Advise that today's conference is being recorded. If you require any further assistance, please press star zero. I would now like to hand the conference over to Jonathan Lock, Senior Vice President, Chief Development Officer. Thank you. Please go ahead.
Good morning, and thank you for joining us for this special Chemours Mini Investor Day, covering our Thermal & Specialized Solutions business. I'm joined today by Mark Newman, President and Chief Executive Officer, and Alisha Bellezza, President of Thermal & Specialized Solutions. Before we start, I'd like to remind you that comments made on this call, as well as the supplemental information provided in our presentation and on our website, contain forward-looking statements that involve risks and uncertainties, including the impact of COVID-19 on our business and operations, and the other risks and uncertainties described in the documents Chemours has filed with the SEC. These forward-looking statements are not guarantees of future performance and are based on certain assumptions and expectations of future events that may not be realized.
Actual results may differ, and Chemours undertakes no duty to update any forward-looking statements as a result of future developments or new information. During the course of this call, management will refer to certain non-GAAP financial measures that we believe are useful to investors evaluating the company's performance. A reconciliation of non-GAAP terms and adjustments are included at the end of the presentation. With that, I'll turn things over to Mark for some opening remarks. Mark?
Thank you, Jonathan, and good morning to everyone on the call. Thank you for joining us for this Mini Investor Day covering our Thermal & Specialized Solutions or TSS segment. Coming off the excellent results we delivered in Q1, we are very excited to be sharing more about our TSS business and the potential for long-term secular growth we see ahead. As you will hear from Alisha in a few minutes, TSS is a unique platform and positioned to help support sustainable development across a wide range of end markets. The headline is Opteon, our low global warming potential refrigerant of the future. The story goes far beyond and is built upon advanced climate-friendly solutions our technology enables.
Before I turn things over to Alisha, though, I wanted to recap the four key priorities we are driving as a management team here at Chemours, so you can see how this fits into the overall picture. Priority one is to improve TT earnings through the cycle while growing with strategic customers. We have the best book of contracted business in our history and are now focused on additional steps that will reduce earnings and cash flow volatility through the cycle while liberating capacity for our most strategic customers in high-value applications.
Priority two is to drive secular growth in TSS and APM behind class-leading products and innovative chemistry. Today, you're gonna hear more about the TSS story. Over in our APM segment, our industry-leading chemistry positions us uniquely to win in clean energy and advanced electronics like few in the industry.
We continue to support investment and growth in key materials such as our Teflon PFA and Nafion membranes. Priority three is to continue to manage and resolve legacy liabilities consistent with the Chemours-DuPont-Corteva MoU. With this agreement in place, we will continue to put legacy issues behind us and work collaboratively with all stakeholders, including the communities in which we operate, to ensure a sustainable future for Chemours. Finally, priority four is to return the majority of our free cash flow we generate to our shareholders through a steady diet of share repurchases and a stable dividend. We are transforming Chemours through the investments in our first three priorities, but believe consistent cash returns to shareholders will compound our value creation over time.
My entire leadership team is focused on these priorities, and we're excited at the number of levers we have to drive shareholder returns in the years to come. With that, I'll now turn things over to Alisha.
Thank you, Mark. Let's turn to slide four. I wanna start off by saying that I'm thrilled to be here with you today for the first time since we launched our Thermal & Specialized Solutions, or as we call it, TSS business. Before we jump in, a bit about how we arrived at TSS, because I believe our ability to redefine the business in our industry is reflected within our name. First is thermal. We all know that the heating and cooling of our environments, surfaces, and equipment are foundational to modern society, and we are masters of thermal management. Second is specialized. From foams to propellants, our chemistry helps enable and power many of the great non-thermal modern conveniences and innovations that surround us. Finally, solutions. This is what we do.
We bring the best chemistry to market and truly partner with our customers to deliver solutions which go beyond the molecule. We have a lot of new information to cover today to help you get more insight into the business and get you as excited as we are about what's to come to deliver a mid- to high single-digit growth and above 30% adjusted EBITDA margin. Our vision for the future is simple.
We want to use our chemistry to realize bold ambitions and move beyond the status quo to drive meaningful, sustainable change. Our society needs solutions that enable technological progress and innovation to contend with the unfolding threats of climate change, and that's where we come in as the TSS business. We bring the technical expertise needed to develop solutions that align with international regulations, create products with lower Global Warming Potential or GWP, and improve performance.
Our solutions are enabling industries to address performance and environmental challenges, and that's what we wanna discuss here today. First and foremost, we are a highly profitable business with high returns, and we continue to generate consistent and reliable profitability coupled with robust cash generation. But our financial performance is just one part of the value that our thermal management solutions create for our stakeholders. The second part centers around our positive ESG impact, which are driven through our innovation efforts. Today, we'll discuss our opportunities for near-term growth. We'll talk about how we're investing in mid and long-term innovation. We'll also address some of the most important global mega trends which support the secular long-term growth of our business. We'll talk through how we're doing all of this while still maintaining 30%+ EBITDA margins.
