Welcome to the Enbridge Inc. Second Quarter 2022 Financial Results Conference Call. My name is Sylvie, and I will be your conference operator for today's call. At this time, all participants are in a listen-only mode. Following the presentation, we will conduct a question-and-answer session for the investment community. During the question-and-answer session, if you have a question, please press star one on your touch-tone phone. Please note that this conference is being recorded. I would like to turn the call over to Jonathan Morgan, Senior Vice President, Capital Markets. Jonathan, you may begin.
Thank you. Good morning, and welcome to the Enbridge Inc. Q2 2022 earnings call. Joining me this morning are Al Monaco, President and CEO, Vern Yu, Chief Financial Officer, and the heads of each of our business units, Colin Gruending, Liquids Pipelines, Cynthia Hansen, Gas Transmission and Midstream, Michele Harradence, Gas Distribution and Storage, and Matthew Akman, Renewable Power and New Energy Technologies. As per usual, this call will be webcast, and I encourage those listening on the phone to follow along with the supporting slides. We'll try to keep the call to roughly one hour, and in order to answer as many questions as possible, we'd appreciate you limiting your questions to one plus a single follow-up as necessary. We'll be prioritizing questions from the investment community.
If you are a member of the media, please direct your inquiries to our communications team, who will be happy to respond. As always, our investor relations team will be available following the call for any additional questions. On to slide two, where I will remind you that we'll be referring to forward-looking information on today's presentation and in the Q&A. By its nature, this information contains forecasts, assumptions, and expectations about future outcomes, which are subject to the risks and uncertainties outlined here and discussed more fully in our public disclosure filings. We'll also be referring to non-GAAP measures as summarized below. With that, I'll turn it over to Al Monaco.
Thanks, Jonathan. Hello, everyone. I'll start off this morning with how we're doing on our key priorities mid-year. I'll then cover our business update, including the new investments announced today that further accelerate our natural gas strategy. Vern will recap our capital allocation framework and review our financial results, the future outlook, and ESG performance. Before we do that, let me begin with the bigger picture and the two-pronged strategy we laid out at Enbridge Day. It's pretty clear we're in a global energy crisis, and that we'll need all sources of supply to meet demand with affordable, sustainable, and secure energy. As we've said before, North America is extremely well-positioned with globally competitive, reliable, and sustainable supply. Given the inflection point in energy markets we've experienced, our two-pronged strategy is proving to be the right one.
That is to continue investing in the best conventional opportunities while ramping up and franchise low-carbon infrastructure over time. Our focus in the last few years is to build out our export infrastructure, and that's even more relevant today. Acquiring the Ingleside export facility filled out our Gulf Coast liquid strategy and is already opening up low-carbon export opportunities. With our natural gas systems along the Gulf Coast and in B.C., we're capitalizing on global LNG demand growth. We've got a plethora of low-carbon development opportunities in flight that nicely leverage our existing assets and fit our low-risk model. We see renewables, RNG, hydrogen, and carbon capture picking up steam and bolstering growth. With that context, here's the mid-year check against our priorities. Our number one priority will always be safety, and we're tracking well this year.
Operationally, we performed well in Q2, strong utilization, record gas transmission delivery days, and good wind resources. Results-wise, we had a solid quarter, and we're on track to achieve our full-year EBITDA and DCF per share guidance. That puts us in good shape on our three year 5%-7% DCF per share CAGR target through 2024, off of 2021. The balance sheet is strong, and we're on track to exit 2022 at the low end of our leverage range. So far this year, we've secured CAD 4.5 billion of new investments that are right down the middle of the Enbridge fairway. That includes expansion of our B.C. system and a 30% stake in Woodfibre LNG. Our post-2024 secured growth hopper is filling up nicely.
On capital allocation, we'll continue to be disciplined by optimally deploying growing free cash flow. Part of that is returning capital to a steadily growing dividend, and we've initiated share buybacks, as you've seen. On to the business update, beginning with liquids. After an extended upstream and downstream turnaround season, Mainline volumes are ramping up. We expect to get to the full-year average guide of 2.95 million barrels per day. In gas transmission, we had four of the top five power plant peak delivery days in the last five years, and we hit record LNG and Mexico export deliveries at three BCF a day in April. A couple of weeks ago, we also reached an agreement in principle on the Texas Eastern rate case. Very good news there.
We're moving along well on CAD 7 billion of capital in execution. In utility, there's another CAD 3 billion underway, including 40,000 customer adds this year and three more RNG projects. Finally, in renewables, we're in heavy construction mode with four offshore wind projects and ten solar self-power projects totaling almost CAD 3 billion. Again, part of that is offshore France. Saint-Nazaire is going well and on schedule to start generating cash flow later this year. Now a brief update on liquids fundamentals and Mainline tolling. The global energy inflection point I referenced earlier is driving improving North American oil fundamentals. This is Colin's John Madden-type graphic that explains why. First, the historically long turnaround season has wound down. WCSB production is ramping back up as the Mainline was apportioned for August deliveries, so basically we're at capacity.
Permian supply is strong, with growth this year expected around 500,000 barrels a day. Given OPEC constraints, embargoed barrels, and a return of Asian economic growth, the natural outlet for light barrels is exports to Europe. Over time, we'll see inventories building back up, including the U.S. Strategic Petroleum Reserves. You recall, inventories are extremely low levels right now. These shifting fundamentals are positive as we're well-positioned on both light and heavy barrels. On Mainline tolling, discussions with our customers continue. We've spent quality time exchanging information upfront, and we're now in negotiations. Overall, the process I would say, and our discussions with our customers have been constructive. As you know, there's a preference for an incentive-based model, which has worked well for our customers and us over the last 25 years.
We're pursuing that option, but we're prepared to shift the cost to service if needed. Either option is acceptable to us, as we've said in the past. To keep that latter part moving along, you'll likely see some required pre-filing CER notices in the next month or so. We're motivated to land something that works for our customers and a reasonable risk return profile for us. Timing-wise, we'll likely decide which of the two paths we'll be on by the end of the summer. Let's shift now to our LNG strategy, starting with the fundamentals and how we're positioned. Right off the bat, it's clear that natural gas is an increasingly exciting story and will be a growth driver for us in the long term. First, North American LNG exports are expected to increase to 30 BCF per day, and everyone knows the reasons behind that.
