Ladies and gentlemen, thank you for joining us and welcome to Pembina Pipeline Corporation Q1 2026 results. After today's prepared remarks, we will host a question and answer session. If you would like to ask a question please press star one to raise your hand. To withdraw your question press star one again. I w ill now hand the conference over to Dan Tucunel, Vice President, Capital Markets. Dan, please go ahead.
Thank you, Jen. Good morning, everyone. Welcome to Pembina's conference call and webcast to review highlights from the first quarter of 2026. On the call today, we have Scott Burrows, President and Chief Executive Officer, and Cameron Goldade, Chief Financial Officer, along with other members of Pembina's leadership team. I would like to remind you that some of the comments made today may be forward-looking in nature and are based on Pembina's current expectations, estimates, judgments, and projections. Forward-looking statements we may express or imply today are subject to risks and uncertainties, which could cause actual results to differ materially from expectations. Some of the information provided refers to non-GAAP measures. To learn more about these forward-looking statements and non-GAAP measures, please see Pembina Management's discussion and analysis dated May 7, 2026, for the period ended March 31st, 2026.
As well as the press release we issued yesterday. All of which are available online at pembina.com and on both SEDAR+ and EDGAR. I will now turn things over to Scott.
Thanks, Dan Yesterday, we reported first quarter results, which were highlighted by adjusted EBITDA of CAD 1.131 billion. It was a strong start to 2026 operationally, commercially, and financially. The fee-based business is tracking to plan and overall results are outperforming budget given the spike in key commodity markets that began in March. Operationally, we saw volume strength across key systems, including Alliance Pipeline, Cochin Pipeline, and the conventional pipeline systems. First quarter results have kept us on track to realize our 2023- 2026 fee-based adjusted EBITDA per share compound annual growth of approximately 5% and within the target range provided at our 2024 investor day.
As Cam will discuss in more detail, due primarily to the stronger marketing outlook, we have updated our 2026 adjusted EBITDA guidance range to CAD 4.35 billion-CAD 4.55 billion. At the midpoint, which is where we are currently tracking to, this is an increase of CAD 175 million or 4.1%. Supported by continued growth in our low-risk fee-based business, we were pleased yesterday to announce a CAD 0.025 per share or 3.5% increase to the quarterly common share dividend, beginning with the dividend to be paid in June. In addition to strong financial results, Pembina continues to reliably execute its portfolio of projects under construction, realize continued commercial success, and advance projects under development in service of its growth strategy.
Highlights of 2026 to date include placing the Wapiti expansion and K3 cogeneration facility into service on time and on budget. In addition, construction of RFS IV, a 55,000 barrel per day propane plus fractionator at the existing Redwater complex, is nearing completion. The rail facility was placed into service in February and commissioning of the fractionator is underway. The project is trending under budget, and the fractionator is expected to be placed into service by the end of May. Cedar LNG continues to progress on time and on budget. The construction of the floating LNG vessel is now more than 50% complete, and with winter now behind us, the onshore construction teams have resumed activities with the focus of executing on an eventful 2026 construction season.
With many of the onshore teams having only recently returned to site, it's already exciting to witness the progress being made. Commercially, in 2026 to date, Pembina has renewed existing contracts and executed incremental new contracts totaling approximately 110,000 barrels per day of transportation capacity on the Peace Pipeline, demonstrating the value customers place on the reliable and value-enhancing service provided by our leading transportation network and integrated value chain. We recently closed an open season for the proposed short-haul point-to-point transportation service of the Canadian segment of the Alliance Pipeline System. The proposed expansion would provide natural gas delivery to a new meter station in Fort Saskatchewan with an anticipated in-service date in the fourth quarter of 2029. The successful proponents have been awarded capacity conditional on the project being sanctioned.
The project continues to progress towards a final investment decision with ongoing work streams focused on regulatory and engineering activities. On the project development front, Pembina and Kineticor are progressing the Greenlight Electricity Centre, a proposed multi-phase natural gas-fired combined cycle power generation facility. We are advancing various work streams related to the approximately 900 MW per space. Ongoing activities include finalizing a lump sum EPC agreement, finalizing a commercial agreement with the customer, and project financing. A final investment decision is expected by the end of the second quarter of 2026. Finally, before turning the call over to Cam, I want to quickly recap our recent business update call held on April 7th .
