NACCO Industries Q1 2025 Earnings Call Transcript

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Provided by Quartr
May 1, 2025

There are 5 speakers on the call.

Operator

This call is being recorded on Thursday, 05/01/2025. I would now like to turn the conference over to Christina Kmetko, Investor Relations. Please go ahead.

Speaker 1

Thank you. Good morning, everyone, and welcome to our twenty twenty five first quarter earnings call and webcast. Thank you for joining us this morning. I'm Christina Kmetko, and I'm responsible for Investor Relations at Nantco. Joining me today are J.

Speaker 1

C. Butler, President and Chief Executive Officer and Elizabeth Loveland, Senior Vice President and Controller. Yesterday, we published our twenty twenty five first quarter results and filed our 10 Q. This information is available on our website. Our remarks that follow, including answers to your questions, contain forward looking statements.

Speaker 1

These statements are subject to several risks and uncertainties that could cause actual results to differ materially from those expressed in the forward looking statements made here today. These risks include, among others, matters that we've described in our earnings release, 10 Q and other SEC filings. We may not update these forward looking statements until our next quarterly earnings conference call. We'll also be discussing non GAAP information that we believe is useful in evaluating the company's operating performance. Reconciliations for these non GAAP measures can be found in our earnings release and on our website.

Speaker 1

Now I'll turn the call over to JC for some opening remarks. JC?

Speaker 2

Thank you, Christy, and good morning, everyone. I'm pleased to report another quarter of strong financial results. Consolidated operating profit increased over 60%, while this improvement was partly offset by higher net interest expense and a reduction in other income. We still delivered a 7% increase in net income and a 14% increase in EBITDA. Christie will provide more detail about these financial results in a minute, but first, let me talk about our operations.

Speaker 2

The significant improvement in operating profit was driven by our coal mining segment, where segment adjusted EBITDA more than tripled over the prior year. There were two primary reasons for this improvement. First, we had an increase in earnings at our unconsolidated operations led by higher pricing at Falkirk and a moderate increase in customer demand at Coteau. Second, Mississippi Lignite Mining Company operated more efficiently on improved customer demand compared to twenty twenty four when the Red Hills Power Plant was operating with only one of its two boilers. I'm thrilled to see these improvements in our coal mining segment.

Speaker 2

We are also encouraged by the current administration's actions, which are fostering a more favorable regulatory environment for the fossil fuel industry. Mitigation resources also contributed positively to the improvement in consolidated operating profit and EBITDA. This business reported its second consecutive quarter of profitability and anticipates generating profit for the full year. North American Mining is operating well, but its results were affected by reduced customer demand, some of which is due to temporary one off situations while some customers are experiencing a softer market. Operating profit decreased on a significant reduction in year over year tons sold as well as an increase in operating expenses.

Speaker 2

This decline was partly offset by an increase in part sales. While this quarter didn't provide a favorable year over year comparison at North American Mining, results improved compared with the fourth quarter of twenty twenty four. We expect North American Mining to generate increasing levels of operating profit and EBITDA over time as benefits from new and extended contracts add to the profitability of existing contracts. Let me shift to sawtooth mining, which is the exclusive contract miner for the Thacker Pass lithium project in Northern Nevada. Lithium Americas continues to make progress on the Thacker Pass project.

Speaker 2

Lithium Americas and General Motors recently announced their final investment decision for construction of phase one of the project. We view this as a step positive step toward development of a US produced lithium supply chain that will reduce American dependence on foreign suppliers for critical minerals. We continue to support the project by assisting with certain construction services as they ramp up work to build the lithium processing plant. Phase one production continues to be estimated to begin in late twenty twenty seven. At Minerals Management, segment adjusted EBITDA increased 10% over the prior year.

Speaker 2

As we mentioned in our year end earnings release, during the fourth quarter of twenty twenty four, Minerals Management increased their investment in a company that holds non operating non operated working interest in oil and natural gas assets in the Hugoton Basin. This investment drove the improvement in segment EBITDA and is expected to continue to be accretive to future earnings. We are very pleased with the work done by the Catapult Mineral Partners team, which manages this segment. While we continue to budget up to $20,000,000 annually to expand our portfolio and provide long term stable cash flow generation, our business model allows flexibility regarding the cadence and type of investments we make based on available opportunities that we believe will result in significant long term value and increasing profitability. We believe that this expansion and diversification program has us well positioned to generate increasing levels of operating profit and EBITDA well into the future.

