Ameren Corporation (AEE) Earnings Call Transcript & Summary

Good morning, and welcome to the Ameren Corporation Annual Meeting of Shareholders. I would now like to turn the conference over to Warner Baxter, Chairman, President and CEO. Please go ahead, sir.

Thank you. Good morning, ladies and gentlemen. I am Warner Baxter, the Chairman, President and Chief Executive Officer of Ameren Corporation, and I welcome you to this virtual Annual Meeting of the Shareholders of Ameren Corporation, Ameren Illinois Company, which we operate as Ameren Illinois, and Union Electric Company, which we operate as Ameren Missouri. We certainly appreciate all of you joining us online today. At Ameren, our customers are at the center of everything we do, and we never compromise on safety. It's one of our core values. As our world continues to address COVID-19, many things are uncertain, and Ameren's commitment to safety for our coworkers, our customers, our communities and to you, our shareholders, remains constant. Due to the global COVID-19 pandemic and to support the health and well-being of our coworkers and shareholders, we decided to hold this meeting virtually today. We appreciate your help in putting safety first by attending this meeting online. At Ameren, we have taken a number of actions in response to COVID-19, and I'll provide a more comprehensive update later in our meeting. Before doing so, I want to express profound appreciation for those who are on the front lines battling this virus: to the health care workers, first responders, grocery store workers, community leaders and, of course, all utility workers across our nation, thank you. In particular, I want to express my sincere appreciation to my Ameren coworkers who remain focused every day on delivering safe, reliable power and natural gas to millions of people in Missouri and Illinois. And of course, my heart goes out to our customers and our communities that have been impacted a great deal by this devastating disease. As you logged into the meeting this morning, you may have noticed that an agenda and rules of conduct for the meetings were posted under the Meeting Materials section of your screen. In fairness to all shareholders in attendance, we intend to conduct the meetings in accordance with this agenda and rules of conduct. In addition, out of respect for everyone's time, I intend to complete all topics on this agenda within 45 minutes. Before we continue with today's meeting, I would like to inform you that all members of Ameren's executive leadership team are joining us remotely today. I am proud of this team, and I appreciate their leadership and focus on safety and our strategy. They will be available as needed to answer your questions during question-and-answer portion of the meeting. Also on the line with us and available to respond to questions is Miles Mooney, a partner of PricewaterhouseCoopers LLP, the company's independent registered public accounting firm. We will begin by conducting a joint business meeting for our subsidiary companies, Ameren Illinois and Ameren Missouri, and following that, we'll commence the Ameren Corporation meeting. I will be presiding over the 3 meetings. Following the adjournment of the meetings, I will also give a business review and answer questions, including those that were submitted prior to the meeting. Shareholders who are logged in to the meeting may also submit questions at any time during the meeting in the space provided on the virtual meeting platform. At this time, I'll call the joint Annual Meeting of Ameren Illinois and Ameren Missouri to order and turn the call over to Chonda Nwamu, our Senior Vice President, General Counsel and Secretary. Chonda?

Thank you, Warner. I submit to the meeting forms of notice of the meetings for Ameren Illinois and Ameren Missouri, together with the affidavit of mailing of the notices to the shareholders of record at the close of business on March 9, 2020, the date set for the purpose of determining the shareholders entitled to vote at this meeting. I also submit to the meeting certified lists of the holders of all the issued and outstanding shares of the capital stock of Ameren Illinois and Ameren Missouri at the close of business on the record date. All of these documents will be filed with the minutes of this meeting. Based upon the percentage of the total shares of each of Ameren Illinois and Ameren Missouri held by holders of record now present by proxy, we have a quorum for this meeting. The matters requiring a vote by the shareholders of Ameren Illinois and Ameren Missouri are limited to the election of directors of Ameren Illinois and Ameren Missouri. The names of the nominees are set forth in the company's respective information statements. Each company has an advanced notice provision in its bylaws, and no nominations were received. Accordingly, all nominations are closed. The polls are now open for voting for the directors of Ameren Illinois and Ameren Missouri. I will pause here to allow any preferred shareholders of Ameren Illinois and Ameren Missouri who wish to do so to vote using the vote here button on your screen. [Voting]

