment-grade credit rating and best position our company to continue to be able to fund our robust growth opportunities over the long term. Over the past 12 months, we successfully executed on our plan by taking several critical actions that strengthen our balance sheet, create a flexibility in our funding plan, and optimized our portfolio for future growth. Now, if you allow me to take a few minutes to recap what those items were. Five of our critical actions this year focused on optimizing our balance sheet and putting us on an accelerated path to achieve our credit metrics on a sustainable basis.
We closed a successful asset sale program with the sale of two assets, generating proceeds on completion that will exceed our $1.3 billion target set just last year by more than double. In June, we announced and closed our $1.2 billion sale of our interest in the Labrador Island Link to KKR, which improved our 2024 cash flow to debt metric by 60 basis points. In August, we announced the sale of New Mexico Gas, which, when closed, will improve that measure by another 50 basis points. In June, we also increased the flexibility of our balance sheet by completing a $500 million issuance of hybrid securities. These net proceeds were principally used to repay approximately $450 million of long-term holding company debt.
Because this financing receives 50% equity treatment by the credit rating agencies, it further reduced our holding company leverage and improved our 2024 cash flow to total debt by approximately 20 basis points. In addition to the more traditional asset sales, the Nova Scotia Power team negotiated two fuel securitizations. After negotiating the sale of CAD 117 million in fuel costs to the province in the spring, in September, Nova Scotia Power announced that financing from the federal government that will effectively securitize the remaining fuel deferral and other related charges balance and provide a cushion for higher fuel costs in 2025. These actions are incredibly important for customers at Nova Scotia Power. By extending the repayment period of the higher fuel costs, it significantly reduces the cost impact to customers.
And as these transactions substantially represent asset sales for Nova Scotia Power, they also help support the financial health and resiliency of the utility. The transaction reduced our overall debt balance and improved our credit metrics by more than 30 basis points. Overall, our actions have enhanced our 2024 cash flow to total debt metric by 120 basis points, with a further 50 basis point reduction expected upon the finalization of the New Mexico Gas sale in 2025. The measures have added significant flexibility to our balance sheet. And going forward, the proceeds from these asset sales, which exceeded our 2024 funding plan by more than two times, will also reduce our need for new equity over the forecast period, which I'll get into in a few moments. A key element of translating our rate-based growth and earnings growth is achieving balanced regulatory outcomes.
Constructive rate case outcomes allow us to effectively manage regulatory lag while making the prudent and important investments for our customers to improve the reliability and resilience of our systems and to execute on government-mandated decarbonization policies. Over the last 12 months, our teams have delivered constructive rate case outcome at all three of our U.S. utilities, most recently with a meaningful decision at Tampa Electric yesterday. Archie already covered the highlights, so I won't repeat what he's already shared with you, other than to say that the decision was balanced and constructive and in line with what our expectations were. Specifically, we retained our 54% equity thickness and had our midpoint return on equity set at 10.5% with a 100 basis points band on either side.
Looking forward, we will work with stakeholders to ensure that the investments we are required to make for the benefit of our customers are included in customer rates as efficiently as possible. We'll work to find creative alternatives to help minimize the cost of these investments for customers and can already point to examples where we've accomplished this, partnering with local governments in Nova Scotia to keep financing costs low and leveraging the IRA to help fund renewable projects in Florida. With our strengthened balance sheet and constructive rate case outcomes, we have established a strong foundation for the future progress. Now, let me walk you through the detail of our plans for the coming years. The earlier presentations highlighted why this period is transformational for the utility industry, making it a pivotal time for investment in our regulated portfolio.
Key trends such as accelerating demand growth, changing grid configuration, decarbonization, electrification, and the increasing need for resilience against climate-related events are driving unprecedented capital investment to deliver the reliable energy our customers expect. Against the backdrop of economic and population growth in the areas in which our utilities operate, these forces necessitate significant capital deployment. Our first-ever five-year capital plan totals $20 billion and demonstrates our commitment to the evolving demands in the industry, the robust investments that we need to make to meet the needs of our customers at our utilities, and our confidence that the demand for investment is not subsiding for the foreseeable future. Now, let's look at how that capital will be allocated. Nearly 80% of the $20 billion is concentrated in Florida.