Speaker 2

The current quarter's results support my belief that 2025 is a pivotal transition year for our company, which is described in more detail in our most recent annual report. Overall, I'm pleased with the way all of our businesses continue to advance their strategies, and I continue to be very optimistic about the future. With that, I'll turn the call back over to Christy to cover our quarterly details and outlook in more detail. Christy?

Speaker 1

Thank you, JC. At the consolidated level, we reported operating profit of $7,700,000 and net income of $4,900,000 or $0.66 per share. This compared to a twenty twenty four first quarter operating profit of $4,800,000 and net income of $4,600,000 or $0.61 per share. Adjusted EBITDA increased to $12,800,000 from $11,200,000 in 2024. As J.

Speaker 1

C. Mentioned, the significant improvement in operating profit was primarily driven by a substantial increase in the Coal Mining segment operating profit and improved results at Mitigation Resources. These improvements were partly offset by lower North American Mining segment results and an increase in unallocated operating expenses, principally employee related and outside service costs. The improvement in operating profit was offset by a $3,300,000 unfavorable change in other income expense moving from prior year other income to current year other expense. This decrease was due to lower investment income and higher net interest expense and resulted in a moderate decrease in income before taxes.

Speaker 1

Lower income tax expense in 2025 compared with 2024 led to the moderate increase in our consolidated net income. Moving to the individual segments. Our Coal Mining segment reported operating profit of 3,800,000 and generated segment adjusted EBITDA of $5,800,000 in the twenty twenty five first quarter. In 2024, this segment had an operating loss of $400,000 and segment adjusted EBITDA of $1,800,000 As J. C.

Speaker 1

Already discussed, year over year improvements at both our consolidated and unconsolidated mines led to these favorable results. J. C. Already provided explanations of the North American Mining and Minerals Management segment's results, so I'll discuss the financials. At North American Mining, operating profit decreased to $2,000,000 from $2,400,000 in the prior year first quarter.

Speaker 1

Segment adjusted EBITDA of $4,700,000 was comparable to the prior year. Minerals Management's first quarter twenty twenty five operating profit of $7,900,000 was comparable year over year, while segment adjusted EBITDA increased to $9,800,000 from $8,900,000 a year ago. Looking forward, in 2025, we expect to generate a moderate year over year increase in consolidated operating profit. In the Coal Mining segment, 2025 customer demand is expected to lead to a modest increase in deliveries compared with 2024. In addition, the Coal Mining segment expects to benefit from the absence of temporary price concessions at Falkirk.

Speaker 1

Mississippi Lignite Mining Company continues to recover from inefficiencies experienced while its customers, Fred Hills Power Plant, operated on one of two boilers for more than half of 2024. With the power plant now anticipated to operate at a level consistent with historical averages, coal deliveries are expected to return to more normal levels, resulting in modestly improved cost efficiencies. However, an anticipated reduction in the 2025 contractually determined per ton sales price compared with 2024 is expected to offset these improvements, leading to lower results at Mississippi Lignite Mining Company. This, combined with an anticipated increase in operating expenses in the coal segment overall, is expected to result in a modest year over year decrease in coal mining segment operating profit. North American Mining is expected to deliver improved results in 2025 with anticipated lower first half results offset by expected performance gains in the second half of the year.

Speaker 1

While customer demand is projected to remain relatively stable year over year, profitability improvements will be driven by operational efficiencies and an increased focus on parts sales. Minerals Management's high quality diversified portfolio of oil and gas mineral interest provides a strong foundation of well positioned assets that are expected to continue to deliver solid financial results. As J. C. Mentioned, Minerals Management's twenty twenty four investment in a company operating in the Hugoton Basin is expected to continue to contribute to the anticipated improvement in 2025 operating profit over 2024.