I declare the polls now closed for voting for the directors of Ameren Illinois and Ameren Missouri. As many of you know, all of the shares of common stock of Ameren Illinois and Ameren Missouri are held by Ameren Corporation, and these shares have already been voted. As such, each of the nominees for the Boards of Directors of Ameren Illinois and Ameren Missouri has been duly elected. The final totals will be included in the report of the inspectors of election and will be filed with the minutes of the meeting.

Thank you, Chonda. There being no other business that has been properly brought before the joint meeting of Ameren Illinois and Ameren Missouri, I declare this joint meeting to be officially completed and adjourned. We will now commence the Annual Meeting of Ameren Corporation for the purpose of electing directors and voting on other matters included in the proxy statement. Before we proceed with the agenda, it is my pleasure to welcome Cynthia Brinkley, who joined our Board of Directors in December 2019. Cindy is the former Chief Administrative and Markets Officer for Centene Corporation. She has broad senior leadership experience in operations, regulatory, human resources and diversity and inclusion activities at leading companies in the country, including General Motors and AT&T. Her experience, along with her strong engagement in the St. Louis community, will add a great deal of value to our Board of Directors. Welcome, Cindy. Chonda, please proceed.

Thank you, Warner. I submit to the meeting the form of notice of the meeting for Ameren Corporation, together with an affidavit of mailing of the notice to the shareholders of record at the close of business on March 9, 2020, the date set by the Board of Directors for the purpose of determining the shareholders entitled to vote at this meeting. I also submit to the meeting a certified list of the holders of all the issued and outstanding shares of the capital stock of record of Ameren Corporation at the close of business on the record date. All of these documents will be filed with the minutes of this meeting. Our inspectors of elections are present by phone at this meeting and have reported that we have received proxies representing a substantial majority of our outstanding voting stock, which constitutes a quorum for this meeting. Accordingly, this meeting is now open for voting for the election of directors as well as the other items described in the proxy statement. If you have not already voted your shares and you would like to do so or if you would like to change your vote, you may do so now by using the vote here button on your screen. The polls will close following the presentation of the proposals. The first proposal is the election of 13 directors, whose names and qualifications are listed in the proxy statement. The company has an advanced notice provision in its bylaws, and no nominations were received. Accordingly, all nominations are closed. The second proposal is the advisory proposal -- approval of the compensation of our named executives as described in the proxy statement. The third proposal is ratification of the selection of the appointment of PricewaterhouseCoopers LLP as Ameren's independent registered public accounting firm for the fiscal year ending December 31, 2020. The Board unanimously recommends a vote for the first 3 proposals. The fourth proposal is a shareholder proposal to require an independent board chair. A representative of the shareholder proponent is on the line. Please introduce yourself, and I ask that you please keep your motion to a maximum of 3 minutes. Is the shareholders proponent on the line? If so, will the operator please unmute?

Yes, ma'am, one moment. The line is open.