Our assets are critical to making that happen with last-mile connectivity. You can think of our U.S. Gulf Coast and B.C. Mainline systems as headers, connecting growing low-cost supply from Appalachia, the Permian, the Haynesville, and Montney with export market demand pull. We supply four operating LNG plants in the Gulf, soon to be five actually, and today we make up roughly 20% of North American exports. Those connections are supported by long-term take-or-pay contracts. As you can see here with the bar chart, the precedent agreements we signed on two more LNG facilities that are pending FID, we could see our market share increase to 30% of exports. While our focus is on pipeline connections, we've been open to liquefaction investments, which we talked about before, providing they meet our investment criteria.
Namely, it needs to be a value chain extension of our existing pipelines that anchor expansions or new lines. That means pretty much directly connected to liquefaction. It needs to be aligned with our low-risk commercial model, so highly predictable cash flows and accretive to future growth, so with expansion potential. Here's how our LNG strategy is unfolding, beginning with the Gulf Coast. With Venture Global's sanctioning of Plaquemines, we're now underway with the Venice expansion. That's a solid $400 million investment with a 20-year contract. We've secured now another $1.6 billion with the Rio Bravo new build and the Valley Crossing expansion. Both of the associated LNG plants there are pending FID by NextDecade and Texas LNG. Of course, we're now also in discussion with LNG proponents other than those to see what other opportunities are there.
Related to the LNG connections themselves, a recent open season revealed very strong customer interest in upstream access to our headers to connect growing Haynesville supply to LNG. We're now designing potential options to expand Texas Eastern and Valley Crossing, so stay tuned on that over the next few months. Moving north to B.C. and our T-North system. The fundamentals here point to strong WCSB supply growth over the next several years. We've seen a lot of positivity from our customers recently, which also came through on Alliance's contract extensions. This is all being driven by very low costs and a liquids-rich resource base that rivals U.S. shales. The basin presents a great opportunity to feed growing regional and global demand with natural gas. Our B.C. Mainline is a critical part of getting gas to market, particularly to support LNG pull.
To that point, we've completed a very successful open season and now sanction a 535 million cubic feet a day expansion of T-North. That's larger than we originally thought. This CAD 1.2 billion expansion is mostly compression, and commercially, it's under cost of service. The next step is to engage stakeholders and file the regulatory application, and the targeted ISD here is late 2026. Today, you saw we also launched a binding open season to expand T-South, which is driven by the recent FID of Woodfibre LNG. That expansion would replace capacity currently moving volume to the Pacific Northwest, which will be utilized to feed Woodfibre LNG on the West Coast when it's completed. Our preliminary estimate is CAD 2.5 billion, also tolled under cost of service with a projected ISD of 2028.
If T-South does move ahead, we could see a further expansion of T-North. That's another opportunity. T-North and T-South, I think, really illustrate well the power of our strategically positioned system for low-cost access to growing markets. Now, that system also allows us now to extend our value chain to LNG liquefaction. This morning, we announced a 30% equity investment in Woodfibre, which will be the second LNG facility on the West Coast. This is a really exciting ground-floor opportunity for us, so let me provide some context on what's behind the investment. Our partner, Pacific Energy, has developed a project and established excellent community relationships. Woodfibre is integrated with Pacific's upstream reserves, a 2.8 TCF in the Montney, which is currently producing around 300 million cubic feet a day, with contracted transportation capacity on our system, as I mentioned.
Our 30% ownership in Woodfibre LNG is structured as a preferred interest, which provides us with a predictable stream of cash flow and a solid return. Our share of the expected cost is $1.5 billion, with about 70% of the liquefaction facilities project financed. Our equity investment is approximately $900 million through 2027, which will be easily funded within existing investment capacity. In fact, Vern Yu will discuss the ample room we have to deploy free cash flow going forward beyond that. We've evaluated a number of LNG projects in the past, and this one ticks the investment criteria boxes I mentioned earlier and more. Strategically, it aligns with our very positive view of natural gas today and well into the future, particularly global LNG growth.
It extends our value chain as Woodfibre connects to our upstream pipes, as you see on the map here, and anchors their expansion. Its size and use of existing infrastructure and routing make it highly executable, and we're very pleased with Squamish Nation's support of the project, and I'll come back to this in a minute. It also fits squarely within our pipeline utility model, supports medium- and long-term growth, and it generates a strong equity return, so it clears the capital allocation hurdles we set for organic projects within the framework. Finally, what we really like is that it'll be among the lowest-emission facilities in the world at less than 0.4 tons of CO₂ equivalent per ton of LNG delivered. All in, it clearly hits the mark for us strategically, financially, and it aligns with our emissions objectives.
Woodfibre LNG is located near Squamish, sited on industrial land that previously housed a pulp and paper mill. The plant will produce 2.1 million tons annually, that's around 300 million cubic feet a day, with 250,000 cubic meters of storage. There's very good access to the site via Howe Sound, which is well-traveled, and we expect loadings of 2 ships-3 ships a month. Importantly, the Squamish Nation itself approved the project, which includes a long-term benefits agreement. The LNG plant and upstream infrastructure has received local, provincial, and federal approval. 70% of the capacity of the plant is under long-term contracted offtake with BP, and more capacity is likely to be locked up. FortisBC will expand their system, which connects T-South with the plant itself.
Woodfibre LNG is ideally positioned to meet growing Asian demand, and here's how we see that picture. First, Asian LNG demand is forecast to more than double. Woodfibre LNG is among the lowest-cost supply sources because of the globally competitive Montney supply. There's roughly 150 TCF of reserves at a cost of less than $2/MMBTU, which means Canadian LNG is very high in the global LNG dispatch order. Another part of the value equation here is proximity to markets, which shaves 2 weeks-4 weeks off shipping times, so lower transportation costs and emissions. Combined, these factors make Woodfibre LNG breakevens on par or better than U.S. Gulf Coast alternatives. Even put aside today's frothy global LNG market, the West Coast is highly competitive in any future energy scenario that we see.