We have a clear line of sight to a decade of growth in front of us, and that is being bolstered by a number of factors. First, it starts with the solutions that our products enable. They make significant contributions to the planet and to the people and communities we serve. Our chemistry is critical to so much of our daily lives. Our products play a critical role in the cold chain. They preserve perishable goods by ensuring safe delivery and storage in the transportation process. They also help facilitate expanded access to goods across the globe. We have high-performance thermal management solutions for different applications that are supported by a robust international patent portfolio, and we know that no single patent will significantly affect our market position. We continue to enhance our portfolio in recognition of this fact.
Second, emerging regulations continue to increase the need for customers to use our existing and newly developed low GWP solutions. Specifically, our Opteon products are perfectly designed to facilitate this transition, and we're working with our value chain partners to make this happen smoothly. Finally, as the world continues to innovate and migrate to more sustainable products, we know that our solutions today and those we continue to create will be crucial to enabling forward progress.
Throughout this presentation, you'll hear me elaborate on all of these components a bit more. TSS is poised to meet today's demands and tomorrow's opportunities. Let me show you how. Turning to slide five. Our product portfolio allows us to be number one or two in all hydrofluoroolefin or HFO low GWP applications. Our robust intellectual property portfolio supports our market differentiation for years to come.
This gives us the ability to deliver differentiated products to address our customers' most important challenges. We are the drivers of innovation in this space. Our Opteon solutions are better for the environment and improve performance, so they meet our customers' demands. By 2025, we estimate that our low GWP products will have eliminated approximately 325 million tons of carbon dioxide equivalent globally from the atmosphere. That figure is roughly equivalent to the removal of about 69 million passenger cars driven in one year or the annual energy consumption of about 37 million homes. This forward progress aligns with our sustainability commitments at Chemours to be the leader in a new era of responsible chemistry. Our hope is to create a world in which critical chemistry meets the essential need to solve the seemingly unsolvable, all while protecting the planet and its people. Looking to the numbers.
Our 2021 financial results reflected strong sales and margin performance that were driven by improved demand despite all of the auto OEM headwinds associated with chip shortages. Now in 2022, we delivered a robust first quarter performance with net sales up 40% and adjusted EBITDA up 90% when compared to the same time period from last year. Our Opteon low GWP and legacy products continue to increase adoption in all of the markets we serve. Over the coming years, we envision a clear pathway towards short and long-term sales growth. I'm confident that our customer-centered strategy, together with our innovative solutions, global manufacturing network and experienced team, will enable our business to take advantage of its full growth potential.
Which is why I'm so confident in saying that we'll hit mid to high single digits of top line growth for at least the next decade, all while maintaining above 30% adjusted EBITDA margin. Let's dive into it a bit more, turning to slide six. To enhance customer experience in each of the markets and regions where we participate, we align manufacturing, supply chain, and customer needs to enable an end-to-end agile, integrated operation.
This gives us the ability to drive reliability, performance, speed and innovation. By focusing on our customers and end market needs, we are able to embrace simplicity and make it easier for them to do business with us. For example, about a year ago, we launched the TSS Connect platform. In launching TSS Connect, our goal was to demonstrate how much we value our customers' needs and opinions in our planning processes.
The implementation of the platform was successfully done and will continue to enhance the customer experience. The platform only further illustrates how our cutting-edge approach to advancing the customer experience serves to benefit us all in the long run. Moving to slide seven. If you take a look at this slide, you'll see some of our key markets and applications. You might think that because we invented Freon, we're just a refrigeration company.
While yes, we invented the refrigeration category and continue to revolutionize it with our Opteon low GWP solutions, we are actually so much more. Our products deliver value across multiple industries and applications. We collaborate with equipment manufacturers, formulators, and other value chain partners to develop advanced solutions. These solutions deliver the optimal balance of performance, low GWP, safety and cost across a variety of markets from refrigeration and spray foam to specialty fluids and propellants.
We also play a key role in enabling decarbonization through the replacement of fossil fuel-based heating systems with energy-efficient heat pumps. Heat pumps have become an increasingly recognized technology to reduce household emissions while providing a versatile heating and cooling solution. For example, for home water heating alone, every million units of heat pumps installed would save over 2 billion cubic meters of fossil fuel. With the European Green Deal accelerating decarbonization and driving the region toward a climate-neutral economy, our products play a key role in this transition. Over the coming decades, the expectation is a double-digit growth of residential heat pump deployment. Another great example of a technology we're helping to innovate is foam. Foam insulation is important in construction and appliances due to its energy-efficient properties.
For example, a single house insulated and air sealed with foam has an additional energy savings of approximately 5,600 kilowatts per year, which would be approximately 1,500 kilograms reduction of CO2 per year. We recently launched Opteon 1150 that joins Opteon 1100 in the Chemours portfolio of non-flammable, low GWP foam products. More broadly, as the market and regulations at large continue to move toward more environmentally sustainable products, we're helping our customers by providing viable options to ease this transition. Let's look at how we plan to deliver on that. Turning to slide eight. Clearly, our society needs solutions that enable technological progress and address the ongoing threat of climate change. That's where we come in. We bring the technical expertise needed to lower GWP and enhance product performance.
As business president, I can confidently say to you that we have far-reaching, forward-looking goals for TSS that make us the best in the business. They also get me excited about our future. I know what you want to hear today, and that's how we're going to deliver on these ambitious goals. For us, providing innovative new solutions for our customers is our top priority.