Good morning. My name is Laura Campos, and I'm here on behalf of the Nathan Cummings Foundation to move proposal 4, which asks the Ameren's Board of Directors be chaired by an independent director. Ameren does not currently have an independent Board Chair. Mr. Baxter holds the positions of Chairman, President and Chief Executive Officer, meaning that he is essentially his own boss. We believe that separating the CEO and Board Chair roles eliminates the conflict of interest that inevitably occurs when the CEO is responsible for their own oversight. Corporate governance experts agree. For instance, a recent article in the Harvard Business Review entitled, "Why the CEO Shouldn't Also Be the Board Chair," concludes that separating the Chair and CEO roles can strengthen the quality of the questions the corporation asks itself, improve risk management and amplify the impact of feedback delivered to the CEO, ultimately making it easier to ensure that a top executive does not steer a company astray. We're concerned that the combination of the Chair and CEO roles at Ameren is hindering the company's approach to managing the risks and opportunities associated with climate change. Unlike many of its largest peers, Ameren has not yet committed to achieve net 0 carbon emissions by 2050. In fact, the company depends on coal for roughly 75% of its electricity generation. Even more concerning, it appears that the company plans to spend the next 30 years building additional fossil fuel infrastructure rather than investing heavily in renewables. Utilities like Ameren that do not set net 0-emission goals and align their strategy to achieving those goals by 2050 face increased physical and stranded asset risks. For example, an analysis by Carbon Tracker estimated that 51% of Ameren's coal fleet may be uneconomic today and that 77% could be uneconomic by 2030. Recently, a report by Morgan Stanley analyst suggested that utilities that fail to close coal plants and invest in renewables could be foregoing potential earnings growth. At the same time, Wall Street analysts have noted that a rapid coal-to-clean energy transition could be highly profitable for utilities' investors. The Harvard Business Review article I mentioned earlier repeatedly notes that combining the roles of CEO and Chair can impact a corporation's ability to manage risks, and there are few risks bigger than climate change. To manage it effectively, we believe that Ameren should consider splitting the Chairman and CEO roles. Ameren's shareholders, its customers and the planet could benefit from a strong independent Board Chair to help guide the company towards a 0 carbon future. Thank you.

Thank you. The Board has carefully considered this proposal, and for the reasons discussed in the proxy statement, the Board believes that adoption of the proposal is not in the best interest of Ameren and its shareholders. Accordingly, the Board unanimously recommends a vote against this shareholder proposal. I now declare that the polls are closed. Based on the preliminary report of the inspectors of election, the company has received proxies sufficient to elect all 13 director nominees, give advisory approval of our executive compensation program as described in our proxy statement and ratify the appointment of the auditors. The shareholder proposal to require an independent Board Chair was not approved. The final vote totals will be reported on a Form 8-K, which we will file with the Securities and Exchange Commission within 4 business days.