Amidst the backdrop of expanding market access and growing demand for Canadian energy, we were very excited to provide our thoughts where Pembina is positioned, why its business is advantaged, and how the company's strategy can create value through 2030 and beyond. Our update focused on 3 key themes. The first was reaffirming the company's long-standing commitment to disciplined execution, including strong performance against financial targets. Placing billions of capital projects into service on time and on or under budget, adhering to its financial guardrails and delivering a reliable, growing dividend without interruption. The second was outlining the company's three C strategy, Capture, Connect, and Catalyze, which is underpinned by energy fundamentals and the advantages of its differentiated platform.
Pembina is poised to benefit from growing global energy demand, increasing strategic relevance of Canadian energy and emerging demand drivers such as LNG, petrochemical and data center power demand. The advantages of Pembina's integration, scale, superior market access and entrepreneurial approach and track record of execution uniquely position it to further strengthen and extend its unmatched industry-leading value chain. The third was providing a financial outlook to the end of the decade, including 5%- 7% compound annual fee-based adjusted EBITDA per share growth through 2030. This outlook is underpinned by higher utilization across existing assets, contributions from sanctioned projects entering service, and a portfolio of development opportunities designed to extend the franchise.
The recent announcement of Shell's proposed acquisition of ARC Resources is a compelling proof point that further validates our outlook for the WCSB, and the transaction benefit Shell has highlighted mirrors some of the same themes we covered in our business update. Shell has identified the Montney Basin as a key growth platform within their global portfolio, given its long duration and advantage cost structure. Similarly, our market update highlighted the importance of capturing volumes from premier high-growth areas and connecting them to the best global markets. There's also focus on the interrelationship between growing oil sands demand for condensate and growing demand for natural gas as being two ends of the energy flywheel. Shell stated rationale for the ARC acquisition, driven by liquids first and supported by natural gas, is a proof point of this concept.
As a global energy leader and the number one LNG operator in Canada, we see in Shell a customer whose model and outlook aligns well with ours, and we look forward to their growing presence in our basin. We encourage those that have not already done so to visit our website at pembina.com to access a replay of our business update call and the related presentation. It was a strong and eventful first quarter that sets us up very well for the remainder of the year and beyond. I'll now turn things over to Cam to discuss in more detail the financial highlights for the quarter.
Thanks, Scott. As Scott noted, Pembina reported first quarter adjusted EBITDA of CAD 1.131 billion. Relative to the first quarter of 2025, strong operational performance and volume growth across the pipelines and facilities divisions was offset by the impact of the new toll structure and revenue sharing mechanism on the Alliance Pipeline, as well as lower contribution from the marketing business due to narrower NGL frac spreads. The net result of the first quarter was a CAD 36 million or 3% decrease over the same period in the prior year.
Looking at quarter-over-quarter results by division, the major factors impacting the quarter in pipelines included lower net revenue on the Alliance Pipeline of CAD 26 million due to the net effect of the negotiated settlement between Alliance and its shippers, which became effective on November 1st, 2025, partially offset by an increase in interruptible and seasonal revenue on the Alliance Pipeline, driven by higher demand for natural gas in the U.S. Midwest during the first quarter of 2026. As well as higher revenue on the Cochin Pipeline due to wider condensate price differentials. In facilities, factors impacting the first quarter included a higher contribution from certain PGI assets, primarily due to higher volumes.
In marketing and new ventures, first quarter results reflect the net impact of narrower WCSB and U.S. NGL frac spreads, resulting from lower NGL prices combined with higher U.S. natural gas prices, partially offset by the benefits from exposure to premium propane prices in Asian markets through West Coast exports. In the corporate segment, first quarter results were lower than prior period due to higher long-term incentive costs, partially offset by lower non-compensation related expenses. Earnings in the first quarter were CAD 498 million. This represents a 1% decrease over the same period in the prior year. In addition to the factors impacting adjusted EBITDA, the decrease in earnings in the first quarter was primarily due to a lower share of loss from Cedar LNG compared to the same period in the prior year.