More broadly here, as a side note, we see a huge opportunity here for Canada to materially ramp up LNG exports. The economic benefits are obvious, but also for Canada to play a leading role in improving global energy security and reducing GHG emissions beyond our own borders. Finally in execution, the plant will be a modular design, which is ideally suited for this location under a lump sum turnkey EPCC contract. The final capital cost will be determined next April, and that'll be the basis for setting our return and preferred distribution. The Squamish Nation has completed an environmental assessment of the project, and actually, it's the first one to be approved under the government of Canada's Five Principles framework. With environmental approvals in hand, the team is now focused on securing construction permits.
We've laid out the timeline here with an expected ISD of 2027, and the spend is spread out over the next five years. Before I turn to Vern, a quick recap on our low-carbon strategy. As you know, our approach is to capitalize on existing infrastructure to extend growth with the same business model and returns as the rest of the business. All in, we've got close to CAD 4 billion in development with more on the way. On renewables, our development pipeline in France is about 2 GW, providing good growth visibility there. 10 solar cell power projects are underway on our own systems with another 300 MW in development. On RNG, we've supported 50 projects where producers have applied to the Clean Fuels Fund program, and the gas transmission team is also developing eight projects.
On our Wabamun Carbon Hub in Alberta, we're planning well tests to confirm geology and finalizing commercial discussions with Capital Power and Lehigh Cement. Recall here we have 4 megatons of CO₂ annually signed up, and we're in discussions with other potential partners. The project is also supported by five Indigenous groups who can become equity owners in the projects, and we're looking forward to that. Finally, in the Gulf Coast, we're in discussions with off-takers for a proposed hydrogen and ammonia production facility at Ingleside. With that, I'll turn it over to Vern.
Thanks, Al, and good morning, everyone. Before I review this quarter's results, I want to step back and remind you on how we're thinking about our low-risk business model. We've designed our business to be resilient through all market cycles, and it's proven itself out over and over again. The most powerful example of this was during 2020, where we were able to meet our financial guidance despite the significant impact that COVID had on global energy demand. That's because our business is built on serving demand pool markets with strong long-term contracts, and we have conservative financial policies. Our contracts have commercial protections for rising inflation, where about 80% of our EBITDA has built-in toll escalators or we have cost of service recovery mechanisms. The majority of our debt portfolio is fixed rate, which limits the impact of higher interest rates.
Our cash flow stability allows us to be confident in our financial results and provides us with a lot of financial flexibility. We expect to generate growing cash flows this year, 9% over 2021, and this drives out our CAD 5 billion-CAD 6 billion of annual investment capacity. Our balance sheet is in great shape, and we expect to be at the lower end of our debt-to-EBITDA range by the end of the year. All four credit rating agencies have reaffirmed our triple B-plus stable credit ratings this year. We've continued to grow the dividend ratably with another 3% increase this year. We're supplementing that with opportunistic share buybacks. We've added CAD 4.5 billion of new growth projects so far in 2022, which provides great visibility to our post-2024 cash flow growth.
All these projects come with the same low-risk model I just walked through and generate attractive returns. Let's remember, all of these opportunities have competed against all of our other capital allocation alternatives, including share buybacks. Let's move to our financial performance. Our second quarter results were up significantly over 2021 on strong operational performance across all of our businesses. We're seeing the benefit of the CAD 14 billion of capital we put to work last year. We're tracking to our plan with some puts and takes across the businesses. In liquids, the Mainline moved just under 2.8 million barrels a day in the second quarter, which was in line with our expectations given upstream and downstream customer maintenance activities. As a reminder, our results and full-year guidance include a provision for the ongoing Mainline tolling negotiations.
Gas transmission utilization was solid and last year's CAD 1.4 billion expansion to our B.C. Pipeline system is driving growth. In Q2, we saw good contributions from DCP and Aux Sable on the back of strong commodity prices. These assets represent less than 2% of our EBITDA, so it's not a big driver overall. It's business as usual at utility, with a small impact from the sale of our New York assets at the end of last year. Our renewables business continues to benefit from strong wind resources. Energy services remains below expectations due to tight basis differentials and backwardation in commodity prices. Results in this business are expected to return to a positive contribution next year, with the expiry of certain contracts that are negatively impacted by current market conditions. Finally, rising interest rates have had a slightly negative financing cost for us.
A very solid quarter. Let's move to our full-year outlook. We expect our systems to be highly utilized for the rest of the year. Mainline volumes are rebounding after Q2 customer maintenance, and we'll go back into a portion then in August. In gas transmission, strong commodity prices are generating a slight tailwind for our stable and DCP investments. While the utility and renewables are tracking to guidance. Energy services is expected to remain a headwind for the balance of the year. In terms of DCF per share, maintenance spending is expected to pick up in the second half, which is aligned with our full-year guidance. Interest expense will be slightly higher than we expected, given higher interest rates. Again, this clearly demonstrates the predictability of our business. I'll now move to our secured capital program. Today, our secured capital program sits at just over CAD 15 billion.
Execution is progressing well, with CAD 4 billion of capital entering the service this year, driving cash flow growth in 2023. This capital spend is largely locked in under fixed-price contracts, providing good inflation protection. We've added a number of new secured projects to our backlog this quarter. These new capital requirements are easily absorbed within our CAD 5-6 billion of annual investment capacity, and there's no change to our equity self-funding model, as most of the capital that we've announced today will be spent beyond 2024. Now, let's talk about how this capital program feeds our growth story. Through 2024, our secured capital program drives a highly visible 5%-7% DCF per share CAGR.