Thank you, Chonda. There being no other business to attend to. I now declare the meeting adjourned. I will now provide you with a business update. Before I do so, I need to share that the comments I make today may contain statements commonly referred to as forward-looking statements. I encourage you to read this slide. I will begin my discussion with a topic that is at the top of everyone's mind today, COVID-19. Needless to say, COVID-19 has created significant challenges around the world, for our country, for our communities and our customers and for our company. As we learned about the risks of the novel coronavirus in January, we quickly began taking actions, including assembling our crisis management response team. From the very beginning, 2 key fundamental principles have and will continue to drive our actions and decisions. Foremost, it's the safety and security of our coworkers, customers and the communities we serve. Also of critical importance is continuing to deliver safe and reliable electric and natural gas service for millions of people in Missouri and Illinois through the execution of our company's strategy. With these fundamental principles in mind, we quickly began implementing our pandemic response plan. And we have taken several significant actions, including travel restrictions and transitioning a large portion of our workforce to working from home. Of course, in order for us to deliver on our mission, not all of our coworkers can work remotely. Every day, every day, many of our coworkers are out in the field and in our energy centers to keep the lights on and the gas flowing for millions of customers. To protect our coworkers and our customers while maintaining safe, reliable operations, we've taken several actions, including securing and supplying enhanced personal protective equipment, modifying our work practices to include proper social distancing, separating work crews and implementing robust health screenings. We've also made several changes to our human resources policies to support coworkers. Of course, all these actions were not done in a vacuum. Our COVID-19 response plan has been informed by world-class health experts, industry best practices and working closely with our local government and leaders. Combating and beating COVID-19 will require all of us to continue to work together as a team. I'm proud of how our collective team has responded to this challenge. We also recognize this is a difficult time for many of our customers who are struggling financially due to lost wages and other circumstances related to COVID-19. That's why we quickly and voluntarily suspended all electric and gas disconnects for nonpayment and waived all late payment fees for customers unable to pay their bills on time during this pandemic. In March, Ameren Missouri donated $1 million for energy assistance to our community partners, the United Way of Greater St. Louis and HeatupMissouri.org. The program provided much needed energy assistance funds for customers across Missouri who are experiencing hardships. In addition, as part of our Ameren Missouri rate review settlement, we are working with the Missouri Office of the Public Counsel to provide another $3.5 million in energy assistance funds from Missouri residential customers in need. Our proposal is pending final approval from the Missouri Public Service Commission. The Ameren Care Charitable Trust also donated nearly $1 million so far with additional contributions coming to help individuals, families and communities in Illinois and Missouri affected by the pandemic. And we are not done. We will continue to be there for our customers and communities in the months ahead. From a financial perspective, Ameren's ongoing commitment to maintaining its investment-grade credit ratings and a healthy capital structure has allowed access to the long-term debt markets to finance our operations and investments. For prudent management and deliberate corporate actions, we have created significant financial flexibility to allow Ameren to withstand the challenges related to COVID-19. On May 12, I'll provide a comprehensive update on our first quarter 2020 earnings, earnings guidance and other financial matters. Despite the challenges created by COVID-19, Ameren's financial position remains strong. Moving now to our performance in 2019. I am pleased to report that 2019 was another year of solid execution of our strategy on all fronts. As you can see on this slide, the execution of our strategy over the last several years, including significant investments in critical infrastructure, has enabled us to deliver strong earnings per share growth, which has driven superior total shareholder returns. Looking ahead, we will remain focused on executing this strategy, which puts our customers at the center. That requires us to clearly understand what is important to them. Our customers tell us that they want safe, reliable and affordable electric and natural gas service. They care about the environment and our sustainability plans, including our transition to a cleaner and more diverse generation portfolio. Customers also want us to be easy to do business with. And finally, they want Ameren to be a good corporate citizen in our communities. We are delivering on these customers' expectations. Our company is laser-focused on delivering safe and reliable electric and natural gas service to our customers. Over the last 5 years, we successfully executed approximately $11 billion in capital projects with this objective in mind. These investments are delivering results. Since 2013, the duration of our customers' electric outages has been reduced by an average of 