Please note this conference is being recorded. I will now turn the conference over to your host, Anton Jelic. You may begin.
Thanks, Mike. Good morning, everyone, and welcome to the 2024 Q1 quarterly earnings call for Polaris Renewable Energy. In addition to our press releases issued early today, you can find our financial statements and MD&A on both SEDAR+ and our corporate website at polarisrei.com. Unless noted otherwise, all amounts referred to are denominated in U.S. dollars. As well, I'd like to remind you that comments made during this call may include forward-looking statements within the meaning of applicable Canadian securities legislation regarding the future performance of Polaris Renewable Energy and its subsidiaries. These statements are current expectations and as such, are subject to a variety of risks and uncertainties that could cause actual results to differ materially from current expectations. These risks and uncertainties include the factors discussed in the company's Annual Information Form for the year ended 31 December 2023.
As always, I'm joined this morning by Marc Murnaghan, CEO of Polaris. At this time, I'll walk everyone through our financial highlights. Power generation. During the three months ended 31 March 2024, power production was 213,434 MWh, compared to 217,613 MWh in the three months ended last year. For Nicaragua, in the Q1 of 2024, production was 117,972 MWh lower compared to the same period last year at 125,930 MWh. Moving on to consolidated production in Peru for the three months ended 31 March 2024, was also slightly lower at 64,578 MWh than the comparative period last year, which totaled 66,334 MWh.
At our Dominican Republic Canoa 1 solar facility, we produced 14,530 MWh in the three months ended 31 March 2024. This is lower than the Q1 of 2023 due to lower irradiance. For Ecuador, in the Q1 of 2024, average production of 10,223 MWh was similar to production in the comparative period last year. Then finally, in Panama, Vista Hermosa Solar Park production of 6,130 MWh was greater than management expectations, with no comparative to 2023, given the facility went COD in Q2 2023. Revenue was $20.6 million during the three months ended 31 March 2024, compared to $20.1 million in the same period last year. Net earnings.
Net earnings attributable to owners was $4.3 million for the quarter, compared to $4.7 million for the same period last year. Adjusted EBITDA. Adjusted EBITDA increased to 15.7 million for the three months ended 31 March 2024, compared to $15.3 million for the same period in 2023. Cash generation. Net cash from operating activities for the three months ended 31 March 2024 of $8.7 million, lower than the $10.1 million for the same period last year, mainly due to lower cash received from Peru, as expected, due to recognition of unearned revenue. Net cash used in investing activities for the three months ended 31 March 2024 was $1.3 million, compared to $3 million in the same period of 2023.
While the cash usage in the current quarter relates to the Canoa 1 optimization project, cash usage in investing activities in the same period last year for disbursements were linked to construction of the binary unit in Nicaragua and the Vista Hermosa Solar Park in Panama. Net cash used in financing activities for the three months ended 31 March 2024 of $6.5 million is in line with net cash used in financing activities reported last year. Finally, I'd like to highlight that we have already announced that we'll be paying a quarterly dividend on 24 May 2024 of $0.15 per share to shareholders of record on 13 May 2024. With that, I'll turn the call over to Marc, who'll elaborate on our quarterly results as well as on our current business matters. Thank you.
Thanks, Anton. Yeah, so for the quarter, on a consolidated basis, production and revenues were in line with our budget, and costs came in slightly below budget. The big one being in Nicaragua, just to give some numbers on a monthly basis, we were 51.6 average megawatt in January, and then we were up to 54.6 MW in February, and March was 55.7 MW. So, a noted improvement from January to February and March, based on call it changing the injection strategy and scheme from what we had going into November and December last year.
So we did get the expected improvements, and I would say that the levels in February and March are levels that we would expect to see for the remainder of the year. Although it is worth mentioning that, as expected or planned in April, that we did the major maintenance on one of our turbines, which was fine. It was executed on time, and there were no issues whatsoever with the turbines, which is great. But that does represent downtime of about 15, 16 days in April, as expected, but so that does have an impact on the current quarter. Peru was essentially in line on a total production basis despite the outage at Canchayllo, which will be back online later this week.
DR was a little bit lower, but Panama was a bit higher, so I would say the kind of solar was on a combined basis in line with the budget. Panama, in terms of revenues, was a bit higher, just because spot prices were again higher than expected, and we do think that those higher prices are likely to continue in Q2 and Q3, but come back down to a more longer-term number in Q4 this year. In terms of the growth projects at Canoa, the optimization is going according to schedule. The most of the CapEx has been spent, with the bulk of it actually having been spent in Q4 last year.