Speaker 1

First half earnings are expected to be comparable to prior year results with an anticipated significant improvement in the second half given anticipated trends in oil and natural gas prices and projected volumes. We expect to complete the termination of our defined benefit pension plan this year. Once complete, obligations under the terminated plan will be transferred to a third party insurance provider, eliminating future earnings volatility from changes in our pension obligation. Although the plan is currently overfunded, a significant noncash settlement charge is anticipated upon termination that will result in a substantial decrease in net income compared to 2024. Excluding the anticipated settlement charge, net income is expected to decrease moderately from 2024.

Speaker 1

Before I discuss our liquidity and cash flow, I wanted to point out that we have added total assets by segment to our segment disclosures in the 10 Q. We believe this information will help our investors better understand the value of each of our segments. Looking at other balance sheet and cash flow information, we have consolidated cash of approximately $62,000,000 and debt of $96,000,000 at 03/31/2025. The availability under our revolver was $90,500,000 During the first quarter, we paid 1,700,000 in dividends and repurchased approximately 22,000 shares of our Class A common stock at prevailing market prices for an aggregate purchase price of $700,000 As of 03/31/2025, we had $7,800,000 remaining under our $20,000,000 share repurchase program that expires at the end of this year. Based on our current business plan, we project a steady increase in annual cash flow generation beginning in 2025.

Speaker 1

We will now turn to any questions you may have.

Operator

Thank you, ladies and gentlemen. We will now begin the question and answer Should you have a question, please press the star followed by the one on your touch tone phone. You will hear a prompt that your hand has been raised. Did you wish to decline from the polling process, please press star followed by the two. Our first question comes from the line of Doug Wise with DSW Investment.

Speaker 3

Hey. Good morning.

Speaker 2

Good morning.

Speaker 3

I guess just starting with the call segment. So in focusing on Mississippi Lignite, I guess that continues to show gross profit losses, although I think there was a $3,000,000 inventory charge in the quarter. Can you just say can you just explain a little bit what leads to those recurring inventory charges? Well, the

Speaker 2

and you I just want to make sure you're asking about the inventory impairment. Is that correct? Yep. Yeah. So, you know, it's a it's it's basically, you know, what is the cost of the coal on the pile, which is determined, you know, by regular sort of inventory accounting compared to the sales price.

Speaker 2

So there's a couple things going on with respect to that. One is, you know, last year was a pretty inefficient year because, you know, for part of the year, we operated really with reduced cost, but you can't really cut it in half even though the power plant for the first part of the year was only taking half load because one of the boilers was out. So that ended up as with a situation where we were putting pretty high cost coal into the inventory that, you know, we continue to work our way out of that. The other side of it is on the price side, you know, we've got a a an a lower adjustment in the price right now, which I know we've talked about this before, is determined by a formula that's in the contract. It's the same formula that's been there since the contract was signed in the, you know, mid late nineteen nineties.

Speaker 2

That formula price looks at a basket of indices that, you know, anybody can pull off, you know, government data sites. And they are partly based on a one year change in those indices and partly based in a five year change in those indices. Well, one year, you know, is pretty normal. There's nothing odd happening there. If you think about five years ago right now, right, we were May first of twenty twenty.

Speaker 2

And if you think about indices for various, you know, commodities and and factors in The US economy, they were all over the place. So for the next, I'd say, year or so, we're gonna go through a period where the price is gonna get is gonna be influenced by this five year change in prices. It's looking at what it was five years ago versus now. So we've got some noise in all of this on the pricing side related to the fact that we just had very odd movement in the indices from five years ago. So it's really a combination of higher priced coal on the pile because of inefficiencies last year and some strange things going through what should otherwise be pretty normal movement in index adjusted price.

Speaker 2

I think when we get through this, you know, period when the price is is behaving in strange ways and we get, you know, more normal operating costs flowing through the the inventory, you know, this is all gonna return to a more normal pace.

Speaker 3

Mhmm. And is that probably next year?

Speaker 2

Well, I would say yes. But barring any other thing happening in the future that, you know, it's comparison from current indices to past indices, whether that's one year in the past or five years in the past. So I can't tell you what I expect to happen with those indices over the next year or two.