Whether we're talking about innovating in today's world or the world we anticipate playing in two decades from now, we have the solutions and the expertise to make a real difference today and tomorrow. We're a leading thermal solutions provider, and we know how to retain that position. We need to be strategic in how we choose the partnerships, sustainable solutions, and innovation opportunities we pursue. Our products are highly profitable because they solve real business challenges, and they're environmentally sound.
We have a lot of growth potential ahead, and we're laser focused on seizing these opportunities. It's our duty to prioritize customer focus and collaboration in the development of our applications. We're a performance-based organization, and our ability to execute on this fact is critical for our future. Moving to slide nine, let me take you through our TSS growth framework and expectations for the future. As I said earlier, we see at least a decade of growth ahead of us, which will be propelled forward by regulations and market-driven innovation. You'll note that these first two phases outlined here are well underway. Our near-term growth will mainly be driven by regulations that are transitioning markets and our customers away from higher GWP products toward our Opteon solutions.
You probably recall us talking about the European Union F-Gas Regulation and the Mobile Air Conditioning, or MAC Directive, that were implemented in 2014 and 2017, respectively. Those two pieces of legislation did a couple of things in Europe. First, the F-Gas reg set forth an HFC phase down schedule. It initially had a target to achieve a competitive low carbon economy by reducing approximately 78% of emissions by 2050. Second, in 2017, the EU MAC Directive went a step beyond, requiring all new passenger vehicles to use only refrigerant gases with less than 150 GWP. At the same time, legislation in the U.S. was passed to economically incentivize automotive manufacturers with CAFE or Corporate Average Fuel Economy credits to switch to low GWP refrigerants.
More recently, some other countries like Japan and South Korea have adopted similar legislation. These regulatory achievements resulted in significant conversion from HFC-134a to products like our new Opteon YF, going from a product with about 1,400 GWP to about 4 GWP. Today, the expansion phase is all about the adoption of Kigali as well as similar legislation and regulations. Like the F-Gas Regulation, Kigali set forth a familiar approach to emission reduction targets and timelines by using a baseline year with a series of step downs clearly laid out. At this point, approximately 130 countries have ratified the Kigali Amendment or have legislation that mirrors its intent. Like the American Innovation and Manufacturing Act passed in the U.S. in December of 2020.
Since we have hit more significant phase downs on top of already tight supply chains, we've noticed that our customers are transitioning to low and ultra-low GWP Opteon products within the automotive, HVAC, and foam market. Finally, we're seeing global mega trends driving the need for more advanced thermal management solutions with a better environmental footprint. I'll go into more detail a bit later on this, but for now, let me stress how important it is that we're not only planning for the short term, but that we are focused on the next decade ahead and even well beyond. Let's move on to discussing the different Opteon growth phases. On slide 10, let me explain in more detail our expected short-term growth from the expansion phase.
As you can see, these are some of our key markets and applications, mobile air conditioning, commercial refrigeration, air conditioning and heat pumps, as well as chillers and foam blowing agents. These markets are all being impacted by evolving regulatory requirements and need constant innovation to support customer interests. We estimate the total addressable market for these segments to be approximately $11 billion by 2026. What's really interesting here and what I want to direct your attention to are the growth rates that each market will convert to low GWP products in that timeframe. Growth in our industry is happening, and we are well positioned to serve these emerging low GWP needs. Our investments in innovation and capacity enable a strong position to support our customers and partners through the next decade.
We are very much in an expansion phase right now and moving into mass adoption of low GWP solutions. Just take a look at the future of stationary markets, specifically with AC and heat pumps. You'll see that only about 25%-30% of the market will have converted to low GWP solutions by 2026. We have the infrastructure in place to get us there, and we're just getting started.
With this in mind, let's move to the next slide. As we mentioned earlier, in the last couple of years, we've seen how regulations in Europe play a pivotal role in moving the market towards low GWP solutions. Despite the initial challenges faced in Europe when the regulations were rolled out, especially the influx of illegal HFC imports, there have been many learnings that stakeholders have taken into consideration to continue driving the phase down.
I have confidence that the expertise the regulators and industry gained in Europe will help achieve the intended climate goals faster and facilitate the transition in a successful way. Besides the work already being done to prevent illegal imports, the recently proposed F-Gas provision establishes even better measures to control and ease illegal imports, and it goes one step further with more stringent and streamlined penalties for those found to be violating the regulations.
In the U.S., we do not expect to encounter the same magnitude of challenges we did in Europe. The EPA is also proactively addressing the threat of illegal imports with its proposal for a tracking system. It's also looking into the formation of a task force and well-defined, sometimes very significant penalties for those in violation. We're ready for this next phase of regulation. We're ready for the U.S. AIM Act and the revised F-Gas regulation.
We know how these regulatory trends will affect our markets. We also have the tools in place to help our customers plan for and make this transition smoothly. That's really exciting to us because it means they'll help us usher in this next era of environmental sustainability. These regulations drive the need for next-gen solutions, which I'll discuss in the next slide. Turning to slide 12. As we've shared previously, we keep reinventing our product portfolio to support the phase down regulations.
We at Chemours have developed and commercialized a portfolio of low global warming potential solutions that leverage HFO technology. Our Opteon portfolio, in addition to existing low GWP HFCs, enable our customers and value chain partners to transition to more sustainable solutions. We've invested about $1 billion in research and development, manufacturing assets, and downstream product and application development with low GWP HFO technology.