Some more was about one to 1.5 was done in Q1 of this year. Not much left to go on that, and that is going according to schedule. We would expect that to be done by July. In terms of the larger expansion with the solar plus batteries, we did receive approval to amend the environmental permit in the quarter, Q1, so that's great. And then about four weeks ago, after we had that in hand, we submitted for approval to amend the concession to include batteries, which we don't expect any issues with that, given that the regulator is pushing for storage on the island.
And once we have that, we're ready to go with adding panels and storage such that we can just provide more energy under the current Canoa 1 contract. I think it's worth mentioning that the CapEx costs that we are seeing at this point in time continue to look very good. Panels on the solar panel side, they continue to be excellent. And at least initial quotations on the battery side look very good. So we're happy with where that sits. We just need to call and place the order. So we were thinking about two to three months to get the approval from the concession, and then after that, we can get moving on the project.
I did mention last time that we had signed an LOI on an acquisition. That's a big part of the strategy. We are in an exclusivity period as we speak, and it's moving very quickly. We hope to have something on that in the very short term, in terms of announcing that and explaining what we're doing. I would say it very much ties into the strategy of shifting the focus from just straight renewable projects to renewables plus storage. That's a big focus, and the acquisition very much is in line with that, focus going forward. And so I really think that it will tie things together in terms of the strategy, but also the capital allocation plan, and t hat plan, in terms of capital usage, will become much more evident in the short, medium, and even longer term.
Given what we're doing at Canoa, but also this acquisition, I think we're putting the strategic pieces together to shift the focus and really increase, I would say, the opportunity set for us as a company. And financially, we're well positioned to go after this, given our cash position and reasonably low leverage at this time. I have discussed the possibility to change that in terms of some ParentCo financing or green bond financing, where the plan at this point would be to look to do something in September, October timeframe as the repayment for the San Jacinto loan is really January of 2025.
So we would look to do something, call it end of Q3 or early Q4 this year, where a use of proceeds would be to repay that loan, as well as likely providing capital for the growth projects, including the Dominican with a particular focus on the Dominican. So, with that, if we can execute that, just even in the very short term, there's significant torque and leverage to our cash flow per share because we don't need to raise any equity to do this.
It really has a big impact on both the operating cash flow and the free cash flow per share that we can generate, which will give us leverage to do more things, which would be increased growth and/or potentially increased dividend and/or potentially increased share buybacks, which we did do some last year. So, I think if we can execute on that, we will have many more arrows in our quiver to do all the things we want to do, and that should take place in the back half of this year. So with that, I will open it up for questions.
At this time, we will be conducting a question-and-answer session. If you would like to ask a question, please press star one on your telephone keypad. A confirmation tone will indicate your line is in the question queue. You may press star two if you would like to remove your question from the queue. For participants using speaker equipment, it may be necessary to pick up your handset before pressing the star keys. One moment please, while we poll for questions. Our first questioner is Nicholas Boychuk from Cormark Securities.
Thanks. Morning, Marc. First thing, on the cost profile. I think it's kind of an interesting dynamic that you're still seeing less inflation than your North American peers. Can you kind of walk through that dynamic? Why is it you're seeing that, and how should we be thinking about it moving forward if, if it is going to persist?
Yeah. So I would say if we split it up into two components, one is operating, I'll deal with that first, and second, the cap costs. So on the operating side, I think there's always some efficiencies that we're able to generate in terms of generating more megawatt-hours without, call it, adding staff. And I think we're also able to do more projects with the current staff we have. So that's one dynamic. But I would also just say that I think from a overall labor inflation, we just haven't seen that pressure in the markets we're in or nearly the same amount of pressure on that side of things that people are seeing in North America. So I think that's very good for us, obviously.
And then on the cap cost side, it's worth bringing that into the conversation as well, because, you know, we're focused, at least in the short term here, on the solar side as well as the storage. And, even though, you know, those are not being manufactured sort of where we are, you're just seeing that the call it, the increased volumes globally are having a really big deflationary impact on the capital costs. So, we're, we are seeing that as well, which I think is really important. So the projects in DR that we're looking at, the, y ou know, everything's coming in below what we had estimated on the capital, on the equipment side of things. And then I would say the, the, i t's a much smaller component, but the labor side of those projects is in line with what our expectations are.