This growth builds off a solid base in 2021, and we expect to continue to deliver 1%-2% per year of growth from contractual revenue escalators and productivity enhancements. Our secure capital program will deliver another 4%-6%, and all of this cash flow will be under our low-risk commercial framework. We have excellent visibility in achieving our three year plan that ends in 2024. With the recent additions to our secure capital and the additional opportunities we're advancing, our capital program provides good visibility for longer-term growth. As we look forward, we continue to see a robust opportunity set to fill in longer-term growth across all of our businesses. We're seeing an uptick in development activity across both our conventional and low-carbon platforms.
As I mentioned previously, we have CAD 5 billion-CAD 6 billion of annual investment capacity driven by our growing free cash flow growth and our balance sheet capacity. Investment-wise, we'll continue to prioritize rate-based growth in our gas businesses, along with low capital intensity, optimizations, and expansions across our footprint. The low-risk investments are highly executable with attractive returns and should drive a base capital program of about CAD 3 billion per year. That leaves roughly CAD 2 billion per year of excess investment capacity that will go to the next best alternative. Either more organic growth, share buybacks, tuck-in M&A or debt repayments. Even with the capital we've announced today, which is spread out over several years, we have meaningful investment capacity to deploy through our current three-year plan. We'll continue to be disciplined, benchmarking all of our new investment opportunities against all of our capital allocation alternatives.
Before I turn it back to Al, let me update you on our ESG priorities and the great progress we are making there. At the end of June, we released our 21st annual sustainability report. We believe that ESG is foundational to our business, and we are proud of our performance. You can see here in 2020, we set new ambitious goals across all aspects of E, S, and G, with clear pathways to achieving them. In 2021, we put in place the organizational building blocks to make it happen, establishing specific plans across businesses and aligning our compensation and financing costs to ESG performance. Our focus now turns to executing those strategies to achieving our goals, and we're making good progress there. On safety, we reduced our trip rate over 29%, and we've heavily invested in pipeline integrity over CAD 6 billion in the last three years.
This underlies our commitment to driving industry-leading safety and reliability. Our emission performance remains on track as we have achieved a 27% reduction in emissions intensity since 2018, and a 20% reduction in methane emissions in our gas transmission business. On diversity, we're on our way to meeting our diversity and inclusion goals. Internally, that means enhancements to our recruiting process and mandatory training to reduce bias, combat racism, and increase cultural awareness. That's translating into real improvement across all levels of the company, including our board of directors. Ultimately, we believe our approach to ESG aligns us with our stakeholders, customers, investors, our right of way communities, and this provides us long-term strategic advantage. With that, I'll turn it back to Al to wrap up.
Thanks, Vern. To summarize, the business is running well, and we're on track to meet our financial targets. Along with the global focus on reducing emissions, the importance of energy security and affordability has validated our two-pronged strategy of investing in both conventional and low-carbon infrastructure. We're executing our capital program, advancing our export strategy on both gas and liquids, and securing new investments to support post-2024 growth. We'll continue to be disciplined capital allocators, protect the balance sheet, and advance our ESG commitments. With that, we'll open it up to questions.
Thank you. We will now begin the question-and-answer session. If you have a question, please press Star on your touchtone phone. If you wish to remove from the queue, please press star two. If you are using a speakerphone, you may need to pick up the handset first before pressing the numbers. Once again, if you have a question, please press Star one. Your first question is from the line of Rob Hope at Scotiabank.
Good morning, everyone. The first question's on the Woodfibre project and the investment in LNG liquefaction facility. This looks like a bit of a unique situation where you have a preferred interest, limited commodity risk. Can you speak to moving forward, if you do get comfortable in investment in LNG liquefaction facilities, would you be willing to take a little bit of commodity exposure if it does yield additional upstream opportunities? I guess the follow-up question there would be, you know, in the past or in the future, you know, are you having discussions with proponents about other facility investments?
Okay. Thanks, Robert. I'll start off with respect to the first part of your question around would we be willing to take additional risk? I think the short answer to that, probably not. We searched far and wide for this opportunity. We looked at a lot of others actually, and we landed on this one because as I said in my remarks, it ticked all the boxes for us. One of the important boxes is ensuring predictability of cash flows. We won't stray too far from that going forward, and we'll continue to look for the commercial models that support the rest of our value proposition, which you know well. Yeah, the short answer on the second one, talking to others, yes.
As you know, there's a lot of opportunities, particularly in the Gulf Coast. As I mentioned earlier, we're really well connected there and lots of development going on. Sure, there's opportunities, but the investment criteria will stand and we'll continue to be very disciplined on this going forward.
All right. Thank you for that. Just to follow up, sorry, I guess another question. On the Mainline, recontracting efforts, it's been relatively quiet from the producer community on this one right now. Can you maybe speak to what the main sticking points in terms of negotiations have been? From the outside, you know, I believe the investment community is taking the fact that it's been quiet from producers as they seem, you know, we'll call it relatively aligned, and the expectation is that a negotiated settlement will be reached.
Well, I'll turn it over to Colin here. Generally speaking, Rob, like I said earlier, it's going pretty well in terms of our discussions. As you can imagine, there's all kinds of different interests at play here. Overall, there's, you know, 38 potential shippers involved in this discussion and who will have to approve any kind of settlement. You know, there's lots of different views on it. I'm not surprised that it's relatively quiet as you're putting it in terms of the public picture. I can tell you there's lots going on behind the scenes in terms of the discussions with our customers.
As I said earlier, a lot of information being shared to make sure that we have the transparency, not just into what we think the future holds, but how we've performed under this Mainline tolling over the last 10 years. A big part of that, Robert, is the service we provided, and I think a real good value for our customers out of the basin and our refiners downstream. You know, I think we're gonna continue to work on it, but Colin, you may wanna add something to that.
I think you had it. Just briefly, I think Robert, I think the historic ordering the Mainline contracting proposal there was disagreement among industry, as you'll recall. That was around contracting the line. We've taken that off the table, to be clear. Once we've removed that, it's removed that point of difference. Industry is now, in our view, relatively aligned on what they want from us, as Al said, which is alignment to hustle towards their interests, which we've now contained in our tolling proposals. We're not there. We cannot assure we're gonna get to a negotiation here, and we've got alternatives that are, you know, equally attractive to us.