Speaker 3

But my understanding is they would be based on price increases. Right? So so if we got into a I I guess you haven't I don't think you've given too much detail on what the individual components are. I think you might have mentioned labor was one of them. But

Speaker 2

Well, one of one of the one of the larger indices in all of this is diesel.

Speaker 3

Diesel. Okay. Interesting. I see. So it's actually working.

Speaker 3

It's and

Speaker 2

prices Yeah. It's breaking up for 5 years.

Speaker 3

I see. Yeah. So so it's it's really so oil prices have have have a influence on this. Yep. Okay.

Speaker 3

But I guess it just kind of conceptually you know, that's that's the the price that's the revenue component. But on the cost side, that would sort of flow through. I I mean, that that should normalize over the next year. Is that the right way to think about that?

Speaker 2

Yes. I mean, assuming that the plant operates as we think it will, you know, the cost side should normalize.

Speaker 3

Yeah. Okay.

Speaker 2

Okay. Including, you know, the cost of inventory that are on the stockpile.

Speaker 3

Right. Okay. And A a coal mine

Speaker 2

as a so a coal mine is a is a operation that has a lot of fixed costs. So it you know, you get your best efficiencies like any kind of factory when it's operating, you know, at its designed level. When you have periods when you're operating at a lower level, it just increases your unit cost. It's it's really no different than a factory.

Speaker 3

Right. Right. Okay. In terms of regulatory a more a more favorable regulatory environment, What what are are are there practical implications there? I know you had some pending EPA issues, so I I assume that those are, you know, less of a concern.

Speaker 3

But are there other practical implications?

Speaker 2

Well, I mean, the, you know, the EPA I mean, it's, you know, it's not just the EPA. It's the, you know, Department of Energy. It's Department of Interior. I mean, you've got a an administration that is very focused on developing, you know, United States resources which include incredibly abundant coal, oil, and natural gas, right, fossil fuels. Two weeks ago was it two weeks ago, three weeks ago, Liz?

Speaker 2

The president we've sort of are referring it internally as coal day. But the president signed four executive orders that were focused on really focused on coal. But it included things that dealt with, you know, making sure that people are looking at the stability of the grid for any coal fired power plants are retired. One of them made coal a critical mineral in the, you know, in the government context. He asked agencies to look at any sort of regulatory biases against fossil fuels including coal and get those out of the process.

Speaker 2

And also encouraging people to look at developing coal resources particularly when it can support the twenty four seven energy needs in data and AI. I you you ought to just I'm not gonna describe it as well as you can find on the Internet. I'd encourage just to Google, you know, presidential executive orders on coal, and you can read through the form. But it's it's pretty good stuff.

Speaker 3

Mhmm. Sure. Let's see. On on North American Mining, is Docker gonna be consolidated or unconsolidated?

Speaker 4

It's

Speaker 3

consolidated. Okay. And then in terms of normal seasonality there, what is the first quarter typically a soft quarter anyway? I mean, what would be the cadence of earnings for that that segment?

Speaker 2

In North American Mining, I mean, I don't think there really is much seasonality to that, largely because of where we operate. You know, majority of our of our operations are in Florida, Although, you know, we are expanding across the country, but it's most mostly in Southern states. So you don't really get any seasonality unless, you know, from time to time you get a hurricane that goes across Florida and that can disrupt operations in varying degrees, depends on where the hurricane hits and, you know, what the damage is and things like that. But that's really the only kind of seasonality that I think of is in that business. Otherwise, it sort of just marches along quarter by quarter.

Speaker 3

Mhmm. And was was weather a factor again this in the in the first quarter?

Speaker 2

Not really. I think what we saw in the first quarter is, you know, there were there were a few one off situations, although, you know, situation sort of implies something negative. It's just, you know, periodic outages on draglines and and, you know, customer pauses in their operations while they do things on their side of the fence. So we had some of that going on in the first quarter. And then we have had some customers that are just seeing, you know, a modest decline in demand.