Adjusted earnings were CAD 505 million or a 6% increase over the same period in the prior year. Compared to the factors noted previously related to earnings, the change in adjusted earnings excludes the lower share of loss from Cedar LNG, driven primarily by unrealized gains on derivative instruments, partially offset by higher unrealized foreign exchange losses. Total volumes in the pipelines and facilities divisions were 3.7 million barrels of oil equivalent per day in the first quarter. This represents an increase of 1% over the same period in the prior year. Higher first quarter pipelines volumes were driven primarily by higher interruptible and contracted volumes on certain pipelines, primarily driven by favorable condensate pricing and higher demand from colder weather in the U.S.
Higher first quarter facilities volumes were driven primarily by higher volumes from certain PGI assets, primarily at the Dawson assets and at the Duvernay complex, largely offset by lower volumes at the Cutbank complex, as well as a decrease in Aux Sable volumes due to lower ethane extraction. Yesterday, Pembina announced a revised 2026 adjusted EBITDA guidance range of CAD 4.35 billion-CAD 4.55 billion. The revised midpoint of the 2026 guidance range, which is where we are currently trending, is an increase of CAD 175 million versus the original guidance, primarily due to the outlook for the marketing business for the remainder of the year. The revised 2026 outlook for the marketing business includes a stronger contribution from the crude oil marketing business and wider Canadian and U.S. frac spreads.
In particular, Pembina and its customers are benefiting from exposure to premium propane prices in Asian markets through Pembina's 20,000 barrel per day Prince Rupert terminal and 20,000 barrels per day of long-term contracted capacity at third-party facilities that became effective April 1, 2026. Further, as previously disclosed, approximately 65% of Pembina's 2026 frac spread exposure has been hedged. On a quarterly basis, for the remainder of the year, Pembina has hedged approximately 90% in the second and third quarters and 40% in the fourth quarter. The lower and upper ends of the 2026 guidance range are framed primarily as a function of commodity prices and the resulting contribution from the marketing business, interruptible volumes on key systems, the U.S. Canadian dollar exchange rate, and Pembina's share price performance and its impact on incentive compensation costs.
As a result of the updated outlook for 2026, Pembina now expects the 2026 year-end proportionally consolidated debt to adjusted EBITDA ratio to be approximately 3.5x-3.7x . Excluding debt related to construction of the Cedar LNG facility, which is expected to enter service in late 2028, this ratio would be approximately 3.3x-3.5x . I'll now turn things back to Scott.
Thanks, Cam. In closing, I want to remind you that Pembina will host its annual meeting of shareholders today at 2:00 P.M. Mountain Time, 4:00 P.M. Eastern Time. It will be a virtual-only meeting conducted via live audio webcast. Participants are recommended to register for the virtual webcast at least 10 minutes before the presentation start time. For further information on the annual meeting, please visit the Investors tab at www.pembina.com. Thank you for joining us this morning. Operator, please go ahead and open up the line for questions.
Thank you. We will now begin the question and answer session. Please limit yourself to one question and one follow-up. If you would like to ask a question, please press star one to raise your hand. To withdraw your question, press star one again. We ask that you pick up your handset when asking a question to allow for optimum sound quality. If you are muted locally, please remember to unmute your device. Please stand by while we compile the Q&A roster. Your first question comes from the line of Aaron MacNeil with TD Cowen. Your line is open. Please go ahead.
Hey, morning all. Thanks for taking my questions. I've been thinking more about-
Thanks
the business update. We're starting to see early signs of some pretty meaningful incremental basin egress coming together. As projects move toward FID, when would you expect Pembina to begin to see the second order impacts from that? Which parts of your existing asset footprint are likely to see those expansion opportunities first? Maybe just to give you some specifics in terms of what I'm thinking about, like, how would you position to bring more condensate to Fort McMurray, either via Cochin or Peace? As well as how should we be thinking about sort of the alignment with your new partner at PGI when it comes to deploying incremental capital?