Okay, got it. That makes sense. Thanks. Switching to growth here. Obviously, it's good to hear about these acquisitions, but in the investor deck, we've also now got a new project that's an extra 10 MW solar expansion opportunity in Nicaragua. $6 million cost, $1.2 million EBIT to pick up. That seems highly attractive on a ROIC basis. Can you kind of walk us through what that opportunity is, how it's going to get operational by Q2 2025, and kind of talk us through that?
Yeah. So that's the one. That one specifically is we're repurposing some panels that we're going to have post the program in the Dominican. I can tell you that even that CapEx number is highly conservative, given that. So we're really. The CapEx for that project is just, it's from inverters and racking, really. And so the issues in Nicaragua, we have a reasonable amount of parasitic load. So we can do a behind-the-fence project there, and essentially anything it generates is. You're saving the parasitic energy, which is the same as generating more, quite frankly, at that $111/MWh price, which is a very good price. So that's the idea.
It's not really a greenfield project because we have the site, we have the land, we have the interconnect. So it, that just seems like a sort of an obvious home for the panels, and it should be even better than those economics that we're presenting.
Okay, that's great. I'll get back into queue.
Thanks, Nick.
We now hear from David Quezada with Raymond James.
Thanks. Morning. Maybe a first question, just on the environment market you were discussing in terms of solar panels and just, you know, how attractive the costs are for them today. Is there any opportunity for you to maybe capitalize on that situation more broadly, like pre-buying panels for future projects? I'm just curious if you think that that low cost of panels is something that's going to stick around for a while, or is it sort of a temporary situation brought on by global oversupply?
Yeah, I don't think we have the balance sheet to really do that, David, to in a way speculate on it. And I would say that that thought definitely occurred to me 18 months ago, two years ago, 12 years, 12 months ago, six months ago, and if we had have done it then, we would have been wrong, at least up until now. So, I guess my view also is that, yeah, you're going to have these short-term, I think we are living a bit of a short-term benefit from our perspective, given the tariff in the U.S. But I also think when you just look at the total, you know, gigawatts installed globally every year, that number is going up and up and up.
So I think in the longer term, it's that volume that's gonna drive things. So I just think we're better to ride that curve, practically, as well as the practicality of, you know, we have an acquisition that's a great use for proceeds. Probably better we do that than speculate. As tempting, though, I take your point. It is tempting to do that, but I don't think we would.
Great. Nope, that's fair enough. Appreciate those comments. And then maybe just a question more broadly, and we certainly appreciate the comments around the upcoming M&A. That sounds exciting. But I'm just curious, like, is it a fair way to characterize it that when you think about building versus buying assets, that you've got your attractive PPAs in the Dominican, and so it makes sense for you to build new projects there, but outside of that, you know, maybe it's such a buyer's market for operational assets or things that are closer to operational that you might just opt for that, just given the multiples you're seeing there. Is that, w ould you agree with that?
Yeah. What I would say, the not yet operational, call it shovel-ready or close to shovel-ready, we probably are seeing more opportunities there than ever. And in terms of return opportunities, it's probably the best. Just because most, call it, bigger companies or infrastructure funds are chewing on their own pipelines, and in this sort of rate environment, nobody's really, t hey're more trying to decide what of their portfolio they're gonna go, go with, as opposed to really, you know, expanding it. You know, other than maybe Brookfield, most people are, not getting around all of their own. And so we are seeing a lot of, I would call it, late-stage development, projects that, are on the market right now, and, I don't think there really is a home for these things.
So we are seeing a, I'd say, almost a bigger increase in that than we are in, call it, operating projects. And I think the multiples on operating projects has come down, but not as much. Just given that, you know, a lot of these are good projects. If they have a long-term PPA, and they're appropriately, call it, levered, but not too much. The multiples have come down, but they're not in a forced sale position. Whereas they call it the late-stage development, a lot of those are forced, are being forced. So I think for us, the opportunity set that we have on that front, though, is very big. It is, I would say, share price dependent. So as we, y ou know, at the current share price, we have some opportunities that actually work for operating assets, believe it or not, that are accretive.
But it's not huge at that, at this share price, which is why we're gonna try to execute the plan we have, you know, call it without equity. However, if we get a bit of traction on the share price, you know, the opportunity set really starts to grow exponentially, call it with every dollar in the share price. So, you know, 15, 16, 17, there's a lot of operational assets out there now that weren't out there a year ago. So that can work at those prices for us. When we're always looking at those, we have a huge funnel. It becomes, you know, is it a good project, and can we do it at a price that works for us?