Speaker 2

You know, nothing dramatic, but they're seeing some softening demand and that, you know, causes because we're feeding their operations, you know, we're fully integrated into their quarries and, know, we're operating at specific quarries for them. It's really, you know, what demand are they seeing at their quarries and and what sort of production they need out of us.

Speaker 3

Mhmm.

Speaker 2

So it's a little bit of one off one off stuff and it's a little bit of some just economic softness with some customers.

Speaker 3

Mhmm. Yeah. Makes sense. I guess then on on free cash flow, it looked like there were a number of puts and takes on working capital. I guess the biggest is you had a large item for mining supplies inventory, which you have a noncurrent asset, so I assume that's more than a year.

Speaker 3

Is, do you still expect working capital to be a source of cash this year? And and I guess why why that large step up in that, mining supplies inventory?

Speaker 4

So it really wasn't a step up. If you look, we just reclassed a portion from current to long term. We we really dug into our inventory, and a lot of that is just critical spares. And we don't necessarily have a plan to use them in the next twelve months, so we reclassified a portion of that. But if you add up the total, it's $94,300,000 of inventory, which compares to $94,600,000 last year.

Speaker 4

So it's there was just a reclassification within the balance sheet to better, differentiate what we expect to turn in twelve months versus not.

Speaker 2

Like, if you think about the about the fact that we operate, you know, on the North American mining side of

Operator

the

Speaker 2

business in particular, we operate 30 something like 35 draglines plus or minus. You know, they're they're single it's a single machine that's an important part of the customer's factory. Right? We've got a dragline on-site that's producing the aggregates that our customer will cut wash, crush, size, and sell to its customers. If we have a unexpected outage because of a component failure on a drag line, that can be a very serious issue because some of these components on these draglines can take months to acquire, which is why we keep components, critical components on hand in our inventory.

Speaker 2

And as Liz described, we took a deep dive into that and decided that some of those things may get used. I mean, look, you never know when you're gonna have an unplanned outage. But we looked at a number of these parts and said, we're holding these for the long term. It's really think of this as an insurance. Holding the part is really like an insurance policy on the operation of that machine.

Speaker 2

And so that's why we reclassified them from short term to long term.

Speaker 3

Okay. Makes sense. So do do you still think

Speaker 2

about Your question about working capital though, you know, we're not really a working capital driven business. You know, when we have a a dragline outage coming up, particularly in our North American Mining part of the business or it could be at Mississippi Lignite Mining Company, we will increase our inventory because you wanna have all the parts on hand when you take your dragline down in order to do the work. So from time to time, we'll increase our inventory and then we'll get consumed while we're while we're doing an outage. So you will see some of those fluctuations. As far as customer receivables or our payables, there's you know, it's really just kind of a steady cadence that doesn't fluctuate that much over time.

Speaker 3

Mhmm. Okay.

Speaker 4

One of the I've made on that is that we do have we do have a deposit. We have a line on our balance sheet deposit with vendors. You can see that. It's $14,500,000 at the March, and we expect that to turn this year. So that will be a pickup this year, but we've been increasing that.

Speaker 4

It's just that it went up $5,000,000 in the quarter, so that kinda offset some of the improvements. And we also talked about we had a change in the timing of our insurance renewal. And so we prepay that and then expense it throughout the year. We move we move that out of q one, so that's part of what was driving some of the change in the working capital.

Operator

Again, if you have any question, please press star one on your touch tone phone.

Speaker 1

I don't think he's here.

Speaker 2

Looks like we lost looks like we lost Doug somehow. Sorry.

Speaker 1

You raised his hand again.

Speaker 2

No. Okay.

Operator

We have Doug on the line again.

Speaker 3

Sorry. So I guess on on the also on the balance sheet, you have that asset held for sale line. What what's in that?

Speaker 4

It consists of some draglines and a building in North Dakota that we got as part of the termination settlement with with the Great River Energy.

Speaker 3

Mhmm. And you you expect to sell those this year?

Speaker 4

They're all being actively marketed.

Speaker 3

I see. Okay. And then I guess last question would just be on the well, sorry. Two more. On on the remediation, that my sense is is kinda lumpy as you get credits and and realize, proceeds on those.