43%. Customers also want affordable electric and gas service. We're relentlessly focused on operational excellence, continuous improvement and disciplined cost management to meet our customers' costs -- keep our customers' cost competitive and affordable. I am pleased to say that our customers' electric rates are among the lowest in the country and approximately 24% below the national average. Looking ahead, we will also remain focused on delivering distinctive long-term value to our customers by building a more secure, reliable, resilient and cleaner energy grid of the future. We will accomplish this by effectively managing our plans to invest approximately $16 billion in energy infrastructure projects over the next 5 years to make the grid stronger, smarter and cleaner. These investments will not only strengthen our energy grid to meet customer needs and exceed their expectations, but they're also expected to create thousands of jobs for local economies. Our ability to make these critical infrastructure investments has been facilitated by constructive state and federal energy policies across all of our businesses. Constructive energy policies supporting robust investments in energy infrastructure are critical to meeting our country's future energy needs and delivering on our customers' expectations. Our customers also care about the environment, and to be clear, we care deeply about the environment, too. For years, Ameren has taken proactive measures to significantly reduce environmental emissions from our coal-fired energy centers. Today, sulfur dioxide and nitrogen oxide emissions from our 4 baseload coal-fired energy centers are, on average, 77% below the limits established by the Environmental Protection Agency. Three years ago, Ameren became the first electric utility in Missouri and among the first in the country to establish a goal of reducing carbon emissions at coal-fired energy centers by at least 80% below 2005 levels. Notably, we plan to invest $1.2 billion for 700 megawatts of new wind generation. I will also note that in 2020, we incorporated an industry-leading renewable generation and energy storage performance measure in our long-term incentive compensation plan based on our assessment of industry practices and input from shareholders. That change is described in more detail in our proxy statement. In addition, we announced plans to retire our coal-fired energy centers over the next 25 years beginning in 2022 with the retirement of the Meramec Energy Center. During 2019, we also continued to implement robust energy efficiency programs in both Missouri and Illinois, providing nearly $180 million in funding. And we are not finished. We will issue an updated integrated resource plan in Missouri this fall. The plan will incorporate input from many key stakeholders and will outline how we plan to provide generational resources to meet our customers' energy needs over the next 20 years, as well as how we plan to continue our transition to a cleaner and more diverse generation portfolio in a responsible fashion. I invite you to read more about our environmental performance and responsible transition to cleaner energy in our 2020 sustainability report, which we published this morning at amerensustainability.com. When customers interact with Ameren, they expect an easy, pleasant and seamless experience based on timely and accurate information. In a time when customers can have virtually any product delivered to their door with a few simple clicks, their expectations for all of their interactions, including those with our energy company, are increasing. Ameren is focused on meeting our customers' rising expectations by making significant investments in digital technologies, smart meters and cyber security. These investments enable our customers to pick their own billing date, update preferences for outage communications and [Audio Gap] [indiscernible] are well aligned with those desires. And Ameren has a strong focus [indiscernible] different place. Most notably billions of dollars in infrastructure [indiscernible] at our communities. These projects create thousands of jobs. Additionally, we are very focused on contracting our work to local suppliers, especially through our broad supplier diversity programs. Our focus on diversity, equity and inclusion in Ameren is not just reserved for our own operations. For years, we're providing meaningful diversity and inclusion training programs free of charge that have been used by local schools, nonprofit organizations and businesses. Of course, Ameren also displays our strong corporate citizenship through very robust giving and volunteers and programs, some of which I highlighted earlier in response to COVID-19. You can count on us to remain a strong corporate citizen and to take actions that are designed to enable our communities to thrive for generations to come. In closing, much has changed in our world since the start of this year, but one thing has not. Ameren's focus on our mission: to power the quality of life for our customers and the communities we serve. I am absolutely confident that working together as a community, we will rise to meet these challenging times as a company, a community and a country. The disciplined execution of Ameren's strategy over the past several years has delivered significant long-term benefits to our customers and shareholders, and we're confident our continued strong execution of this strategy will deliver superior value for decades to come. Thank you for your continued confidence in Ameren. This concludes the business review. With that, I'd like to now move to the question-and-answer portion of the meeting.