Anyway, a little more color there, Robert.
All right. Thank you for the answers. That's it for me.
Thanks, Robert.
Jeremy Tonet. My apologies. Jeremy Tonet from J.P. Morgan is on the line with a question.
Hi, Jeremy.
Hi, good morning.
Morning.
Just wanted to comment a little bit more on Woodfibre here and the preferred structure that you set up. I was just wondering if you could touch a little bit more about specific, I guess, risk versus reward parameters or hurdles you're looking for here. Were you always seeking a preferred equity structure? Could this preferred equity convert into common or have any other upside levers down the road? Just trying to get a better feel for this.
The short answer on the second part is no, it's not convertible to anything under this arrangement. I think that probably the biggest upside lever to think about here is the integration we have upstream, Jeremy, as you see, it's anchoring a lot of opportunity. You know, the investment itself is really, as we said earlier, kind of an extension of the value chain that we've got in B.C. We're a big player there operationally. We've done a lot of project execution in that region, so I think we're bringing that to the table. In terms of the structure itself, we always intended to essentially eliminate as much commodity exposure here as we could, and I think we've achieved that with this structure.
You know, the simple way to think of it is we'll have an investment here, with a certain level of equity, and we'll earn pretty much you know a return in that business that is again pretty much fixed and very consistent with the rest of Cynthia's GTM business. That's at a high level how we're looking at it. I don't know, Cynthia, if you wanna add anything to that.
Thanks, Al. I would just add, as you said earlier in your comments, that it is that opportunity for us to have very assured cash flows. We're working with a partner. We're going to have an opportunity to continue to build on the existing relationships we have in B.C., and it's a great opportunity for us.
Yeah. Just maybe a little bit more color, Jeremy. What we really like about this is, aside from what I mentioned earlier about very low rate of emissions, really world-class on that front, but this is an integrated project, which means that the supply costs and tolls are essentially locked in if you look at the partnership level structure here. Of course, you know, there's a commitment by BP to take 70%, which is really the driver here. It's pretty much locked down from our point of view, and as we alluded to earlier, that's sort of what we're looking for with this investment.
It's a smallish investment for us to start out in liquefaction and, you know, we'll develop more capabilities as we go forward, but this one really fits the bill for us, I think, at this point.
Got it. Thank you for the details. Yeah, that makes sense. A lot of pull across the portfolio, so obviously a lot of leverage in that sense. And next question I had, just really want to talk about, you know, there's a lot of natural gas logistics growth that you've talked about here, but the Haynesville specifically seems like there's a good amount of growth there. I think you had talked about kind of initiatives there in the past, and was just wondering how you think Haynesville growth might play into Enbridge's future.
Well, I'm gonna let Cynthia speak to the details here, but essentially, we carried out an open season a little while ago here, and we were quite impressed, I guess, with the level of interest in order to get onto our system. You know, we heard from a lot of customers and, you know, we're really in the process now of just designing options for them. You know, I alluded to, you know, we'd probably see some activity here later in the year. Again, big header system, very cost-effective and the natural lead-in to the Gulf Coast LNG projects from the Haynesville directly. That's the big picture. Cynthia, maybe you wanna speak to some of the other aspects of this.
Yeah. Thanks. As Al said, with the results of that open season being so positive, we are just working out details now with our customers. It's both that demand pull from the LNG exports and some of the industrial users in that space, and then the supply push from Haynesville. As we're working through those project details, of course, our connectivity with that header system, the ability to tie into some other existing infrastructure really is where we're looking to add value with our customers. We are working through those details now. It is an exciting time, but it is up to us to work with our customers and come up with those competitive solutions. More to come in the future.
That's exactly right, Jeremy. You know, when you think about it, this is a competitive space, right? Other players have, you know, desires to add more capacity in this region. The advantage we have is we're in the right spot, and the expandability of the system is there. This is all about cost, ensuring that you've got the lowest cost solution right from the supply source into the LNG facility. We have a good carve-out of advantage here, if I can put it that way.
Got it. That's very helpful. Thank you.
Yeah. Thanks, Jeremy.
Ben Pham from BMO is online with a question.
I appreciate the disclosure on the inflation protection on existing assets. I'm wondering, as you sanction new projects and we're seeing cost creep on some of the bigger infrastructure projects out there. I'm thinking specifically Woodfibre, as you go through cost estimates. Like, how do you balance that inflationary risk against achieving growth targets and other ways to achieve returns like share buybacks?
Yeah, this is a great question. Very topical, Ben. Maybe what I'll do is I'm gonna have Vern talk to the projections you referred to in the business. Maybe I'll just touch a little bit on the broader issue around investment and how we look at that given the pressures. You know, first of all, I think generally, if you look at our capital spend profile here in the last two years and then going forward, you know, we've really completed you know, a very large chunk of the secured program. Of course, that includes Line 3. If you look at the program size that Vern referred to at CAD 13 billion, you know, about CAD 3 billion of that has been spent, so we got another CAD 10 billion to go.
If you look at the list of projects, certainly smaller, there isn't the sort of the mega scale line three projects in there. They're diversified across the business and geographic areas. If you look at the projects right now, the way we're situated, we're pretty much on time and on budget. There's a few things here and there, but that's the bigger picture. What really gives us some comfort, though, is around our major projects execution process. I think we've had a pretty good track record here. We try and lock down as much of the cost as we can, and fixed price a lot of it. The scale of Enbridge, you know, helps here in terms of supply chain and what we can command in the marketplace.
Of course, in some cases, we have recovery mechanisms to make sure that we're getting our return on enough capital. You know, that's the big picture. We got comfortable on Woodfibre after a lot of diligence around the capital cost estimate at this point. Then, as I said earlier, the final cost estimate for purposes of our distributions and preferred return here will be set sometime next April or thereabout. That's sort of the big picture on how we're thinking about the pressures we're seeing in inflation and so forth. Maybe, Vern, you can cover off how the rest of the business is protected.