Speaker 3

Is that right? Is that not a steady quarter to quarter business?

Speaker 4

And then they you're talking about mitigation?

Speaker 3

Yeah.

Speaker 4

That's mitigation resources. Yeah. That that's lumpy.

Speaker 2

Okay. It's sort of lumpy by design. Right? You you get a you know, the life cycle of a mitigation bank is, you know, we identify an area where we wanna be. We ultimately identify a watershed.

Speaker 2

And these are, you know, these are gonna be in high growth areas, you know, high growth states, high growth areas in those states. We acquire a piece of property. We work with the army corps of engineers to develop the plan for restoring streams and wetlands to a healthy state. And they you know, we and they, the Army Corps of Engineers, agree on something that's called a mitigation banking instrument. It specifies the work that we need to do, and then it provides the timeline with which credits will be made available for sale.

Speaker 2

And as those and and that can be over a ten year timeline. And it might be that you get some credits available right away because you're putting conservation easement on the property. You may then take two years. I'm making up the two years, but it might be two years to get the next lump of credits that are available once we've done some physical work on the streams or wetlands. And then, you know, as we demonstrate the health of the stream or we get, you know, grass and trees and and natural, you know, plants established, you might get more credits over time.

Speaker 2

And so the life of the credit of the mitigation bank will have periodic credit releases that, you know, will turn into credit sales. We'll make money on those. Now, you know, this is a this is business is still pretty young in its life. As we get more and more mitigation banks, just the, you know, the law of averages and large numbers will start to smooth this out because you're not just dealing with a handful of mitigation banks that have credits. You got lots of mitigation banks with credits.

Speaker 2

We're also supplementing that income with smaller, shorter term reclamation and restoration projects that are largely done on behalf of state and local municipalities, state governments, local municipalities, including the abandoned mine land work. All those projects tend to be on average less than a year. And, you know, they're sort of a steady, you know, source of recurring income. Same deal. As we get more and more of that flowing through this business, it'll start to smooth out the overall results.

Speaker 2

But certainly, for a while, we're gonna continue to see pretty lumpy earnings in that piece of the business. But it is I don't want you to think that that doesn't make it a great business. This is a great business. Really like the business model. Really like opportunity for returns that it provides with us.

Speaker 2

And it's really just a story of scaling the business. And that's why we're excited in the last two quarters with reported profitability and we expect them to be profitable for the year. Is there a way to

Speaker 3

track your expansion in that business in terms of, you know, the number the the acreage or or some other metric?

Speaker 2

Living Luis and I are looking at each other trying to figure out what the metric would be. I mean, it's, you know, it's number of mitigation banks. It's, you know?

Speaker 4

Even then the credits within each bank

Speaker 2

Yep. Differ. Yep. And the pricing differs and

Speaker 4

Is it a stream credit? Is it a wetland credit? You know, like so that there's yeah.

Speaker 2

That's We don't we don't have a good answer for that right now other than I can assure you that the business is growing pretty rapidly, and we're pretty excited about the trajectory that we're on. But we haven't figured out a good metric to describe that. And, you know, look, it'd be easy to say number of mitigation banks, some of these mitigation banks are very small and some of them are very large. So

Speaker 3

Right.

Speaker 2

You know, and and it could be acreage, but that varies tremendously. If you're if you're that if you've got let's just say you've got a hundred acres in a place that, you know, has competitive banks that can be and and it's moderate an area of moderate growth, that can be very different than a mitigation bank with not a lot of competition in an area with extremely rapid growth. And, you know, we run these banks over a number of years, and we try to get in when land has not yet become astronomically expensive. And so what we tend to see is, you know, in the early days, we can buy the land and we can do the work, and then you just see the area explode. Think about the highest growth areas in the country.

Speaker 3

Mhmm.

Speaker 2

You know, the the value of those credits can go up pretty substantially. Even if it's a small bank, it can suddenly turn into a really valuable asset.

Speaker 3

Did you actually own the land on those those areas?