We received several questions via our proxy voting process prior to the meeting today, which we will address first. If you logged into the meeting with your 16-digit control number that was provided in the proxy materials, you can submit questions under the Ask a Question section of your screen. We may group some questions together, and we'll address them only once as we attempt to get as many topics as possible in the time allotted. I will now start with the submitted questions. The first question was how many Ameren employees have been furloughed or terminated. Our response is Ameren has not furloughed or laid off any coworkers due to COVID-19 crisis. The next question is to please disclose the number of votes for and against each agenda item. As noted by Chonda Nwamu earlier in the meeting, the final -- vote totals will be reported in a Form 8-K, which we will file with the Securities and Exchange Commission within 4 business days. Our next question is as follows. Six of Ameren's peers have now set targets of net 0 emissions by 2050 or earlier. What is the process the Board has followed in evaluating the time line for Ameren to do the same? I'll start with this. Our Board of Directors is actively engaged in reviewing the company's generation strategy. Now they do this primarily through its review of Ameren Missouri's Integrated Resource Plan, which I referred to earlier, and that's filed with the Missouri Public Service Commission. And that plan is updated every 3 years, and it assesses our customers' energy needs over the next 20, if not 30 years. And it ultimately assesses alternatives to meet those needs, taking into consideration several things, including costs, reliability and environmental matters. Now it's also a plan that includes extensive stakeholder input. Now -- and the last plan we filed was in 2017, and we're going to update the Integrated Resource Plan in 2020. In the context of that plan that we'll file in September, one scenario that will be assessed among many others, will be a net 0 carbon emission scenario by 2050. So we look forward to presenting our plan to the Missouri Public Service Commission later this year, and we'll be able to comment on that to our shareholders after we file that plan later this year. So we had 2 other questions that came in that are really pretty similar. So I'm going to group them together, and then I'll respond accordingly. So I'll go with -- they are as follows. Given the scale of the opportunities and risks, associated with the energy transition facing Ameren, why does Ameren's Board think it is appropriate to omit environmental expertise from its evaluation matrix for Board qualifications. A similar question was given the scale of the opportunities and risks associated with the energy transition facing Ameren, why does the Ameren Board think it is appropriate to have no directors with proxy-reported renewable energy experience? Well, let me say this, while we have not historically called out specific environmental and renewable energy experience in our skills matrix, let me just say it is a matter that we do take into consideration. Now in particular, what we do, do is we identify directors that possess utilities/regulatory experience as well as operational experience. And so directors with these skills have a strong understanding of environmental and renewable energy matters. And so I think I should also point out that, look, we have 2 directors that have extensive and direct utilities experience, both Rafael Flores and Craig Ivey. Now they bring additional expertise to the Board of Directors in both of these areas, both the environmental and renewable energy area based on their literally decades of direct experience in our industry. So we're really pleased to have them on our Board of Directors. You should also know that, look, we hold regular Board of Director development sessions that includes presentation by both internal experts as well as external subject matter experts on a host of things, including generation resource planning, environmental matters, renewable energy matters, new technologies and deployment and, of course, broadly, ESG issues. Then I guess, finally, I'll point out earlier this week that we're very pleased and honored that the Ameren's Board of Directors was named as 1 of the top 10 in the nation, in the nation among all industries by diversity and for its strong diversity on its Board of Directors. And so I think needless to say, we spend a great deal of time as a Board of Directors to make sure that we have a world-class Board of Directors to serve our shareholders. And so our next previously submitted question is as follows. Given the substantial risk of stranded assets associated with the Ameren's failure to accelerate the phaseout of coal generation, why do members of the Ameren Board think it is adequate for independent oversight of the CEO to be led by an Independent Director who is the former Chair and CEO of a company named as one of the toxic 100 list of the nation's worst air polluters. Multi-phased comments and questions, so let me start with this. First, I begin with disagreement with the characterization that Ameren faces substantial risk of stranded assets. And we are executing a strategy that I talked about earlier that will transition our generation to a cleaner and more diverse portfolio in a responsible fashion, which carefully balances customer liability, affordability and environmental stewardship, 3 things that I said before that are important to our customers. We're absolutely very thoughtful on that in terms of how we put together our generation strategy, and this approach meaningfully reduces the risk of stranded assets. I'll also say that our baseload coal-fired energy centers are among the best in the nation in terms of operations and environmental stewardship, both of which reduce the risk of stranded assets. So I disagree with that characterization at the outset. Now with regard to your comments on our lead director, Rich Harshman. I must say I can't comment on any list his previous company have been listed on, but I can comment directly, directly on the leadership qualities and expertise of Rich Harshman. Now Rich brings extensive operations, environmental, regulatory and financial expertise to the Board of Directors. And further, you should know as a CEO of a Fortune 500 company for many years, he brings incredible leadership skills to the Board of Directors and to me as Chairman and CEO of this company. In addition, Rich has and continues to be for decades a strong community leader. So speaking as Chairman of the Board and as a shareholder of Ameren, we are fortunate to have Rich Harshman as lead director of Ameren Board of Directors. So now that completes the questions submitted in advance of the meeting, but now joining me today is Andrew Kirk. He's our Director of Investor Relations. Andrew has been monitoring questions that have been submitted during the meeting. So Andrew, do we have any additional questions?