We remain committed to the ongoing development needs of our customers throughout this phase down. Moving forward, we will continue enabling innovation to support market and regulatory needs. We'll continue protecting our customers, partners, and investments with a robust international patent portfolio that continues to grow to cover our existing and new product pipelines. Moving to slide 13.
When we think about the future of our business, it's clear that it will be greatly influenced by four key trends in particular. These are some of the major market trends that we're seeing impact our everyday lives and are connected to some of the most important U.N. Sustainable Development Goals. Let's start with decarbonization and electrification. Today, the world is working together to address climate change in different ways. The global temperature increase is one of the most pressing challenges we face today.
One option to address the rise in temperature is to pair electrification with advanced decarbonization solutions to enable a more sustainable and potentially carbon-free future. To get there, the global economy needs to lower the carbon intensity that results from transportation, construction, and heavy industry. While electrification is effective in many applications, it requires new thermal management solutions to reach its full potential, given the significant heat generated from the processes. This is an area where we, as the Chemours TSS business, can make a big difference. Today, we're at the dawn of a new era of connectivity. Remote work has become commonplace. E-commerce is the way to buy. Video calls are now a way of life, and there are many, many other examples that I can think of that showcase our increased connectivity.
To support this growth, we need to advance our infrastructure development, like with data centers, to accommodate these now commonplace experiences. In order to assist our infrastructure development, we need to create high-performing, more sustainable solutions. That's where TSS comes in. We have the thermal management expertise needed to partner in many of these areas and be a crucial part of the solution. When it comes to the growing middle class, its shift toward urbanization is being driven by societies that keep changing, just like our planet. In the world's fastest-growing regions, the growth of the middle class is leading to greater energy consumption and energy generation. This, in turn, increases the need for new technologies. Our solutions can enable systems to consume less energy with the same or better performance to support accelerated growth.
Then the final key trend that I want to touch on here revolves around climate impact and the circular economy. All of the mega trends I previously mentioned are focused on solutions that can reduce climate impact. However, it is also very important that we develop solutions that can enable circularity. In TSS, we have the expertise and experience to help achieve this.
Clearly, collaboration in this space will be critical across the value chain. These mega trends are opening up the opportunity for us to move beyond just market-driven growth. They're allowing for us to make strategic decisions when it comes to our research and development processes so that we're actively paving the way for advanced technologies. To make this more tangible for you, I want to show you some examples of how our low GWP applications are leading to real-world innovation.
Moving on to slide 14. When it comes to electric vehicles, this sector of the market is obviously of high interest and growing. There's no doubt that EVs have the potential to reshape the transportation sector by significantly reducing carbon emissions and facilitating a more sustainable future for all of us. Transportation is one of the highest CO₂ emitting sectors. Electric vehicles could change this. There are studies that show that electric cars generate less than half of the emissions generated by gasoline-powered cars throughout their lifecycle. When we look at the realities of mass adoption, there are some challenges that stand in the way of EVs becoming commonplace, which, fittingly enough, our thermal management expertise and Opteon solutions portfolio are well suited to address and even solve in many cases. Let me give you an example.
I'm sure you're all familiar with how our Opteon refrigerants are used to cool the inside of a car on those hot days. What you might not realize is we can play a role in heating them as well. When you look at the typical car that we all grew up with and compare them to EVs, one point is abundantly clear. EVs don't have a combustion engine.
They have batteries. In the winter, when temperatures are cold and people need to heat their car cabin, an internal combustion car will generate heat from the engine to provide warmth. With EVs, you don't have that option. Instead, they pull energy from their battery, which takes away from their ability to perform and drive long distances. An option that does exist is to incorporate a heat pump, which redirects heat into the cabin and keeps temperature under control.
Unlike the electric resistance heating system, which creates heat from the energy drawn, a heat pump merely redirects it. Our Opteon products enable the heat pump to operate efficiently. Even beyond temperature control, our thermal management solutions will be critical to EV innovation. There's a plethora of opportunities here to utilize our applications in ways that enhance electric vehicle infrastructure efficiency and performance to create more economical cars.
Our innovation for the marketplace of the future doesn't stop here. I want to walk you through how our immersion cooling technology works as well. Moving on to slide 15. In the same vein as EVs, robust data centers are an important part of our present and future. The number and size of hyperscale and edge data centers is growing. Today, the world demands applications such as the cloud, Internet of Things, artificial intelligence, and cryptocurrency.
The emergence of these applications is resulting in IT changes that are forcing a renewed look for advanced technology. There's an increasing demand for highly effective cooling solutions to lower power consumption, water use, and carbon emissions while enhancing performance. Data centers require thermal management systems to remove heat from servers and ensure reliable operation. Their cooling systems use different mechanisms to ensure IT equipment is kept at an effective operating temperature. Again, this is where our innovation becomes critical to the industry. Let me paint a quick picture for you to give you some context into how this technology actually works in real life. Take a second and picture the smartphone that I know you all have on you right now. Let's say you leave it out in the sun all day. It starts overheating and not working well.
Now it needs to cool down before you can use it again. Imagine if there was a special type of liquid that you could submerge your phone into, and it would cool the device immediately without impacting its ability to function at all. Well, that technology does exist, and it's actually what immersion cooling allows us to do, particularly at large scale with data centers.