We anticipate the robust population and economic growth in Florida continue, with Tampa Electric and Peoples Gas experiencing customer growth of 4% and 2%, respectively. Almost 20% of the planned capital program will be spent in Nova Scotia to support the growth we're experiencing in Nova Scotia and the continued commitment that we have to improve reliability. As we build out our capital strategy for the next five years, we are being thoughtful and deliberate in allocating funds to drive value for our utility customers. This includes meeting the demands of the future grid and ensuring that our power supply becomes more reliable, resilient, and sustainable. In the end, that's the outcome that matters most to the people we serve. So I want to take a moment now to look at some of the major components of the $20 billion capital plan.
We are investing more than $13 billion in projects aimed at upgrading, strengthening, and modernizing the grid. These initiatives will improve reliability, efficiency, and resilience, and allow us to meet the evolving customer needs while driving operational efficiency and cost savings. At Tampa Electric, this includes investments in the expansion of the transmission and distribution networks to support our customer growth and investments in the Storm Protection Plan to harden the grid. At Nova Scotia Power, it includes projects like the Atlantic Reliability Intertie, vegetation management, and storm hardening. And at Peoples Gas, we have significant investments targeted at bringing new customers online as we continue to see growth in the demand for natural gas. In addition, our system improvement investments have hardened the system, increased reliability, allowed us to meet compliance, and create redundancy in the system. Approximately $3.5 billion is allocated to expanding our renewable energy capabilities.
This includes integrating renewable energy capacity and investing in energy storage to mitigate the intermittent nature of renewable generation. Examples include continued investments in solar power at Tampa Electric, additional hydro and wind capacity at Nova Scotia Power, and electric grid-scale battery storage at both of these utilities. These initiatives reduce customers' exposure to volatile fuel prices, and in Nova Scotia, will support the achievement of our legislated carbon reduction targets. At Peoples Gas, we will continue to invest in renewable natural gas. The RNG investments at Peoples Gas supplement gas delivery to CNG and LNG users, enhancing their sustainability portfolios and supporting decarbonization efforts for customers seeking lower carbon fuels, and finally, we expect to invest more than $2 billion on strategic investments in new technology and customer-focused initiatives to help advance greater operational efficiency, cost savings, and enhance service delivery across our operating companies.
The plan that we have outlined aims to drive rate-based growth of 7%-8% over the target time horizon. This competitive and sustainable growth rate allows us to deliver value to our expanding base of electricity and gas customers at our utilities while managing regulatory lag and the cost impact for customers. Disciplined growth, supported by a prudent funding plan, will translate into predictable earnings per share of 5%-7%. Now, let's look at how we will fund this growth. The most sustainable source of funding as we grow is reinvested cash flow from our operations. And the best use of that cash flow from our high-growth jurisdiction is reinvesting to meet the needs of the future. We expect our organic cash generation to fulfill 45%-50% of our funding needs.
The next largest component of our funding plan is issued by our operating companies to fund their growth plans. These debt issuances will be aligned with the capital structures approved by their respective regulators. At the holding company, we expect to maintain our holding company debt at 30%-35% of total debt. The use of debt financing will be judicious and will be mindful of our stated financial priority of maintaining investment-grade credit ratings on a sustainable basis. We expect debt issuances to make up 30%-40% of our planned capital spend. Further, we believe hybrid capital has an important role to play in our funding requirements. Hybrids receive 50/50 debt equity treatment from the rating agencies.
This favorable treatment of hybrid and preferred equity makes these attractive tools that we'll continue to access strategically to fund approximately $750 million-$1 billion, or up to 5% of our funding plan. As I mentioned earlier, we're able to conclude strategic asset sales on highly favorable terms, including the pending conclusion of New Mexico Gas for $750 million. This has reduced the need for outside equity. To the extent that equity is required to support our organic growth we're seeing in our operating companies, we'll continue to access the equity markets through our DRIP and ATM programs for up to 10% of our funding needs. We expect to raise, on average, approximately $400 million a year between these programs. The ATM program, in particular, allows us to be strategic and prioritize equity raises in more favorable markets.
And with the success of our asset sales this year, we do not expect to require any equity through the ATM program in 2025. We have been thoughtful in developing our capital and funding plans over the next five years. And it has been done in support of the financial priorities that I've outlined. But I don't want to minimize the work that it took to get to this point. When you look at our debt portfolio at the end of 2022, just before our last investor day, and compare it to where our balance sheet is today, you can see how impactful our actions have been in deleveraging and creating balance sheet flexibility. Our debt balances at December 31st, 2022, reflected significant regulatory deferrals at Tampa Electric and Nova Scotia Power.