Okay. Thanks, Al. On the capital side, obviously we try to lock in all of our costs as we sanction projects, employ fixed price EPC contracts where we're able to. Our large scale obviously allows us very competitive supply chain. Most of the new contracts and commercial agreements that we have announced have cost recovery mechanisms should the capital go up. If we move to the OpEx side, I think I mentioned in my prepared remarks that 80% of our EBITDA has protection against inflation. Really we're seeing that through fixed revenue escalators or the ability to come back for cost of service rate filings, although there is a little bit of a delay there. Finally, I think it's important to point out that most of our costs are fixed.
We're a large capital user, so it's not the O&M that's really at risk. We do have some exposure to power prices and labor. On the power price side of things, we have, in certain instances, the ability to flow those costs back directly to customers. Our solar self-power program in the long term provides us a hedge against rising power prices. I think that covers it all.
Oh, thanks for the fulsome answer. Maybe my second question, going back to LNG and, as you think about capital deployment forward on LNG exports, is it more of a learning process for you now with Woodfibre and then?
Executed and constructed with Pacific, and then you'll look at potentially another investment or you have appetite for maybe doing something else.
Yeah. I think we have appetite, but you know, on the one hand, sure, it's a new area for us. On the other hand, we've... You know, if you look at the execution we've had in large infrastructure, it's been roughly CAD 100 billion over the last decade. We've put a lot of projects into the ground. This, of course, is, you know, infrastructure and it's similar to what we do. Sure, we're gonna learn something through the process here, but we'll also look for other opportunities, and see if there's something that could fit commercially that again addresses the investment criteria that we go after, which is high degree of predictability.
Back to the cost question, we've got enough surety here that we're comfortable that the project will be strong, and there's a lot of built-in mitigations to how the developer to this point has constructed and designed the commercial arrangements here. We're happy with that.
Okay. Great, thanks, and have a good long weekend.
Okay. Thanks, Ben.
Matt Taylor from Tudor, Pickering is online with a question.
Hey. Yeah, thanks for taking my question. Yeah, just first off, congrats on that massive success of that recent Enbridge Tour Alberta for Cancer. So yeah, well done there. It seems almost all of us have been impacted by cancer in some way. So it was close to home there. Nice to see it back in person. Just one question for me, maybe a question for you, Al. Is there a role for Enbridge to play in owning pipeline infrastructure in Europe as the continent gets retooled away from Russian gas?
Yeah. Well, first of all, Matt, thanks for mentioning the Ride. I mean, I think it's pretty clear this is a very centerpiece of our, you know, community initiatives, and which we have many, but this really stands out. Some of the people around the table here today have been involved for a long time, and it really is, you know, a premier event. Thanks for mentioning it. Short answer is sure. You know, if you look at the fundamentals around how gas is gonna have to be diversified in terms of sources of supply for Europe, it's an opportunity for us. You know, it always comes down, of course, to whether we can get the right risk-reward profile, just like any other project.
The good news is that, you know, with the renewables business that we've established there, we have some good experience in Europe. We've got some good partners. We've also been, of course, in Europe before when we had a large investment in Spain, so we're familiar with the neighborhood, if you will. You know, it will depend on whether we can find something that fits the commercial model we like and return.
Great. Thanks, Al. Have a good day.
Okay. Thanks, Matt.
Robert Kwan from RBC Capital Markets is online with a question.
Great. Good morning. Just thinking about your two-pronged strategy in capital allocation, you've got, you know, growing gas opportunities that's evidenced by the numerous secured projects, and you've also targeting the low-carbon strategy. It's you know, just it's picking up steam. If you think about those opportunities, but your capital discipline and the equity self-funding model that effectively is capital constraining you. You know, to date, you've talked about cherry-picking the projects with the highest risk-return profiles, but if the portfolio of opportunities within your core footprint and strategy are growing, can you just talk about how you might or might not change your capital allocation priorities?
Well, I'll start off, and Vern can chime in. You know, in a nutshell, Robert, we're not changing the capital allocation framework. I think we're pretty happy with the opportunity it provides. Not only that, it's just the ranking process that we go through to assure that we're generating good value. As you know, we've got CAD 5 billion-CAD 6 billion that we have available to invest. We said that, you know, roughly, CAD 3 billion of that is, let's call it ratable growth, if you wanna refer to it that way. Michele's utility business, Cynthia's gas transmission business and of course, maybe lower capital intensity projects in the liquids pipeline area.
We've got a lot of capacity aside from that CAD 3 billion to deploy and have options to deploy either in new organic projects like the ones we're just talking about today, opportunities for tuck-in M&A, obviously share buybacks is on that list. As you know, Robert, it sort of went up in the order given the current valuation, which we see as attractive for buybacks or of course you could retain that capacity, and pay down debt temporarily. As you look at the numbers today, for example, on new, newly secured projects, you know, it really eats into that $2 billion, but really not that much annually.
We've got a lot of flexibility still to deploy, and we'll continue to be very careful to put that CAD 2 billion to the best opportunities that we see based on that list of options that I mentioned. Vern, do you wanna add anything to Robert's question?
Well, I think you hit on the main point, Al, that the balance sheet has lots of capacity. That CAD 5 billion- CAD 6 billion per year is very ample, and that goes out over many years. The projects that we've recently announced all have spends that are relatively elongated, so in any individual year, it's not a lot of capital.
I think as you see us pursue more low-carbon opportunities, generally the capital associated with those are a little bit lower. We'll have partners with emitters and other indigenous groups and things like that. I'm not too worried about running out of balance sheet capacity anytime soon here.
Yeah. That's a good point. Actually, if you look at the two-pronged strategy, I think there's a very visible runway here, obviously, with let's call them the conventional projects that we've been used to. You're gonna see the ramp-up in lower carbon, probably a little bit further down the road. Then it'll start ramping up significantly. That's how we see it in carbon capture, whether it's hydrogen opportunities. Of course, you know, the renewables business itself has some good legs, but that'll ramp up. In the near term here, combined with that longer-term ramp-up, I think we're well situated with that investment capacity.