Morning, Aaron. Jaret here. I'll take the first part out with respect to the liquids and the condensate. If you think about our current expansions that we have ongoing that we announced just recently, we have the Fox to the Namao pump station increase. That's going to increase our C3+ by roughly 70,000 barrels. That asset today is essentially full, let's kind of think of that as your first de-bottleneck from Edmonton going west. Our Taylor to Gordondale asset. From Gordondale down into Fox Creek, we have a lot of runway currently for it's fully built out for our condensate platform and our crude platform. It's where we get constrained is starting to cross the border into Northeast B.C., where we anticipate a lot of those liquids to be coming from.
Taylor to Gordondale is kind of your first segment. Birch to Taylor is your next segment. That gives us a tremendous amount of runway as new LNG facilities come on for that gas egress. That'll allow the condensate and the NGLs to get into the Edmonton market. With respect to Cochin, you know, fortunately for us, we've been very successful at expanding the capacity of Cochin. Previous owner ran that asset around 90,000 barrels a day. We currently routinely and reliably and safely operate that at about 120,000 barrels a day. Now we're just looking for smaller type optimizations because we really have fully optimized that segment. With respect to PGI assets, it was recently announced that we have a new owner, Apollo. We've met with them.
We think the relationship's going to be very similar to our previous partnership, very much aligned on growing the business. One of the areas that PGI, I believe, has advantage, not only from their position of where the assets are, but it's also the capabilities. Pembina has a extensive capability with respect to sour gas processing. Fifth is one of the largest sulfur recovery facilities in Alberta. K3 is extremely large sulfur recovery. We have other various.
Sour processing facilities. Recently, the Wapiti expansion, we just brought that on. You know, I'm very proud of the team. We kinda glossed over it. Scott mentioned that it came into service. That came into service and was up and running and accepting about 60% of nameplate in just a couple of days. I don't think a lot of operators can say that they can provide their customers with that backstopping. Long story short, we'll be fully built out in our Peace Pipeline being able to accept all the NGLs in the Edmonton market, and then we'll continue to grow our processing footprint, and you'll see probably a lot of expansion in that sour area.
Okay. Nope, thanks for all that. That was a ton. Appreciate it. I might embarrass myself with the next question. I'm not an expert on this by any means. There seems to be a range of views in terms of solvent assisted SAGD among the oil sands producers. What sort of technical or commercial proof points do you need to see in order to wrap your head around this butane enhancement opportunity? What stage are you at in that process today?
It's not an embarrassing question, Aaron, because I think a lot of the SAGD producers have been talking about the solvent opportunities, but they haven't been giving a lot of details. We do believe that butane is a contributing solvent that is being used. Obviously, Alberta is long butane, the opportunity is there. We're honestly just waiting to see how we can provide our customers in a different segment, different types of. Like, we produce primarily field-grade butane. Is there opportunities to upgrade that to ISO and normal?
We're just honestly in the early stages of seeing how these pilots are gonna work out and how we can supply those customers the product that they need to enhance their oil recovery, which ultimately will require more condensate, and you get back into Scott's flywheel comment earlier.
Okay. Gotcha. Thanks, everybody. I'll turn it back.
Your next question comes from the line of Jeremy Tonet with JPMorgan. Your line is open. Please go ahead. Friendly reminder to unmute locally. Your next question comes from the line of Saumya Jain with UBS. Your line is open. Please go ahead.
Hi. Good morning. I was just wondering, it was reported this week that Mark Carney planning changes to ease the process for natural resource projects, including pipelines. Could you provide any color on how you have seen the permitting process change since he's come into office and the sorts of discussions you are seeing in regards to project timelines and if that impacts the way you guys are looking into projects down the line?