The teams at each of these utilities have made incredible progress over the last 21 months, managing through over $1 billion of regulatory deferrals. This has meaningfully reduced our exposure to variable rates at our operating companies. At the holding company level, the sale of Labrador Island Link also significantly reduced our floating rate debt at the corporate level. As a result of these actions, we have reduced our total exposure to floating rates by more than 40% since our last investor day. And looking forward, we expect that much of the remaining floating rate holding company debt will be repaid with the proceeds from the sale of New Mexico Gas in 2025. Lower exposure to variable rate debt going forward translates into greater visibility and predictability around our earnings profile.
Further, through these decisive actions that we've discussed, we have not only reduced our exposure to variable rates, but we've also significantly reduced our holding company to total debt metric from approximately 40% at the end of 2022 to 35% at the end of Q3. And when we consider the pro forma impact of the sale of New Mexico Gas, that would improve that credit metric by an additional 200 basis points. Looking forward, we have manageable refinancing needs over the next five years, further reducing our exposure to interest rates. With minimal bond refinancings required in 2025, we're turning our attention to 2026 and the refinancing of the $1.2 billion in hybrid notes that would otherwise see a rate reset at that time.
Our strengthened balance sheet gives us optionality around how we can refinance those hybrids, which represents the largest refinancing need that we have over the five-year period. Our intention is to maintain our long-term capital structure with approximately 10% hybrid capital and maintain the credit agency treatment of hybrid capital as 50% equity. And while we have not committed to a specific refinancing path at this time, you can be certain that our plan for the hybrids will achieve those objectives. With our strengthened balance sheet and balanced five-year funding plan, we have a clear path to achieving our targeted credit metrics on a sustainable basis beginning in 2025. I think at this point, there could be no question about our ability to achieve threshold credit metrics next year.
We expect the 2025 cash flow debt metrics to be in the range of 12%-12.5%, with incremental improvement expected each year beyond reflecting our growth in operating cash flow. As we implement our plans for capital investment and funding into 2029, we are committed to sustaining our credit metrics that support our investment-grade ratings, and we're confident that our growing cash flows and prudent management of our strengthened balance sheet will support that objective. We have made significant progress on a number of fronts since our last investor day. We have focused our portfolio of companies, strengthened our balance sheet, and concluded rate cases with constructive outcomes. These achievements give us confidence as we move forward with our robust investment and funding plans from 2025 through to 2029.
We believe we're well-positioned to deliver reliable earnings per share growth at a compound rate of 5%-7% over the next three years. Further, by prioritizing the reinvestment of cash flows in our high-growth businesses and with our sustainable dividend growth rate, we will see meaningful improvement in our dividend payout ratio towards our target of 80% by 2027. Finally, I'm excited to share that in 2025, Emera intends to list on the New York Stock Exchange. With a growing majority of our business centered in Florida, we believe a dual listing better facilitates access to capital from our U.S. investors. This step also aligns us with the approximate 70% of current TSX 60 issuers who are already dual listed. In addition, the increased liquidity provided by the listing in the U.S. should help close the valuation gap relative to our dual listed Canadian peers.
I want to be clear that this intention to list does not imply that we're planning to do a U.S. equity offering. Common equity continues to represent only 10% of our funding plan, and we're well-served by the strategic use of both our DRIP and ATM programs. Since our last investor day, a crucial part of our efforts have been to strengthen our balance sheet with a clear focus on improving credit metrics for this year and beyond. We've accomplished what we said we were going to do, and now we're ready to execute against our new five-year capital and funding plan. We have been diligent in developing these plans to achieve our key financial objectives, growing both earnings and cash flow, supporting continued dividend growth, achieving our targeted credit metrics on a sustainable basis, and meeting our customer needs over the forecast period.
With a portfolio heavily weighted to operations in Florida, one of the best regions in North America to own an operating utility, we believe we're incredibly well-positioned to execute on the robust growth opportunities required across our portfolio and, in doing so, deliver long-term sustainable value for both customers and shareholders. And before I wrap up, I want to thank all of you. To our investors, we appreciate that you have many options to invest capital. Thank you for your confidence in Emera. Scott, myself, and our team at Emera take stewardship of your capital seriously, and we will continue to run the business in a way that protects and grows your investment. To the analysts that cover us, thank you for the many hours you commit to understanding our business and your efforts to communicate the Emera story.
You're an important part of the capital markets, and we enjoy working with each and every one of you. Lastly, to our banker friends, thank you for your continued strategic guidance and, of course, your continued financial support. With that, I'm going to ask Scott to join me up front, and we're welcome to open it up for Q&A, and other members of the management team will be readily available as necessary and required.