When we say we're inventing the solutions of the future, this is what we're talking about. This is a new market opportunity for us, and it's a key part of our vision for the next decade of growth. We estimate that our immersion cooling solution currently in development reduced energy use by 40% and potentially allow data centers to reduce up to 60% of space when compared to data centers that use traditional cooling methods like air or water.
We're actively collaborating and investing in solutions that we believe will enable the required growth of data centers in a more sustainable way. Moving to slide 16. I've given you a glimpse at two very exciting areas of innovation for our business, but even that was just a very limited peek at the world of innovation unfolding around us. The increased need for thermal management solutions is a reality, and in anticipation of this growth, we've developed several innovation principles that will guide us along every step of the way. First, our solutions need to be market-driven and aligned with relevant mega trends that are important to our customers. Second, our approach to addressing these emerging trends needs to be highly focused and based on well-defined growth platforms that could enhance existing solutions or adjacent expansion.
Third, we need to ensure that our solutions and approach are aligned with our Chemours corporate responsibility commitment to develop products that will be meaningful to the world. Fourth, throughout the entire process, we need to ensure that we are using our agile innovation management process in a way that enables our ability to fail fast or move forward.
In the near future, we will share more details about other exciting growth opportunities that we're currently working on. We believe that they'll pique your interest too, as they fall in similar veins as the EV and immersion cooling projects that we just discussed. One thing I wanna make clear is that just because we've had recent success with our Opteon product does not mean that we're going to become complacent. We aim to be the partner of choice for our customers always.
With our technical expertise, innovation, IT portfolio, and the exceptional execution of our commercial teams, I firmly believe that we are the most well-positioned to get there. Moving on to slide 17. I know I shared a lot of information with you today. I hope you got a sense of the energy and excitement that we have for the next chapter of TSS and Chemours. We wanted to give you a better understanding of the foundation of our business, the organic growth opportunities that we're seeing unfold, and the new ones on the horizon that we're investing in to provide our customers and the world with better thermal management solutions. We are growth-oriented and continue to look for ways to innovate our solutions so they further enhance efficiency and contribute to the betterment of our world.
Our CRC goals only reinforce this positioning and strengthen our commitment to ushering in a new era of responsible chemistry. By investing in innovation and a market that increasingly prioritizes sustainability, our Opteon portfolio will grow by double digits, contributing to a net top line growth in the mid- to high-single digits and maintaining above 30% adjusted EBITDA margins over the next decade. Based on the market dynamics that we're seeing right now, 2022 continues to be a strong year, showing robust growth. We are truly meeting today's demands, and we are ready for tomorrow's opportunities. Now, I would be remiss if I didn't take a second to thank both our customers and our partners for their ongoing trust and confidence in our ability to deliver exciting and emerging solutions of the future.
I also wanna thank the entire TSS team for their passion to deliver sustainable growth. As we wrap up here and move on to the Q&A portion of our presentation, I wanna thank you all for your time and attention today. I'll look forward to continuing this conversation on our business, and now I'll turn it back over to Mark Newman for closing remarks.
Thank you, Alisha. I hope that you can all see how special this business is and why we're so excited about the future. With that, operator, please open the line for question and answer.
Thank you. As a reminder, to ask a question, you will need to press star one on your telephone. Again, that is star one to ask a question. To withdraw your question, you just press the pound key. Please limit yourselves to one question and one follow-up. Please stand by while we compile the queuing roster. Your first question comes to the line of John McNulty from BMO Capital Markets. Your line's now open.
Yeah, good morning. Thanks for taking my question. So I guess can you help us to think a little bit more about the longer term profitability of the business? I know you've highlighted you expect to have, you know, adjusted EBITDA margins greater than 30%. That, you know, they're candidly, they're above 30% right now, and you're introducing a lot of new kind of exciting products that look like they have a higher price point or a higher value proposition. I guess how should we be thinking about that in the long term?
Hey, good morning, John, and thanks for your question. Listen, you know, we're very excited about the growth and the profitability of this business. Clearly, we got off to a really strong start this year, and so, you know, while we're viewing this as a 30-plus EBITDA margin business, for a long time to come, you know, based on the start we had in Q1, we're likely to be higher than that guide, you know, this year. But very excited about both the top line growth, that we're funding, both through the structural shift to low global warming in refrigerants, as well as the investment in innovation which we went out of our way to share.
I'll ask Alisha to make some more comments about, you know, how she thinks of the margin of this business, but clearly excited to have a business with very high EBITDA margins or great EBITDA margins as well as a decade of secular growth. Alisha.
Thanks, Mark. Hey, John, good to speak to you. Mark is spot on in the way that we're thinking about this decade of growth in front of us, near term, really driven by regulations. We're gonna see Opteon growing likely mid-teens, as it basically supplants HFCs through the phase downs and getting to that net top line growth of the mid- to high-single-digits. As we think about margins, you know, we feel very good about being able to maintain the above 30% targets there. At longer term, you're spot on. We're working on innovation, and those innovations that we have underway will provide a very strong value proposition, and we think that that's what will help us sustain those above 30% industry-leading margins. We're feeling really good about that.