That's great. That's actually a good segue into the second question I've got on the low-carbon strategy. Historically, you were big in North American onshore wind when the opportunities were pretty plentiful, and you could easily get double-digit returns. You slowed that down when the returns were ground down. You actually exited some of those assets. How do you think about, you know, what you did then, and where are we right now with the European offshore wind cycle? Can you maybe just frame where we are with that offshore side against some of those other low-carbon platforms that you just highlighted?
Yeah, that's a very good observation. These things go in cycles, and I think we were in you know very high development mode on the offshore side. I think what you're seeing is now a switchover to the point where onshore wind and solar in North America is really perking up, if you wanna put it that way, just based on a lot of demand for PPAs, corporate-type PPAs that we're pursuing. The good news here is we're well situated with our own solar self-power business as well as opportunities that we see to utilize our land positions. For example, you saw that happen in Ingleside, where we're putting in the solar self-power there.
I think that's a broad brush at it, but I'm gonna let Matthew chime in here for some more thoughts on it.
Yeah. Thanks, Al. I think you hit it. Thanks, Rob. Good observation. I think the big message is a disciplined approach in renewable, given we recognize there's a lot of capital flows, and it can get pretty frothy. You know, you're right about offshore. We're really fortunate to have a great pipeline, good construction projects, great contracts, leases, and we'll build off that, but we're gonna be disciplined. On the onshore side, like Al said, the discipline there is, you know, development using our advantages, which is we have lands, we have load. As we talked about at Enbridge Day, we have over a gigawatt of greenfield projects, so we're gonna focus on the development there. There's lots of demand.
I think there were 17 GW of onshore PPAs, corporate PPAs signed last year in the U.S. That one's probably trending a little bit better in terms of opportunity. Again, gotta maintain the commercial framework and discipline on both areas.
That's great. Appreciate the color.
Okay. Thanks, Robert.
Thank you. We have reached our time limit and are not able to take any further questions at this time. I will turn the call over to Jonathan Morgan for final remarks.
Sorry, operator. I think we'd like to take a few more calls, so let's continue. Operator, let's continue the call, please.
I'm sorry. Linda Ezergailis from TD Securities.
Thank you. Just wanted to get a bit more context on the outlook for potential extensions and expansions of your Mainline, given that you are going into apportionment in August, but there is a competing pipeline potentially coming into service in 2024, which might provide some egress relief for Western Canada. Can you comment on what factors need to be in place to proceed with any sort of initiatives and provide some color on what the timing and scale could be to help industry?
Okay. Colin?
Yeah. Thanks, Al. Thanks, Linda. It is a timely question. I think the conditions is a good way to put it. The first is a commercial foundation on the Mainline itself to provide that clarity and commercial framework to you know take care of return and return of capital return on capital. I think your lay of the land is right. We do expect production over time to fill the Mainline back up. That's dependent on a variety of factors, including policy and producer capital allocation. We do expect that to occur. You know, the basin has been egress constrained a couple of decades here.
I think even beyond the need for physical capacity and moreover the associated net back that goes with every barrel, not just the incremental barrel. I think industry will also be looking to Enbridge for optionality and insurance capacity to get to the best market. I'd say also we're keeping those expansions of the Mainline and downstream market access pipes warm. We've mobilized some early long lead you know supply chain things and permitting parameters to enable that for when it's triggered. I think there is a continuing joint alignment to make that happen. There will be some lead time, and we think it'll feather in nicely to the disposition profile.
Yeah. Linda, you know, I think Colin's covered it really well. You know, bigger picture, if you look at the basin in Western Canada and what's been done on emissions and lowering the breakevens and really sort of setting themselves up for the long term, there's good opportunity, at least in our view here. Obviously, it's up to the customers to move volumes up especially on incremental basis going forward. We know the Permian is really well set up, and that's all driven by exports, particularly for light barrels and products exports. We're setting up well here for an export-driven environment, especially given what's happened with what we call the inflection point around energy security.
It's setting up well, and it sort of flows into what we'd like to see with respect to the commercial arrangement that we're just negotiating here. You know, certainly we could take our time, but you know, there is some level of urgency to make sure that we're providing the service that our customers are gonna want. That's what we're trying to do with the Mainline arrangement.
Thank you. Just as a quick follow-up, you know, your company's been one of the earlier pipeline companies to pivot to an export orientation. My sense is your commitment to extension upstream into gathering and processing has come and gone a few times. Just wondering updated appetite for providing a fuller path upstream into gathering and processing, I guess, more on the natural gas side. You know, are there situations where from a strategic servicing perspective that might be of interest to Enbridge?
Yeah. I'll go and then we'll get Cynthia's comment too. The short answer is we've kind of been there, done that. I mean, there's always, I think, some level of strategic rationale you could, you know, use to say, underpin projects with gathering and processing volumes. Our experience on the gas side is, you know, it's probably a supply risk profile that we're not excited about taking on again. I think that's, you know, that's kind of where we are. It makes sense, don't get me wrong, for a lot of companies, but the business model we have really doesn't call for a lot of G&P type in the portfolio. Do you wanna say anything else on that, Cynthia?
Yeah. I can just add that we are focused with working with our customers to find those solutions, but it is largely on the transportation side. That will continue to be our primary focus.
Thank you.
Okay. Thanks, Linda.
Robert Catellier from CIBC Capital Markets is online with a question.
Yeah. I just have a follow-up question on Woodfibre on the risk return profile. I wanna make sure I understand it here. Just, with respect to construction risk, notwithstanding the fact that you've done a lot of due diligence and it looks like there's a sound contracting strategy in place, does Enbridge have any exposure to cost overruns on the project? If you do need to make an additional contribution, is there a mechanism in place where you can earn a return of the non-capital for that?
Yeah. Well, maybe we should just start with what the mitigation on the capital cost is in the first place. There are two things. At the project level, you've got a fully permitted FID project here. The design and cost estimates are pretty well advanced, and you're dealing with a brownfield site. And of course, as we mentioned earlier, it'll be a lump sum EPCC contract. That actually gets triggered in April when we've got, let's call it a substantial amount of engineering design to lock down what we'll call the final estimate. Don't forget here we've got a modular design and floating storage, so that helps mitigate risk as well and of course pretty much existing pipeline route through the FortisBC right of way.