Hi, Mark Jarvi from CIBC. Scott, at the first panel, you talked a bit about sort of the hybrid approach you take, where you have some top-down guidance, but autonomy at the local level. As you think about the influence from the top down, what priorities have evolved over the last couple of years for messaging that you're delivering to the leaders of your subsidiaries right now? Is it more about smoothing out earnings?
Is it adjusting the pace of decarbonization? Is it managing government and regulatory affairs? What has become more influential from you sending a message to the leaders of your affiliates?
Yeah, so thank you for the question, Mark. I think the reality is the message sometimes is a little bit different from business to business. We certainly would have heard one of them, perhaps obviously, is the focus on people, focus on safety, of course. But I'd say the other is ensuring that we have for shareholders. And part of that is to make sure that we are earning an appropriate return on equity or return on capital for the investments that we're making. So those would be some of the most common themes that not just me, but Karen, Greg, the rest of the team would be conveying. And we talk about collectively as a team as well.
So does that translate into sort of managing the profile of capital between rate cases, riders, and things like that? What specifically are you instructing teams to try to push harder for?
Yeah, so we want to make sure that we're continuing to meet the demands of customer growth and continuing to invest in reliability. But at the same time, making sure that there's a rate path that's both affordable but also provides that return on capital. So that doesn't mean a perfectly smooth return profile, perfectly smooth earnings profile. It's one of the reasons why we talk about a range of 5%-7% EPS growth. And we talk about it on average as opposed to precisely each and every year, because there will be some level of cadence depending on timing.
But within that context, all of the above, as it relates to ensuring that we are thinking ahead, as it relates to the capital that we're investing, we're investing it prudently on behalf of customers, but making sure we're not investing it too far in advance before there's rate support to ensure that we're getting a return on that capital.
And I had another question about NSPI. It looks like a step up in capital spending. I'm sure you don't want to put that capital out there before you can get a recovery of that, which probably signals that you will be going in for new rates sooner than later there. How do you think about positioning that business, given the fact that there was talk of a rate cap in the election, that the generation assets might be spun out of NSPI?
So how do you think about planning that with a few things uncertain in the background before that? And at what point are you confident you can go in with a plan to the regulator?
Yeah, I think what I'd say, Mark, is kind of repeating some of the message before, but that is there is a very constructive relationship that Chris and Peter and the team at Nova Scotia Power have continued to build, not just with customers, of course, but also with government and working with them as it relates to the investments that are needed to meet customers' needs and to execute government policy.
But at the same time, making sure that there is a path for Nova Scotia Power to return to its appropriate return on equity level and working with government around all the different kinds of levers that collectively we can use in order to manage a rate path that's affordable for Nova Scotians. And you would have seen two significant ones this year, of course, with the securitization of the FAM. And then Chris also spoke about the use of special purpose vehicle for some of these incremental investments that are needed, like the New Brunswick-Nova Scotia transmission intertie, the use of CIB funding, and even Mi'kmaq Indigenous Nations equity investment and projects in order to, in part, do the right thing as it relates to our engagement with those communities, but also, frankly, to help to create an affordable rate path for Nova Scotians as those investments are made.
Yes, there is more investment that is required in the system in Nova Scotia. There's more investment in the grid that's required. There's more investment, obviously, in the generation side of the business that is largely being done by government, procuring by government, and the intention of establishing a new independent system operator in Nova Scotia. Government and the utility are working jointly in order to manage the rate path forward as best as possible to keep that affordable for Nova Scotians.
Just to clarify, in terms of the plan laid out, does that involve any spending on generation, or is it exclusively transmission, distribution, and battery storage with the view that generation becomes responsibility of the system?
No planned investment on new generation. It would be ongoing investment in the existing generation that is there.
But at this point in time, no planned CapEx in new generation that would be under the purview of the new independent system operator. There is the ability for Nova Scotia Power or Emera to bid and participate in that process, but that wouldn't be our current intention. We'll stay focused on the transmission and distribution assets, focused on reliability investments for the customer, and collaboratively working with government and the independent system operator in order to navigate that path forward. The one variance, we are investing in batteries, as you heard before, not new generation, but certainly storage, as well as those T&D investments.
Okay, thank you.
Chris, anything I missed in that, or Greg?
Thanks, Mark. Great, thank you Scott.
Pat Kenny, National Bank. Greg, just a question on the $1.35 FX assumption embedded in the capital plan.