Yes, we do, Warner. We have several submitted questions and some statements. So I will start with a statement. Mr. Chairman, the Carpenter Union pension funds with combined assets of $70 billion have a collective ownership position of 164,986 shares of company common stock. As long-term shareholders, we appreciate the efforts of the company to address the difficulties faced by employees, customers and other important stakeholders during the COVID-19 pandemic. Audit firm independence is critically important to the integrity of the corporate financial reporting system. While the company's relationship with PwC is long, long-standing, we would simply like to acknowledge the quality of the audit firm independence related disclosure in the proxy statement and commend the Audit Committee for its work. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

That was -- I appreciate those very kind comments, both related to the actions that were taken with regard to COVID-19. As I said before, it's all about safety first for our coworkers, our customers and our communities. And certainly, we spend a great deal of time making sure that we have robust disclosures across all of our financial filings. And so thank you for those comments. Next question, Andrew.

Yes, our next shareholder question. Any plans to increase the monthly pension payments?

So at this point in time, there are no plans to make any modifications to our pension plan.

Our next shareholder question. I'm a local resident of East St. Louis, Illinois. How will this global pandemic affect our rates in Illinois for 2020 through 2021? During the pandemic of COVID-19, the no-shutoff rule is in place now. But after the shutoff rule is lifted, will residents see a decrease in rates for the next few years?

So Andrew, let me just start with this. As I said during my comments, we understand the challenges that our customers are facing, and so we're clearly empathetic to those. And this is why we voluntarily chose to put a moratorium on our disconnections as well as waive our late service fees. But looking ahead in response to the question, I simply can't predict, ultimately, what the impact of COVID-19 will have on our rates in Illinois or, frankly, in Missouri. So the only thing I will say that we are absolutely laser-focused as a company to make sure that not only we maintain reliable electric and natural gas service, but also affordable electric and natural gas service.

Our next shareholder statement. We commend Ameren for its participation in CDP water reports and actions due to reduced emissions -- to reduce emissions. However, we are still not satisfied that the closure of ash ponds will safeguard our groundwater because the new landfills will not be fully lined as we saw in the traveling demonstrations this past summer of 2019. Thank you, Sister Barbara Jennings of CSJ for Seventh Generation Interfaith Investment.

Well, sister, thank you for that question and missed seeing you at the annual meeting. It has always been a pleasure to visit with you, but I appreciate you actually associating your name with the question. And look, we've had conversations around this for many years. And I think you know that we care about the environment, and we continue to be strong environmental stewards. And now we know that you and other customers and stakeholders have raised concerns about the operation of our ash basins and the potential impact they're having on the drinking water. We've clearly, over the years, have heard those concerns. And we've taken significant actions that are not only consistent with federal and state regulation, but frankly, go beyond those regulations. And so the one thing I want to be clear and we've said it before and we've had it disclosed, we've taken those actions in terms of groundwater and drinking water concerns and we've done extensive analyses and tests that have been undertaken by, really, an independent third quarter -- third-party expert. And those tests have clearly concluded that there is no significant adverse impact on human health or the environment from our CCR management practices and there is no evidence of water contamination in the rivers and the drinking water. And so we will continue to make sure that we manage our ash basins not only in compliance with regulations. But as we've done it before, we've gone beyond compliance because we care about the environment for our customers and the communities we serve.

Our next shareholder question, how much has the past due accounts receivable increased due to COVID-19 virus? Will this cause the company to tap into the line of credit?