That's the project level mitigation. In terms of the structure of this thing, as we mentioned, it's an equity preferred equity structure, so we're not really susceptible to, call it, LNG merchant exposure here. Beyond, let's call it the final cost estimate sometime in Q2, let's say next year, there's always execution risk. Remember, by that time, you've pretty much locked everything down to what would be our satisfaction as part of the you know, the project execution here with the EPCC contract. We think that's low, but ultimately, I suppose there could be changes to costs after that point in time.
Right. Then how would the investment respond then? Would you get an additional return then on any additional funds as I've contemplated in the agreement?
No. The return that we earn on the project and the distribution is going to be set, as I said, in Q2. From there, you know, the return will float. Based on the sensitivities we've done, we don't see a significant variation to the return after that second quarter when all the costs are in.
Okay. Thank you.
Andrew Kuske with Credit Suisse is online with a question.
Thanks. Good morning. You have a number of irons in the fire on the low carbon side, but I wanna specifically focus on CCS. Just how big of an opportunity set do you think you're competing for in both Canada and the U.S. on the CCS front?
Well, boy, that's a broad question, Andrew. It's a good one. I'm not sure we have a great answer in terms of the overall size. I do know that we're pretty well-positioned. Basically, if you look at where the high-intensity areas for carbon capture will be, it's basically where we are. Number one, obviously in Alberta, we're advancing a project there. As we mentioned earlier, in terms of export capabilities on the Gulf Coast, that's another area of opportunity. We've got obviously a big position in Eastern Canada, in the Sarnia area. So, you know, I think at this point, we're sort of developing options and opportunities there. But you know, we haven't put a figure on that potential.
I think the main thing is we've got a natural advantage because we're in those areas, and we'll just have to see what projects pop out of them.
Okay. I appreciate that. I'm gonna take it from the really broad to maybe a little bit more narrow, but not too narrow. Just on the tax support side in both Canada and the U.S. with emerging credits into the future, you know, whether it be in the Canadian regime or, you know, the most recent Inflation Reduction Act proposal earlier this week, how do you think about the tax credit environment, and what do you really need to see the industry be spurred along?
Well, certainly on both sides of the border, we're much happier with what's happened, certainly in Canada with the investment tax credit. I think that's going to be very helpful to get these projects moving. As you know, we need to see action on carbon capture right away. That will help. Remember, though, in Canada, it's also about ensuring that there's a price of carbon that producers can have clarity on. They'll have to make sure that they're getting the right revenue profile related to carbon.
In the US, certainly yesterday's announcement, if all things go through as was announced, you know, moving that 45Q up to sort of that $85 mark and including both blue and green hydrogen as part of that, I think that's very positive. The bottom line is, in order to achieve the emissions targets that we have, you know, both societally, globally, and as well in North America, we need to have carbon capture. I think that's now being recognized, and this will help get investments off the ground for sure.
I appreciate it, Al. Thanks.
Okay. Thanks, Andrew.
Patrick Kenny from National Bank is online with a question.
Yeah, good morning. Lots of discussion on inflation already. Just on the potential T-South expansion, given the CAD 2.5 billion price tag has been out there for a while. Obviously, a lot has changed on the construction front here since Enbridge Day. I appreciate there's now a plus sign added to the CAD 2.5 billion estimate. Perhaps at a high level, you could comment on, you know, what gives you confidence that the budget on your T-South expansion or even the T-North expansion won't spiral out of control like we've seen from, you know, some of the other larger scale developments in B.C.
Okay. We're gonna give that to Cynthia.
Yeah. Thanks, Patrick. I think Al kind of touched on this earlier in his comments. We do have obviously some pretty extensive experience in managing capital projects of this size. You heard Vern go through all of the things that we do when we get into project development to lock in our costs as soon as we can. I would say the other thing just to note, though, on the T-North and T-South system in particular, is that those are cost of service regulatory regimes. You know, we're gonna do everything that is prudent to control costs. At the end of the day, our exposure is pretty limited when it comes to our total capital spend.
I think that's right, Patrick. The only thing I'll add on that is, you know, going back to what we have in the ground here, and these days it is about pipe in the ground. To the extent we can add compression or do some minor looping, and you're doing that in your right of way and where you have existing relationships with indigenous groups. That's part of the equation here to try and manage costs as best we can. Of course, there's inflation pressures, but I think we're in decent shape with all that Cynthia said, and then the fact that we're in the existing right of way helps.
Great. I appreciate that color. Then just as a follow-up on the CCS hub, any update on potentially coming in to invest alongside your customers there on the capture infrastructure part of the value chain? I can't recall if whether or not, you know, they select Svante's technology plays any factor in your interest level to invest upstream on CCUS.
Yeah, that's a good question. Colin, do you wanna.
Yeah, Pat. I think the answer is yes with a comma, and then like we've been saying all morning, subject to the right commercial model. The full value chain does interest us strategically. Our focus is primarily on the pipe and storage at this point, but we remain open to the upstream element you talked about, subject to the right conditions.
You know, it's a little bit like what we said before. It's still infrastructure, so that interests us. As we've indicated, this is all about costs. To the extent we can bring our expertise, let's call it a utility-like model to infrastructure including, I guess, capture, it could make sense. You know, that'll have to depend on how our partners feel about it too.
Got it. Thanks, guys. Much appreciated.
Okay. Thanks, Pat.
We have reached our time limit. We are unable to take any further questions at this time. I will now turn the call over to Jonathan Morgan for final remarks.
Great. Thank you. We appreciate your ongoing interest in Enbridge. As always, our investor relations team is available following the call for any additional questions you have. Once again, thank you and have a great day.
Thank you. Ladies and gentlemen, this does conclude your conference call for today. Once again, thank you for attending, and at this time we ask that you please disconnect your lines. Have a good weekend.