Okay, awesome. Thanks. Appreciate those comments. And then maybe just one last one for me, if I could. Once you get the concession for the batteries at Canoa, what would you say is the remaining uncertainty just related to that project? Or like, what would you call out maybe some key milestones beyond that, whether it be final approvals or you know, construction milestones or anything, and you know, just where you see the sort of like buckets for uncertainty once you-[crosstalk]
Yeah, I mean, that's really the next one is the big one, and then after that, it would be, okay, what's the lead time? You know, it's really then you're putting down payments on the panels and the batteries, and when, what's your, w ho are you choosing? What's your lead time? But based on what we're seeing, at least at this point in time, lead times are totally reasonable on both of those. So call it six months type thing. Potentially less.
Okay.
So, if the lead time dynamic changed significantly, I, t o me, that would be. I don't see that happening, but I guess that would technically be a risk out there.
Perfect. Thanks for that, Marc. I'll turn it over.
Okay. Thanks, David.
We now hear from Rupert Merer with National Bank.
Hi, good morning.
Hi, Rupert.
Just, following up on David's question on the M&A. If you look at the deal that you're contemplating today, would you characterize that as an acquisition of operating assets, or is it operating assets plus a development pipeline?
So it's operating assets, and it has growth opportunities on the site that do need some development work, but we think that there's growth on the site for sure. But it's, you know, that would be growing an already operating asset.
And does it give you access to a, a new region, one where you, you don't have capabilities today?
But yeah, yeah, sorry. It is a new jurisdiction. I would say that we're not per se looking for specific new jurisdictions, but we quite like this one. I think we can handle, for sure, one more. With this profile, we can handle it. It's not a huge, I would say, integration issue. And more importantly, I think it's a market that, l et's just say that the dynamic that exists in the Dominican, which is a high fossil fuel-based market that has a high marginal cost of power, and hence is a market where solar plus storage, we think, works. I would say that dynamic is replicated in this other market, and which makes it strategically very attractive to us.
So, so what we're trying to do in the Dominican, in addition, call it, to what we're doing at Canoa, is we are seeing these other late-stage development projects that we think we can potentially strike a deal, add them into our own sort of pipeline, but in a way that mirrors what we're doing at Canoa. I would say that this acquisition, hopefully, is a mirror image of what I just described that we're doing in the Dominican. So can, could be sort of foundational for in addition with, t he Dominican is, is sort of the, the basis of where we're gonna grow, at least in the short, medium term here.
Okay, great. And with your financing plan, it sounds like you have enough capacity from your, the cash on the balance sheet and your potential for adding leverage. You have enough capacity to manage this M&A and your organic growth. Does it leave any room for future M&A at that point, or is that where you think that your maybe your future M&A will be dependent on market conditions?
Yeah, I think that's a fair way of putting it. I think, you know, we could get an acquisition done. We can do what we're doing in the DR, all of it, realistically, with some form of debt or refi. We would have room to do more, probably some more of our own development rubric, but to do some of the larger, call it, operational asset acquisitions, realistically, that would have to come with some equity.
Okay, great. And then, going back to San Jacinto, I think I may have missed one of the comments you had there. Was it, y ou had one of the units down for the first couple weeks of it. Was that just regular maintenance? And can you talk to us about the strategy going forward with San Jacinto? What's the plan this year? Where do you go from the 55,111 in March, and you know, what's your next well enhancement program?
So, we have two turbines. The plan right now is we do it's a two-to-three-week maintenance on one turbine every 18 months. Okay? So, I think the best way to model it is, well, it's an 18-day was the budget. I think we did it in 16, 15 or 16. Everything was fine, and then, so the next one would be around October of next year. Okay? And then it would be 18 months, so, so the, t here would be a year's period, calendar year, where we don't do it. And everything that we've seen is the turbines have been totally fine, so, you know, maybe we could go to every two years, but let's just assume it's every 18 months, for the next little while.
I don't, given the investment, you know, we actually think by doing what we've been doing recently in terms of changing the injection scheme, could yield some improvements in the overall output. You know, that will really be the focus this year to see if we can, can do that. There's for sure no guarantees on that, but, but that's really a, call it, a no CapEx plan to, to, to see if we can improve the enthalpy in the field and improve the output. And given that we, we did the binary unit in 2022, which was a reasonable CapEx amount, I, I really think for the next three to five years, we're not going to be doing a significant well, you know, program.