Got it. No, that's helpful. Thanks for the color on that. Then, you know, we know you did a large scale expansion of Opteon not that long ago in terms of capacity. I guess when you think about the capital required to keep up with the growth that you're looking at, you know, I guess how should we think about what may need to be added or the investment that we should be considering as we kind of look forward? How should we be thinking about the cash harvesting ability of such a high growth business?
Hey, John, that's a great question. Clearly, when we sized Corpus Christi and we tripled our capacity, you know, it was with having both F-Gas in Europe and AIM here in the U.S. Our view was, you know, this was gonna be the refrigerant of the future, certainly in those two major markets. With that in mind, you know, that's how we sized Corpus Christi. The team's done a really nice job of finding, you know, more capacity in that asset as they continue to run at higher rates over time. Clearly, as Opteon or low global warming refrigerants expand globally, we'll continue to invest behind that expansion in markets.
As you know, this is a business today that generates good margins, great cash conversion on earnings, and we would expect that to continue despite, you know, investing to, you know, stay ahead of the curve here as HFOs expand globally and in other applications.
Maybe I'll add two little anecdotes into that. First of all, we have a phenomenal team at our Corpus Christi site, and they have been doing some really creative work, as Mark was alluding to, of reaming out as much capacity as possible with the existing asset footprint and really driving uptime in a meaningful way to help serve our customers well. The other thing that we've done, John, is we launched our Opteon 1150, which is production that comes from our El Dorado, Arkansas facility. That's a new line of HFO technology, primarily serving the foam markets today, but we see growth in that one too. We've been creative in how we've approached capacity and our ability to serve our customers effectively.
It's really the integrated supply chain and the way we have ourselves set up around the world that gives us a ton of confidence to be able to globally very effectively and efficiently serve our customers. Thanks for the question.
Thank you. Thanks for the color.
Your next question comes to the line of Josh Spector from UBS. Your line is now open.
Yeah. Hey, guys. Thanks for taking my question. Just a couple of questions around the market size and growth. You know, you gave a lot of good information in slide 10 in the presentation. I'm curious if you could comment. Where is the penetration of low GWP refrigerants in those various markets today? In terms of Chemours' portfolio, what's the mix of Opteon versus everything else? You gave a comment earlier to John's question about 15% growth in Opteon. What's implied in the growth of everything else in your calculus? Thanks.
Hey, Josh, it's Alisha. Let me walk you through a couple of aspects to address your question. First, maybe I'll start with the end, which is the mix of our portfolio. The way that we're looking at it today, we expect that by the end of this year, the majority of our revenue will be generated from Opteon products. As we look at the markets that we shared on slide 10, and obviously, you know, alluded to in our prepared remarks that there's a pretty big runway ahead of us for conversion to HFO technology and our Opteon solutions.
When you think about it in the mobile market, to begin with, recall that in Europe and pretty much in the U.S., new vehicle production starting in 2017 all needed to use HFO technology to comply with regulations or to be able to access the CAFE credits in the U.S. Really we've got the biggest car parks ex-China, let's say, using HFO technology now. The growth in the mass market is gonna come from after-market usage, which is growing pretty significantly today. Again, as we look on a global basis, hitting that 50% target by 2026. On the stationary side, Europe's been leading the way in conversion, and that's really driven by the F-Gas regulations. U.S., we are in the beginning innings here, and so a lot of growth in front of us.
We've been really working very closely with major OEMs here in the States, where we have six of them who've chosen our Opteon XL41 to convert to. That really won't start in a meaningful way until we start to get closer to that first major step down in 2024. Really excited about being able to serve our customers and help create a smooth transition through this regulation.
Alisha, I would just maybe add a couple of points. Certainly from a regional mix perspective, the U.S. is lagging Europe on stationary adoption, and so we would expect, you know, more growth relatively speaking in the U.S. versus Europe. The second thing I'd point out is chart 10 shows the market CAGRs. Clearly, HFOs are growing at a more rapid rate within those CAGRs. You know, these are structurally markets that are growing, but within this growth, you know, HFO growth is higher, certainly in the markets where there is an adoption on the way.
Thanks. That's really helpful. If I could just do one quick follow-up. I guess, Alisha, you mentioned most of the portfolio Opteon technologies by the end of the year. Earlier, you said about 15% growth in HFOs, obviously higher than your target. Is that just some math of the blending, or is there something else in there?
I think I said the majority of revenue by the end of this year and into 2023. We would definitely expect that mid-teens growth of HFOs, which is, you know, above the rate of HFCs to get us to that mid- to high-single-digit overall for the business. Maybe a little bit higher growth rate this year, as Mark was alluding to, given the strong start that we've seen.
Okay, thank you.
Your next question comes to line of Arun Viswanathan from RBC Capital Markets. Your line's now open.
Great. Thanks for taking my question. Thanks for all the details. It's definitely very helpful. I just wanted to understand, maybe if you could discuss pricing in this business. You know, in some of these chemical businesses, we get data on, you know, how prices evolve, but this is a little bit more specialized as you note. Is pricing kind of, you know, conducted with customers individually? Maybe you can also address how new products play into that. Should we see some of the growth that you allude to mid- to high-single-digit also driven by mix improvements? Thanks.