Yeah. Scott here. To date, I can't say that we've seen any material change. You know, a recent example of that was our Taylor to Gordondale that took the full timeline to get permitted. We haven't seen it necessarily in action yet, but we are optimistic changes are coming. When we think about our strategy and where our focus is long term, it's really on LNG on the West Coast. You know, any incremental LNG that can be built out would be positive. As well as, you know, some of the proposed pipelines for crude oil will also have a knock on second order effect on our base business. We would like to see those projects go.
You know, like I said, we haven't seen changes yet. If there are changes, I think we would welcome those and view them very positively.
Okay. Great. Then just wanted to ask on the LPG market. With global tensions right now, could you provide some color on the sorts of discussions you're having with customers and how shipping timeline costs have changed for vessels, and how are you seeing demand for propane specifically at Prince Rupert?
It's Chris. Yeah, obviously a topical question with everything that's going on in the market. Scott, or sorry, pardon me, Cam mentioned it earlier. We've got export capacity through our own facility, obviously at Prince Rupert as well as third-party facilities. Both of those opportunities are doing very well in this environment. You know, Far East pricing has been very strong, especially relative to Edmonton and North America, so those positions have served us really well. We've got freight certainty for some time, so we don't have any exposure to some of the price increases and sort of compression that's coming into certain areas as a result of that freight increase.
We're in good shape on that front for some time and really taking advantage of the opportunity. Just quick reminder, like, our Prince Rupert facility has vessels dedicated to it, handy size. At the moment we'll be upgrading those to midsize carriers. In both cases, we've got long-term certainty on that pricing, and then our third-party facilities have similar arrangements.
Your next question comes from the line of Robert Catellier with CIBC Capital Markets. Your line is open. Please go ahead.
Hey, good morning, congratulations on the quarter and the dividend increase. That came in a touch ex-higher than we expected. Looking forward, you know, the 3.5% increase is below what you're expected to generate in terms of your fee-based CAGR. Obviously you'd wanna keep it that way to some extent just for a margin of safety. I'm just, you know, once you get beyond the sort of the inflection in spending in 2026 and 2027, how should we be looking at that sort of medium or long-term dividend growth rate? Because it seems to me there's enough momentum at Pembina specifically and in the industry in general to increase the capital project roster.
Hey, Robert, it's Cam here. A really good question. You know, as you pointed out, the dividend increase for 2026 at 3.5%, you know, is slightly below the 5%- 7% that we talked about from 2026-2 030. You know, I would say that it aligns well with the sort of more near-term profile. As a reminder, going back to what we said in our April 7th business update, you know, we did signal that growth throughout that period would be slightly shallower in, you know, the next couple years and then obviously slightly above that range for the 2028- 2030 period and obviously sort of working out to the 5% to 7% over the period.
We, we would see this increase for 2026 as aligning very closely with the growth in our fee-based business. I think as we, as we look forward to, you know, the future, that continues to be a major anchor for our dividend, our dividend policy and our capital allocation policy. I think we're always mindful of, one, you know, the value that our investors are placing on the dividend, and so that has, in the past, caused us to add some color around that. You know, if we think that's not being rewarded, obviously we wanna be thoughtful about it. Secondly, also, the extent to which our capital program, you know, is relative to our free cash flow profile.
I think, you know, you make the comment that the outlook is clearly improving, and the backlog across the industry is growing. I think we're thoughtful about that as we, you know, think about what cash flow we need to retain to continue to fund those projects accretively. Ultimately, the primary anchor continues to be that fee-based cash flow growth, with adjustments as I described. I would tend to think about it and orient it that way as we get towards the latter half of this decade, recognizing we're also trying to create stability as well and sort of not, you know, big erratic changes year to year. Consistency and predictability is big as well.
Yeah, that's a prudent perspective. Just as my follow-up, you know, the flip side of the coin is to your fee-based growth is of course risk management. So, you know, you have a long history of bringing projects on on time and under budget. I'm just curious, how are you thinking about construction and cost inflation risk today versus where we were 12- 18 months ago and, you know, how that's impacted how you approach risk management on on those major projects?