And it's really let's harvest the cash flows and invest them elsewhere, in the next three to five years. Potentially, year four or five from now, you could look at doing something, but I really think it's that far out.
Great. Thank you. I'll get back in the queue.
Our next question is Ahmad Shaheen with Beacon Securities.
Good morning, guys. Congrats on a solid quarter. I guess most of my questions are answered, but any more color on the cost profile, given the strong performance in Q1, or any one-offs in Q1 that we should not really extrapolate into the remainder of the year and next year?
Yeah, good, good question. I actually should have mentioned that. So, you know, we will have some. It's not gonna be flat from here on out for the rest of the year. But I think Q2 will be even potentially a little bit lower, and Q3, Q4 a bit higher. But the average for the year, I'd say Q1 is representative, so it's not as if there was a one or two one-time items in Q1, and then we're going to bump back up and be even higher. So a little bit less Q2, a little bit higher in Q3 and Q4, but for the year, you know, it's a reasonable number to call it, annualize that plus or minus, you know, a couple of percent.
That's great. And I'm not sure if I missed it, you guys mentioned it. What type of assets are we looking at, the imminent M&A opportunity? Are you at liberty to disclose that?
No.
Okay. Well, let's-[crosstalk]
It's in the renewable sector. That's all I can say.
Fair enough. Well, thanks for answering my questions, guys. Congrats on a successful quarter.
Okay, thanks.
We now hear from Patrick O'Donnell.
Hello, good morning, guys. I'm a retail private investor. Been following the story for a few years. Just had two questions. In terms of broader shareholder appeal with Polaris, I think there's some strong concern about the political corruption credit risk in, just say, Nicaragua, for example, the biggest asset. Just what can you say about these risks and how you've gotten comfortable with them?
Yeah. So in terms of the credit, I would say this project in its current form really started in 2013, but on a much smaller scale, was producing five MW-10 MW since 2007, 2008, and so more than a 15-year operating history, and has received north of, call it $750 million in payments without fail. So I would say that the credit history, which is now, it's reasonable, we're not talking two, three, or five years, we're north of a decade here, is very good. So I guess what we tend to do is point to that. And the thesis has been borne out, which is that this is a key service.
So in these developing countries, the electricity sector is actually on a relative basis, it's at the top, and it's more important than it would be in North America. So, the governments need this, you know, the electricity sector to function, and I would say that has been borne out in the track record. And it's not just in Nicaragua that I just mentioned, but it's in all these markets. Payment history is very good, and because I think it's the power sector. So I would really just point to that, yeah, you can have political noise, but the electricity sector is very quiet, and it really pays the bills.
Got you. And one clarification on that is, in terms of a risk of a government repossessing the asset or just kind of reneging on the agreements that you have in place, I mean, what could you say about that type of risk? Or are they just not well-positioned to operate a plant like in Nicaragua?
Yeah, I'd say it's more that. Let's separate it, because in terms of the two that you mentioned, the first one, repossessing, I'd say we really don't think that is. You haven't seen that in this sector. One, they would scare off all future investment forever in a sector that they really need, but it also doesn't really generate much for them. And these plants, unlike, let's say, a mine or an oil and gas, they're this is just a product that's consumed locally. It's not a, quote-unquote, "natural resource" or national resource that has been exported. So there's no sort of political even benefit. It's pure political cost, and it doesn't generate U.S. hard currency like those other asset classes do.
So they don't, they don't really look at it, these, like a renewable asset in the same way. Where I'd say the second risk that you mentioned is typically, w ell, that's where we would see the risk more. It's more, okay, you've got a great contract, but they would just want to come and pay you a lesser price. So your risk then, the, how do you mitigate that? It's, it's you need to look at where your contract price is relative to their alternative sources of power. And we are in markets. So Nicaragua, give you an example, we're at $111/ MWh.
They still have about 50% of their grid is fossil fuel driven, and they don't have nat gas yet, so they have a lot of oil and diesel power generation, and that comes at about $150-$180. So a big premium to where we're at. So we're providing them with, I think we're in the second quartile, most likely, in terms of the cost curve. So we're providing them with baseload power that's cheaper than their alternatives, so we're not, in our minds, a target. It's the same thing in the Dominican. We're below, we're well below their alternatives.