Yeah, Arun, thanks for the question. Clearly, as you saw in our Q1 results, you know, across our entire portfolio in this current inflationary environment, we've been able to stay ahead of inflation across the portfolio. As we alluded to on the Q1 call and earlier today, you know, there is a structural shift going on in the marketplace. You know, we've started the year, you know, whether it's the return to the office post-COVID, increase in travel in, you know, hotels or eating out at restaurants, there's just really good institutional demand for refrigerants. So it's created an environment with very strong demand, especially here in North America. We have the beginning of a step down in quotas under the AIM Act.
You know, we had a lot of issues last year on China supply. In fact, continue to have issues on China supply. The team's done a really nice job in this business in being very dynamic, understanding the needs of the customer, and being able to take advantage of the supply-demand dynamic. I'll ask Alisha to comment further on sort of how she sees pricing in the year.
Appreciate it. I'm gonna pick up exactly where you left off, which is, you know, the teams around the world really did a phenomenal job starting, I'd say, in the second half of last year as we saw inflation headed our way and really started to work with our customers to anticipate what that was gonna look like and get ahead of it. Mark said it well, the supply environment has been challenging in many markets of the world. Working really closely with our customers, we were able to take advantage of that situation, to smooth out the effects of what the cost side of that is gonna look like for the business. You know, as we think about our day-to-day, we don't have a ton of long-term contracts with lots and lots of customers.
There are certain ones. Certainly in the auto space, we have contractual obligations, but by and large, a lot of our business is really done on a day-to-day or a PO basis, and that gives us flexibility to adjust to seasonality, which sometimes has an influence on pricing and the market dynamics that we face, which have been very challenging and changing pretty rapidly. Thanks, Arun.
Great, thanks for that. If I could just ask a follow-up. I think in the past you guys had noted that illegal imports into Europe had maybe a negative $125 million EBIT drag on Chemours, I think in 2020 or so. Do you see that kind of or where do we stand on that level of impact? Is there potential for some of those headwinds to develop in North America as AIM is implemented? Or maybe you can just comment on that. Thanks.
Happy to do that. I mean, it's a great question and something that we've been spending a lot of time with our value chain partners to think about how to anticipate for. In Europe, there's been a tremendous amount of learnings as we alluded to in the prepared remarks, not just at the Chemours level, but across the industry participants with regulators. Remember, illegals kinda defeat the purpose of the regulation.
There's a unified view that controlling HFC illegals is what's gonna be good for the planet, so we need to take actions to do that. The biggest challenge and the biggest learning that we had in Europe was making sure that there was awareness and understanding of the magnitude of the problem, and the team in Europe has done a great job in working across the value chain to do that.
With the F-Gas revision, we feel really good that there's now some good structures and proposed penalties in place that are gonna serve as a disincentive for future illegal imports into Europe, as well as a common system that's gonna go into the European Union 27 member states that should help track better and control that on an ongoing basis. As we look across the pond here in the U.S., EPA has done a great job of trying to get ahead of this and understand what happened in Europe and be proactive, so creating a joint task force that has Customs and Border Protection, it has the Department of Homeland Security, it has Department of Justice, that are all aligned and thinking about how are we gonna prevent illegals from entering.
They've also proposed, as part of their regulations and their rulemaking, a tracking system that's going to ensure that any HFC product has a QR tracking code associated with it. On top of that, they've said that for imports of HFCs coming into the U.S., they need to submit a 14-day advance notice. Already with just AIM in compliance or underway since January, they've seized material because it hasn't been in compliance with these regulations. On top of all of that, what gives us some good confidence that they're on the right track is using their Clean Air Act authority and the ability that they will have to put some really stiff criminal and civil penalties in place should they find people that are violating the rules.
We feel really good, and we'll continue to work across the value chain, to make sure that we can prevent this from happening.
Arun, just maybe a reflection. Clearly, it's taken a little while for F-Gas regs to work as intended. We're very encouraged by the improvements that Alisha noted that are coming, that have happened and are on the way, and by AIM being adopted here in the U.S. You know, with both sides of the Atlantic, with regulations working effectively to drive lower global warming refrigerants, you know, very excited about the earnings potential and growth potential of this business, you know, having capacitized Corpus Christi with that in mind. This has really been a while in coming, but we're very excited about where we are today.
Thanks.
Your next question comes to the line of Josh Silverstein from Wolfe Research. Josh, your line is now open.
Yeah, great. Thanks. Morning, guys. I was just curious if maybe kind of in ballpark percentages, what might be kind of the recurring or stable sales for key incentives versus what may be a little bit more economically sensitive. I'm just curious because there's clearly some secular growth opportunities here, but also equally some growing recessionary risk coming up. I'm just wondering how that's factored into the mid- to high-single-digit growth outlook for you guys.
Yeah. Clearly what we tried to do today, Josh, is provide a long-term view in terms of, you know, what we believe is a long-term growth rate, you know, for much of the next decade of mid- to high-single-digit. That's a net growth rate. As Alisha mentioned, we have HFOs or Opteon growing in the mid-teens. As we phase down HFCs, you know, we have a net growth here that translates to mid- to high-single-digits. This business has a seasonal factor. The first half is typically stronger than the second half, with most of the refrigerant sales in the Northern Hemisphere for the summer cooling season. Then the other overlay, I would say is auto, right?