Rob, Jaret. Yeah, when you think of kind of the short term, you know, we're obviously seeing pressures on consumables like diesel, et cetera. You know, a large portion of our contracts, that's recoverable, but we're always trying to focus on, offsetting inflation for our customers on all of our operating assets, regardless of the contract. When I think about where, you know, I start to get, you know, asking a little bit more questions is kind of on your critical spares, your long lead items, electrical equipment, and materials that you need for future construction, steel for pipelines and those types of things. I'll break it into two buckets, the way we're thinking about it.
If I think about our Latour pipeline or Birch to Taylor or Taylor to Gordondale, the majority of those materials have been procured and the construction services also been negotiated. Cedar obviously is well in flight. That was 70% lump sum. Now when I'm starting to think about the new backlog, that's really where our teams, you know, we set up a couple of years ago kind of inventory management and a forward-looking amount of capital that we put aside to start really getting ahead of some of these long lead items and procure costs prior to inflation that, you know, that our supply chain teams were forecasting. It's an area that is hyper-focused, and it is gonna take some innovation from our execution teams to be able to maintain margins.
Not gonna lie, we're gonna see continued cost in that area, but we're confident that we will be able to maintain our margins by different partnerships, different contracting strategies, and it's gonna take some work from the owners coming up.
Okay, great. Thank you.
Your next question comes from the line of Robert Hope with Scotiabank. Your line is open. Please go ahead.
Morning, everyone. Two questions on some project outlooks. Yellowhead wasn't in the initial release. Can you maybe provide an update on how you're thinking about the Dow project, the Yellowhead project or as well, or other ethane opportunities?
Rob, it's Chris. Yeah, I mean, that project continues to progress along. I mean, you know, I think in general, I'd say we're really pleased with the entirety of the BD backlog. Those projects we talked about, you know, the deal we're doing with Dow, how Yellowhead fits into that as well as Greenlight are all really trending where we want them and on pace to progress here nicely through this quarter. Not in a position yet to announce anything there obviously or we would have. We're really close and excited about what's coming here shortly.
All right. Appreciate that. Maybe a similar question. The Alliance expansion, looks like the open season was sufficient to move it forward to the next gating item. Can you maybe update us on, you know, the timing of when you think this could be sanctioned as well as potential capital cost?
Rob. Yeah, like Scott said in his opening, we did have a successful open season that closed on the 20th. Can't speak to the commercial specifics obviously at this time, we are continuing to advance engineering and regulatory. Obviously this is a CER-regulated project, we'll have to go through that. Once we get a little bit more clarity on the timelines there, we'll be able to give a little bit more color on when we FID. I will say, you know, we're highly confident, you know, of the process. The demand is required. It's being extremely supported by everyone. All new natural gas consumption in order to generate, you know, liquids is obviously well supported by governments and municipalities and our customers, et cetera.
We're confident that slow expansion will go forward, actually with or without Greenlight. We see a lot of industrial demand in the Alberta industrial heartland and we believe that this is gonna be required.
Great. Thank you.
Your next question comes from the line of Maurice Choy with RBC Capital Markets. Your line is open. Please go ahead.
Thank you, and good morning, everyone. Since you mentioned Greenlight, I'll start there. You highlighted that there is a potential FID at the end of this quarter. I guess just taking a step back, as this journey towards an FID approaches an end and you start looking back at the journey thus far, you know, what has been the part of the process that's taken most time, that's been the most complex, and if there's anything you could have done differently?
Maurice, it's Chris. Yeah, you know, we mentioned it in the intro and you touched on it. Things are progressing nicely there. Looking to get, you know, more info out, you know, this quarter for sure. When we look back, you know, we think there's some things that have gone exceptionally well on the project. We positioned ourselves really strategically in the market with how we, you know, positioned ourselves vis-à-vis land, interconnects, acquiring existing capacity on the system to facilitate the project. When you think about projects of this size and this nature, honestly, when it comes to the engineering and the project development side and it comes to the commercial, they're not off the shelf, they're not vanilla, and they just simply take time.