If it turns out that we are closer to, say, $1.45, as some predict next year, just curious what levers you might have to pull to maintain the equity needs within the funding plan?
Yeah, obviously, I don't think any of us know where the Canadian dollar is going to go. What we've tried to do on our capital plan is to also normalize the starting point so everybody can use their own FX rate to determine how that impacts the capital. Also important to know that to the extent that we have a weaker Canadian dollar, the amount of internally generated cash flow is significantly higher because, obviously, the bulk of our cash flow now is in U.S. dollars, and so some of that is largely self-funding, so to the extent that we have the Canadian dollar stay around $1.40, it doesn't change our funding plans a whole lot.
It would be obviously helpful from an earnings per share perspective.
Maybe a related question for Scott or Archie. But Archie had mentioned that the work done on the decarbonization front was really to help insulate customers down the road from what could come on the carbon tax front. I'm just curious, what is the strategy today? What's being implemented to protect customers from what could come on the tariff front, as well as some supply chain issues related to backlog in transformers, turbines, and other inflationary pressures?
So I'll let Archie answer that question, but just as he's coming up, the other thing I'd say, Pat, is not just as it relates to future carbon pricing or emission cap, but it's also just to reduce the volatility of fossil fuel costs today has been a big part of the investment in cleaner generation today. But Archie, over to you.
Yeah, I agree with that. I think the question you're asking has to do with the tariffs that Trump announced recently, so whether or not he actually moves forward with those,
I guess it's just about, and supply chain challenges.
Yeah. On the first part, which is on the tariffs, we at Tampa Electric, I can't speak for Peoples Gas, but at Tampa Electric, we purchase very few materials from Canada. We've had the procurement team sort of going through the list of all the materials that we purchase. And really, it's a very small portion that would be subject to a tariff if, in fact, something was ever enacted,
and same is true for Mexico, I think.
Yes. Same answer. Same answer for Mexico. On the supply chain challenges, I mean, honestly, we've been dealing with supply chain challenges post-pandemic, and it hasn't slowed us down yet.
I would say we're very aggressive when it comes to our supply chain. It's helped by the fact that we're doing so much capital investment. So it necessitates that we have a very strong inventory. And we take actions well ahead of when they otherwise might be needed to ensure that supply chain doesn't become a challenge. So this is an issue. We've been dealing with it. It hasn't stymied us, hasn't limited our ability to interconnect a customer or to execute a capital project or to deal with a hurricane restoration. We'll continue to be aggressive with our inventory management to ensure supply chain isn't a challenge.
Thanks. Maurice Choy from RBC Capital Markets. Scott, you've been CEO since 2018.
Since then, you've had to deal with a number of themes from deleveraging post-TECO acquisition, COVID, and now moving forward in Florida and dealing with the Nova Scotia government's agenda. What are some of the things that you would have liked to have done over the past six years that perhaps you think it's worth tackling moving forward?
Yeah, so I just want to make sure I understand the question, Maurice. What are the things that you would have liked to do differently or focus on going forward?
Well, some of the things that you would have liked to have done over the last six years that perhaps you didn't manage to, whether for a variety of reasons.
Yeah, I mean, look, there's a reality since I took on this role and partnered with Greg that we've been working on recovery of the balance sheet and achieving credit metrics through the entirety of that time. And there were some things that happened along the way that either the bar was moved or we saw things like tax reform that knocked us back. So the journey took longer than we thought. And I think if I'd known that, then maybe we would have done a few things different earlier. And thankful that we're now in a place where we're solidly and clearly, unquestionably on a path now to get ratings back to stable, to exceed our credit metric thresholds, and continue to strengthen the balance sheet and be able to use that.
So it's nice now to be a little bit more on our toes than on our heels, if that makes sense. And in some ways, the timing is perfect because we're sitting here at a time, as we've unpacked for you all today, where demand is growing. People want more of what it is that we make and sell, electrons and molecules. And so demand is growing. The need and opportunity to invest is as good as it's ever been. And the drivers of that are continuing. So to be in a place now where we're not needing to deliver at the same time as we're investing in this growth, of course, we're going to continue to strengthen the balance sheet. But we're not in a place where we need to incrementally deliver as we're making this CapEx.
It's, frankly, part of what got Greg and I comfortable with being able to initiate EPS guidance for the first time, where we've got confidence in terms of where that balance sheet profile is, the earnings profile that's ahead of us. But if I was able to watch the movie ahead of time, I might have tried to accelerate that balance sheet repair a little quicker. But things happened as they did. Glad we're in the place that we are, and the timing is perfect because I think it sets us up really nicely to deliver strong earnings growth over time over the next few years.