This year, we still expect autos to grow over last year, but clearly those growth rates have been coming down, based on availability of semiconductors for that industry. I'd say those are the kind of factors that I would think about, as an overlay either on, you know, our Q1 results or our full year results. Clearly, you know, our view is auto demand will continue to grow, and so that's a growth trend. Alisha mentioned the growing car park that's on HFO technology. What's ahead of us really is the adoption of low global warming refrigerants in stationary, you know, where we have an advantage based on our innovation and our products in the portfolio today.
Great. Thanks for that. Maybe just sticking with auto, I'm sorry if you had mentioned this before, but did you have mentioned what the potential uplift in, you know, revenue for maybe for EVs relative to ICE, whether it's like, you know, 1.5x or 1.3x? I'm just curious what kind of revenue uplift there is. Thanks.
Yeah, Josh, you know, as we look at it, probably shorter term, yes, the EV will require a bit more charge size than traditional ICE vehicles do today. Longer term, as we think about integrated thermal management, that could increase even more. Don't have a specific number for you, but generally speaking, we see an upward trend.
Got you. Thanks for that. Yeah, I was kind of wondering if there was an opportunity for like software sales and management to go with this and kind of some you know, additional revenue trends for that.
Yeah, I think, you know, we're certainly as we're solutions oriented, we're gonna be thinking about how to integrate and work with auto OEMs for that thermal management need. I think, you know, we'll tell you more as we continue to proceed here.
Great. Thanks.
Your next question comes from the line of Matthew DeYoe from Bank of America. To ask a question, please press star one.
Thanks. I have a couple. As we look at the mid-single to high single digit growth number, I mean, how lumpy do you expect this will be? Should it be outsized growth in quote years and then lower or flat growth outside of that to average in that range? Or do you expect this to be kind of an annual, you know, five to, you know, 9% repeatable growth?
Great question. Appreciate it. You know, Mark alluded to the fact that this year we're seeing auto recovery. We're still seeing some COVID recovery. That's a big driver for improved demand. More generally to your point, over the next few years, regulations are the biggest drivers of growth for the business. With auto recovery in 2022 and now expected to carry into 2023, it'll make a transition. We'll see that coming in as a big driver demand, then the transition will start to become meaningful in the stationary markets. Remember, stationary markets are about three times as large as auto. Then you put on top of it or put the perspective of regulations like AIM in the U.S. and European F-gas regulations. They're definitely leading the pack to convert away from HFCs.
These regulations really create a structural supply constraint, so effectively shifting customers to low GWP solutions like our Opteon portfolio. When we think about this next big step down in 2024 in the U.S. as an example, there will be another 30% reduction, which is equivalent to about 90 million tons of CO2 coming out of the market. That demand doesn't go away. It needs to be replaced by Opteon technology, so low and ultra-low GWP products. As we've said, we really believe we're in a great spot and probably the best spot to work with customers and help them transition into our high-performance solutions. Longer term, it's then the mega trends that kick in. That necessitates, as we were just talking about with the EVs, a different kind of need for thermal management.
The innovation that we have cooking now is what we'll be able to provide to the market in the latter part of this decade of growth that we see coming. Really, you know, near term this year is shaping up to be very nice. Regulations in the short term drive a good bit of growth, and then longer term innovation is gonna be what provides our path forward.
Yeah, Matt, if I could add, I think the essence of your question is mid- to high-single-digit a long-term forecast or a near-term? I'd say it's a long-term forecast, you know, as we look out over the next decade. Clearly, there are drivers today that we're seeing that would point to a higher rate in the near-term. But we're really excited about how we capture this long-term rate in the company, as well as the near-term opportunity, given the, you know, the earnings profile of the business, the cash conversion of the business, and the technical capabilities of the business to offer innovation beyond the structural shift driven by regulation to the mega trends that innovation will feed into.
Okay. The discussion brushed on auto briefly, and one thing I wanted to ask Alisha , when I think about the auto OEM business, the mobile air conditioning, right? If I think about primary OEM and then the secondary market for Opteon, how big could that secondary market end up getting on, like, an annual basis? Is that, like, 20% of the OEM market or 120%? You know, what does that look like from a recharge perspective?
It compounds over time, as you can imagine, right? You know, it's a little bit dependent on crash rates and other things that could require recharge to the system. Yes, the aftermarket and the recharge rate, it does get bigger than the annual OEM consumption as the vehicles age. You've got vehicles that really began in 2017. We're starting to see the demand for, you know, places like AutoZone or O'Reilly's that need to have Opteon YF in their stores because customers are coming in with those newer vehicles and need it to get recharged.
All right. That's all, so thanks.
There are no further questions at this time. I would like to turn the call back over to Mark Newman, President and CEO.
Yeah. Listen, thanks, everyone, for joining us today. We're very excited about our TSS business. We're really grateful to be able to share more details with you about, you know, the foundation that we have, the next phase of Opteon growth, largely driven by some of the structural shifts that are aided by regulation. Beyond that, some of the significant innovation that I see in the portfolio that will sustain growth for many years to come. We look forward to seeing some of you on the road as we travel this week, but really appreciate you all dialing in, and look forward to sharing more with you over time. Thanks again.
Ladies and gentlemen, this concludes today's conference call. Thank you for participating. You may now disconnect.