We're all in all pretty, or I should say very positive on the progress we've made. We'll of course take learnings and apply that to the next one. You know, we don't control the data center build-out. We don't control the fiber build-out. You know, remind everyone that those aren't the businesses we're in. We're the power generation piece, and so we don't have control over the entirety of the timeline. Our customer needs to progress those work streams as well. That's all coming together nicely here in Q2 and we're on pace.
Maybe just a quick follow-up on that thought, like, because you mentioned the future phases, is it then fair that, you know, the additional learnings that you get should lead to better returns in the future phases?
What I'll say is I think we're positioned well for future phases. I think that leadership position we've developed in this space is really in service of having success here on the first phase and positioning us to have that opportunity to do future phases. You know, there'll undoubtedly be synergies between them and advantages as you continue to layer that on. That's been consistent across our business, and I don't think this is any different. In particular, when you start to think about some of the integrated components, I'd certainly expect that as we move into the next phase, we'll see continued improvement in the economics and the advantage of the integrated business.
Maybe, Maurice, Cam, I'll just add one thing to that. I think one of the things that we see as we really gain a foothold in this type of opportunity and, you know, hopefully do more of it is, like we've done in other situations where we step into a new market or a new business, we're looking to mitigate risk in a bunch of different ways.
Just like we did with Cedar, and we're looking at here, you know, part of that is the capital cost risk through a lump sum EPC. In the future, if you think about no additional phases, you know, one opportunity for margin or return improvement is obviously as we get comfortable with the construction, you know, doing something which obviously has a little more risk in it and not pursuing a lump sum. Obviously the trade-off is not paying that lump sum premium. Potential there for us to improve margins by doing that.
Makes sense and good to know. If I could just finish off with a comment you made earlier about the recent upstream M&A within the basin. I wonder if you could expand that a little bit more and talk about direct or indirect impacts to Pembina, given your commercial relationships with those parties, if any at all.
Maurice, I don't have the exact numbers, but if you look back at some of the recent upstream deals, you know, whether it was CNRL going into the Duvernay, you know, some of the comments we've seen out of Ovintiv with their recent acquisitions, and there's probably a few examples that I'm forgetting about. We've generally seen production increase quite quickly after acquisitions close. Most people aren't making acquisitions to just hold production flat. We're pretty optimistic that, you know, history will prove itself out here going forward. As people enter the basin and merge or buy new companies, we've seen that volume growth increase. We're pretty optimistic about that.
No, that's really encouraging. Thank you so very much.
Thank you.
Your next question comes from the line of Ben Pham with BMO. Your line is open. Please go ahead.
Hey, good morning. I'm just wondering with the Western Canadian gas production rising, yet the LPG and the NGLs as well, and part of that is also the ethane side of things which doesn't seem to have a big home right now other than the Dow side of things. Is there opportunity then for you, Pembina, to maybe capitalize on that opportunity, or you think it's more gonna be reinjection into the gas stream, that part of it?
It's Chris, Ben. I think there's undoubtedly opportunity in that. When you look, when you look at how our business has built up over time and you look at the wave of, you know, gas production that's coming, condensate production, associated gas and NGL, I think there's a huge opportunity to continue to extract and capture that those liquids in the province and continue to grow our core business on the back of that. So, you know, our expectation and certainly the efforts we're putting in in and around the core business are in service of capturing that growth on the liquid side along with the gas growth.
Okay. Got it. I know it's early days with your new, newest partnership with the PGI, but anything you can share qualitatively in terms of the business there, your expansion plan, just where you're planning to allocate capital within that partnership?
No, you know, first of all, the deal hasn't closed, but, you know, based on our conversations and getting to know our new partners, we're really optimistic, and we know they wanna grow the business, and we wanna grow the business as well. We're pretty excited to work together with them.
Okay, got it. I'll leave it there. Thank you.
There are no further questions at this time. I will now turn the call back to Scott Burrows for closing remarks.
Well, thank you everyone for taking the time to listen to our call, and thank you to our employees, customers, contractors, and communities for a strong start to the year. like I said, the AGM is this afternoon, so please feel free to dial into that and we'll chat soon. Thanks.
This concludes today's call. Thank you for attending. You may now disconnect.