Speaker 2

In some instances, we own the land. In other instances, we will partner with a landowner. Mhmm. And, you know, we've got a contractual relationship that we will enter into with them, you know, whereby they provide the land and we do the work. You know, we manage the conservation easement, and then there's a compensation mechanism that that rewards the landowner for for the landowner's participation in the mitigation bank.

Speaker 2

And there's several models for how we might reward them.

Speaker 3

Mhmm. Interesting. Okay. And I guess last question would just be on the you mentioned in the release, it sounds like you're making some progress on the solar initiative. Any any any, more color you might have on that?

Speaker 2

So the you know, that's our our region resources business. We're looking at solar. We're looking at solar, you know, solar needs backup as they just learned in Spain. The you know, so we're looking at solar on its own. We're looking at solar with, you know, various types of backup for solar.

Speaker 2

You know, that continues to develop. There's a little bit of uncertainty in that business because, you know, there's some uncertainty about how tax credits are gonna really play out in the future. But the projects that we're working on, we still feel pretty good about, you know, as they move forward. And, you know, the other piece of this is, you know, you can read in the Wall Street Journal almost every day is there's a lot of folks doing data, whether it's regular data or AI or, you know, other supporting functions. And they're looking for behind the meter solutions.

Speaker 2

And so, you know, that's one that's another opportunity where you can develop, you know, a a package of generation. Could be solar, probably solar with backup, put it behind the meter. You don't have to deal with interconnect into the transmission grid and and things like that. So, you know, there's a lot of opportunity here. We're in this business because we've got a lot of land close to generation assets and transmission, if that's the route we choose to go.

Speaker 2

We're also in it because, you know, we've operated adjacent to the energy space for a long time. And we feel like we can leverage to really capitalize on that knowledge and skills in order to, you know, add another piece of our business.

Speaker 3

Mhmm. What where which part of your land are you likely to do that work on?

Speaker 2

Well, it's you said which part of the land?

Speaker 3

Yeah. I mean, I is it the Pennsylvania region? Or

Speaker 2

So it's I mean, it's largely on reclaimed mine land. So think about where we have reclaimed where we have mines. Right? And as we mine, you know, we were always reclaiming behind our mining. And so we've got reclaimed mine land that actually is a in many instances, pretty darn good place to put projects like this.

Speaker 4

Okay. We noted in our release, Mississippi and tax

Speaker 3

Sorry. Say again?

Speaker 4

Noted in the release, Mississippi and Texas.

Speaker 3

Okay. Okay. Got it. All right. Well, as always, appreciate the time, and talk to you next quarter.

Speaker 2

Yes. Thank you, Doug. We appreciate the call.

Speaker 1

Thanks, Ted.

Operator

There are no further questions. Please continue.

Speaker 1

Okay. With that, we'll conclude our Q and A session. Before we conclude, I'd like to provide a few reminders. A replay of our call will be available later this morning. We'll also post a transcript on the Investor Relations website when it becomes available.

Speaker 1

If you have any questions, please reach out to me. My phone number is in the release. Other than that, I hope you all enjoy the rest of your day, and I'll turn it back to Vincent to conclude the call.

Speaker 2

Ladies and

Operator

gentlemen, this is visit today's conference call. Thank you for your participation. You may now disconnect.

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Key Takeaways

  • Consolidated operating profit increased by over 60% year-over-year, driving a 7% rise in net income and a 14% gain in adjusted EBITDA for Q1 2025.
  • The Coal Mining segment’s adjusted EBITDA more than tripled thanks to higher pricing at Falkirk and improved efficiency at Mississippi Lignite Mining Company.
  • Mitigation Resources reported its second consecutive profitable quarter and expects full-year profitability, while the Minerals Management segment delivered a 10% EBITDA increase aided by a new Hugoton Basin investment.
  • Sawtooth Mining, as exclusive miner for the Thacker Pass lithium project, supported the final investment decision with Lithium Americas and GM, with phase one production targeted for late 2027.
  • 2025 guidance anticipates a modest increase in consolidated operating profit and continued cash-flow growth, although a non-cash pension settlement charge will dampen net income; the company holds $62 million in cash and $90.5 million revolver availability to fund dividends and share repurchases.
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Earnings Conference Call
NACCO Industries Q1 2025
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