I would say in Peru and Ecuador, we're right in the middle with our hydros of their average cost, but we're so small that no government's going to take a look, we don't think, at our eight and 20 MW projects and say, "Let's rewrite those contracts." So I think we're really well positioned relative to that, given our contract prices on average are below their marginal cost of energy.
And Patrick, just to add, our social programs are very good, and they're important to the local communities, and I think the governments also recognize that.
Okay, terrific. Yeah, that's great context and feedback on that. A second question was, at current share price and the growth plan that you guys are executing on, anything you can say about why more insiders might not be taking advantage of the growth opportunity? I know there's been some insider buying, but any thoughts you can share on that? I mean, you're not a mind reader, but just looking at that from kind of a broader shareholder perspective.
Yeah, I mean, I bought stock recently. I might buy more. I mean, just we also go in long blackout periods, I would say. So that's, you know, we're now finally coming out of one, but then when you have acquisitions, it actually is quite hard to because the blackout period gets extended. So it is, o ne, it's hard, but I would say there has been insider buying. And, from I would say to, I really can only speak to myself personally. I have quite a large position. I've invested a lot of capital, and I actually have been doing more. So, you know, that's probably all I can say on that.
Okay. All right. Thank you.
A reminder that if you would like to ask a question, to press star one on your telephone keypad. We hear once more from Rupert Merer.
Hi, just a follow-up on power prices. I see, Peru, sorry, it was Panama, $126/MWh. You're still spot there, I believe. Do you see any opportunities for locking in contracts at a higher price today, given the dynamic in that market? Or, what's the outlook for contracting- in the future?
Well, so they have announced that, call it Q3, Q4, they'll be doing a 500-MW tender process for renewables only, which includes some existing as well as new plants. So we fully intend on bidding into that. Now, the $64,000 question is: What do we think the clearing price is going to be for that? It's not $126, I'll tell you that. You know, we're hearing stuff in the $70-$80 range. I mean, when we originally, I would say, built the plant, we were targeting something with a seven on it, in terms of the right number, to get our return. And so, you know, we will bid something. We might bid maybe half the plant.
So yeah, I think there absolutely is an opportunity. We will be bidding in later this year, and we'll see where we get to. But, y ou know, the market's for sure not going to, at least on the contract market, the market is not going to be as high as where the spot market is right now.
Can you bid any-[crosstalk]
And then why you do it, it would really be if we felt that we wanted to basically take some equity out of that project and recycle it somewhere, because, like, that's what a contract would enable it, that's what it would enable us to do. But so it is also somewhat dependent on, you know, for instance, if we did more of a corporate level bond, I don't know if the need would be as strong as if we stayed on the let's just keep doing project finance to grow the business, in which case we would be more eager to get a contract, so we could likely take $5-$7 million of equity, maybe even more out of the project. Because we did equity fund that entirely.
Right. Makes sense. Could you bid any growth projects into Panama?
Yeah, yeah. In fact, we have a list of both developers and other operators in the country that want to bid some other projects with us in that call. And it'll come down to, yeah, at certain prices, we would love to do, w e would love to do more there. So we will be. We're just trying to finalize exactly what it is we will be bidding this quarter.
Great. Then, finally, the Canchayllo. So you had a minor landslide there. Are there any costs associated with that other than downtime, and is it covered by insurance?
Yeah, it would be, but the costs are below our deductible, so it's because the cost to repair it, we think, are in the $60,000-$75,000 range.
Okay.
We have a $250K deductible. And believe it or not, the actual sort of business interruption insurance, it's a two-month deductible, but even then, one of the reasons it's not that expensive, the way that the contracts work there, Rupert, is that, once you get to your committed energy amount, anything above and beyond that is you sell at the spot market, up until 30 April 2024, which is when their power year ends. But April generally, because it's still reasonably, you know, the rainy season there, their spot market is low. So, that facility had already reached its committed energy early in March, and so everything past, everything from the end of March, through the end of March to April, would have been spot market sales, and those are right about $30. It's not a huge impact to us financially.
Okay.
[crosstalk] Like last year, the spot price, spot price on average was over $70, but it's, it's very related to the dry season and the rainy season in that country.
Perfect. I'll leave it there. Thanks, Marc.
Yep. We have reached the end of our question and answer session, and with it, the end of today's conference call. That does conclude today's conference an d you may disconnect your lines at this time. Thank you for your participation.