So thank you, Andrew. This is something we've been carefully monitoring. And the reason why is because there are concerns certainly in the Street that because of the impact on customers, they may have issues associated with paying their bills. Now we will report more on this, Andrew, talk more about our cash flows and implications on our outstanding receivables during our call next week on May 12. So for now, I'm just going to withhold that. I encourage our shareholders to listen in. But at the end of the day, what I said at the outset, I'll say again. We have taken significant actions to ensure that Ameren has been not only financially strong, but has the liquidity to manage these issues. And so as you saw on a slide a little bit earlier, we have a very strong liquidity position. And because we've been very disciplined and prudent in terms of how we manage our financials and as well as our cash flows, we have had access to the capital markets, net access to the capital markets through our strong credit ratings, and balance sheet puts us in a position to weather the storm, if you will, associated with COVID-19.

Our next shareholder question, Mr. Chairman, the recent growth in the size of passive mutual funds, corporate ownership interest in U.S. corporations have been dramatic, raising important public policy and corporate governance issues. Currently, BlackRock, Vanguard and State Street collectively own 25.4% of the company's outstanding shares. Does the Board see this growing ownership concentration of passive index fund holders as a positive or negative development as regards long-term corporate planning and performance? And also, are there potential conflicts of interest when a 5% owner is managing company retirement plan assets? Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

Andrew, I believe there are 2 questions in there. I think that first question was do we have a -- does the Board of Directors have a position in terms of these investors in terms of whether it's a positive or negative development. I would say the Board has not taken a position on whether that's positive or negative. We certainly welcome all long-term shareholders and all shareholders with our company. Secondly, we do not see a conflict of interest, though, associated with the second part of that question.

Our next shareholder question is Ameren working with Invenergy on Green Belt Express transmission project to enable more wind energy from Southwest Kansas to be connected to the grid in Missouri.

So thank you for that question. So Invenergy has certainly come and spoken to Ameren about their projects as they have to many stakeholders around the state of Missouri. But I can tell you, while we've had -- we've engaged with them, we are not actively working on the Green Belt transmission project with them.

Our next shareholder question, when will Ameren begin using hydrogen storage and fuel cell combination to store excess power for later use.

That's an interesting question. We do a couple of things. Number one, energy storage, as you heard me say before, is something that is certainly at the top of our mind. And in fact, we are making investments, both in Missouri and we want to in Illinois, in terms of solar plus energy storage because we think that is a great tool to enhance reliability. We've seen it in Missouri and that we're hopeful to get legislation passed in Illinois to give us the ability to do it because we think it's a great win-win for our customers. Now when you look at energy storage, there are all kinds of technologies that ultimately drive that. The real question is when we will start using -- looking at fuel cells. We do look at those things, and in fact, we make millions of dollars of investment each and every year in research and development with organizations like the Electric Power Research Institute. So Andrew, it's premature. This is still working through the process of our assessment. So it'd be premature to predict when and whether we would do that. But no doubt, we believe energy storage is going to be part of our nation's, our region's and our company's energy future.

Our next shareholder question is Ameren interested in buying Invenergy.

So is Ameren -- so let me be clear about this and I've said this before and I'll say it again, now we are focused on executing the strategy that I laid out before you. We never comment on any speculative transactions, and so we can't and we'll remain focused on the execution of that strategy, which is an organic growth strategy, a robust organic growth strategy that entails investing in significant energy infrastructure that brings significant value to our customers as well as to our shareholders. So the bottom line, we're going to continue to be focused on executing that strategy.

Warner, we have no further questions.

Terrific. Terrific. Look, this --I appreciate those questions. They were very thoughtful. And so now this completes our question-and-answer portion of our meeting. So I certainly appreciate all of your interest. And so if you do have any additional questions, please feel free to reach out to our investor services or Investor Relations groups. Their contact information is on our website. Rest assured that at Ameren, we will remain focused on safely executing our comprehensive business strategy by leading today so that we can transform tomorrow. Thank you all for your interest in Ameren Corporation.

The conference has now concluded. Thank you for attending today's presentation. You may now disconnect.