Rich Simon with J.P. Morgan. I wanted to circle back to some of the Florida load growth commentary, but maybe dialing in on the data centers.
I think it was developers in discussions now realized every project could be different, and you said you wouldn't land them all. But can you give a sense on the overall pipeline and then just where, roughly, in the process they are when there could be updates that emerge? Thank you.
Thank you very much, Rich, for that. So a couple of points on all that. Yes, I did say eight different developers. Right now, the pipeline is in the neighborhood of 1,200 megawatts. So what we're dealing with are really data centers that are arranged from, I think, as small as 10 megawatts to as big as I think the biggest one right now is 350 megawatts. And that pipeline continues to grow. I mean, you're really starting to see a lot of action.
I think your second question is, when are we going to be able to announce something? I'm not sure. Not today, but certainly feeling good about it, and just to put a couple of things into perspective, so for a system the size of Tampa Electric, to the extent that we were able to land a 300-megawatt data center that operates with a 90% load factor, for us, that would represent 12% load growth on an annual basis, and a 300-megawatt data center in this day and age is actually not a very large data center. I mean, a lot of them you're seeing are 1,000 megawatts, and so given our scale and what's happening with data centers, they really represent a very meaningful step in growth for us as a company.
To the question that was asked earlier on supply chain, and to give you a real live example of when I say we're aggressive when it comes to the supply chain, in anticipation that something is coming on data centers, we actually have already purchased. We've put the orders in for all of the transformers, everything that would be required to interconnect a meaningfully sized data center so that when you actually land the fish, we don't find ourselves in a situation where we're saying, well, we're just not ready for you yet. We're being very proactive, very aggressive, because it's clear to us from these data center developers, speed to serve is critical. And we're making sure that that's not a constraint for us.
And then just one follow-up question on regulatory strategy. Tampa Electric, great case in the rearview now.
Any learnings to inform kind of the PGS regulatory strategy going forward? Any takeaways there for future PGS filings?
So I'll call Helen up. So I think there's a reality that with the pace of growth that the Peoples Gas sees, that there's going to need to be sort of a continued assessment as to the need for rates. There's been some sucess recently with some riders. Yep. Over to you.
Yeah, so thank you for the question. I think riders, going back to the conversation around what can we learn from each other, riders is definitely an area of focus for us. And this year, we received approval for a municipal relocation rider. We're asked to move pipeline as a result of transportation projects, so highway replacement projects. And we now have a rider in place to enable us to get rapid recovery of that capital.
We also filed for an extension of our cast iron and bare steel rider with the intent of getting more of our sustaining reliability resiliency type capital covered as well. And so we're still waiting on the outcome of that. With respect to other outcomes from the Tampa Electric rate case, we're evaluating things like subsequent year adjustments. And we've been looking at all of the utilities as they file and trying to understand the merits of the different strategies that have been deployed because one utility went forward with three years of MFRs. Others are looking at subsequent year adjustments. So we're looking at what the appetite for those different mechanisms is, all in the spirit of trying to get to a place where we have more mechanisms to recover our capital more quickly. So we'll do a full debrief of the Tampa Electric rate case.
As we talked about how our teams work together, Peoples Gas has people sitting on the Tampa Electric rate case group and vice versa. And so we're sort of constantly learning and paying attention.
OK, so if there's no more questions, final call. So let me end by repeating a message from Greg. And that's a sincere thank you for spending the better part of four hours with us this afternoon. We know there's lots of demands on your time and really appreciate the time that you've taken to spend with us today, the support that you all provide, and the interest and the engagement that you all had today. So thank you for that. I also want to thank all the panelists today, Archie and Chris and Helen, but also Karen and Lia, Chip and Dave, of course, Greg, as always.
As you know, these things don't happen on their own. It's a massive effort to organize. Dave Bezanson and his team, including Arianne and Bailey, who's been in the back flipping slides for us, and Yolande and so many others that have contributed to this, thank you all for helping to pull this off today. For those who can join us, and I hope all of you can or as many as possible, we have cocktails and then dinner at Carisma Restaurant, just a couple of blocks from here at 6:00 P.M. For those of you that need some workspace between now and then, there are meeting rooms and space available for you down the hall. The team can help to make that available.
For those of you that are sort of heading onward from here, either now or later, my final message would be one of safety, and that is to please travel safely. Again, thank you all for your interest.