EverGen Infrastructure Corp. ($EVGN)

Welcome to the EverGen Infrastructure's First Quarter 2026 Earnings Results presentation. [Operator Instructions] As a reminder, this call is being recorded. Before we begin, I would like to direct all participants to our website at www.evergeninfra.com, where you'll find a copy of the first quarter earnings presentation. Please allow me to remind you that our discussion today contains forward-looking statements. Actual results may vary materially from those discussed. Additional information is contained in the first quarter 2026 management discussion and analysis. I will now turn the call over to Chase Edgelow, EverGen's Chief Executive Officer.

Hello, and welcome, everyone, to our Q1 earnings call. For EverGen, the last 12 months have marked a period of transition. Since our recapitalization transaction that occurred in May 2025, the focus has been on 3 priorities: one, completing our refinancing, which occurred in terms of our debt refinancing in Q1 and stabilizing the business. Secondly, optimizing our operational performance from our existing assets, putting in place lasting and sustainable operating systems as well as the culture and mindset to succeed. And thirdly, looking ahead to growth. In terms of our platform reset, we have been able to continue to show the fruits of the labors from the disciplined operating performance culture that our team has brought forward into Q1. In terms of the benefits, we see that in stronger RNG production and ultimately, improved operational performance. Before I turn it over to Maria to touch on our Q1 financial results. I'll just take a moment here to remind our shareholders and investors and others joining the call of our current position. So following the recapitalization transaction and financings that occurred in Q1 and May 2025, we are left with a shareholder composition that is approximately 72% held by Board management and institutional ownership. What this means is we've got a very strong supportive base of high net worth family offices of institutional investors like pension funds and we remain focused on the business. From a market capitalization standpoint, our market capitalization is approximately $10 million with $17 million of debt primarily held at the asset level. What this means for the company is that there is a significant amount of torque to the upside as we continue to demonstrate our financial results. And we also have flexibility, balance sheet flexibility to do more outside of our existing portfolio, given that we've reduced our corporate debt. And so with that, I'll turn it over to Maria, given that we've recently come off of our Q4 results and to provide an update almost 30 days later here, Maria. Take it over.

Thanks, Chase. As Chase already mentioned, Q1 was an important quarter of execution with the closing of the new FCC debt facility and the closing of the second tranche of the private placement and the results for the continued progress that has been made to strengthen the business as well. Turning to the numbers for Q1 2026. Revenues increased 38% compared to Q1 of the prior year, reaching $2.6 million. And this is primarily driven by higher volumes at our organic and waste and composing facilities as operations returned to more normal levels at that site. RNG revenues also increased 25% year-over-year, driven by continued production growth at Fraser Valley Biogas and GrowTEC. Compared to Q4 2025, revenues were lower at $2.6 million versus $4.2 million, this reflects the normal seasonality of our business and also Q4 2025 had also benefited from carbon credit sales that did not occur in Q1, mainly due to just timing settlement of those sales. And turning to adjusted EBITDA, Q1 2026 came in at $870,000, which represents a $420,000 or a 93% increase compared to Q1 2025. This was largely driven by improved operations and the revenue improvements already mentioned. Compared to Q4 2025, adjusted EBITDA was lower, which reflects the already mentioned normal seasonality of the business and then also Q4 2025 had benefited from those carbon credit sales. On the balance sheet and liquidity, the Q1 financing transactions that we've already touched on and that we discussed on the previous call have had a meaningful impact. Our working capital position improved to a surplus of $2.1 million at the end of Q1 2026 compared to a working capital deficit of $1.9 million in March of last year and a deficit of $855,000 at the end of 2025. This reflects the tangible impact of the refinancing and private placement that was completed in January. Overall, the Q1 results reflect the continued improvement in our core operations, and the balance sheet is now in a much stronger position than it would have been a year ago. With that, I'll turn it back to Chase to continue the presentation.

Thanks, Maria. This is an important chart to really demonstrate where we stand today, what the performance in Q1 means in terms of the broader picture and where we've come from. And I think looking at corporate RNG production, while it's not the entire story, ultimately, EverGen as a business,is a balanced waste and energy business in the sense that we get paid fees to take waste. That's a significant portion of revenue. And then we get to turn that waste into usable renewable natural gas that we sell on 20-year contracts. So the 2 sides of the business do work in tandem, but we look at our RNG production as a parameter of our success as a platform. And really, what you see here is a step-up from corporate RNG production of approximately 150,000 gigajoules in 2024 to sustained 2025 and into Q1 production at the 200,000 gigajoule level. Now to continue to expand our near-term target of 230,000 gigajoules is really driven by low cost, high payback or short payback, high netback capital investments into our projects. So recycling some of our existing free cash flow back into growing our asset base. And then our medium-term targets are driven by bringing on our short-term growth projects. So as an example, the PCR RNG expansion project would add 100,000 gigajoules. That is a project that is nearing FID. And then long term, our targets are driven by our growth portfolio. And this is really just a small snapshot of what we have in the works and what we think is possible. In terms of why we've built EverGen and why we think it's a resilient infrastructure business for the long term. I mentioned the combination of RNG+ organic waste, the high-quality revenue streams. I've mentioned the contracted nature of both of those revenue streams. And then every optimization that we do that increases gas production comes with improving margins typically. So those revenue improvements go directly to our bottom line. And then fourth, we can touch on later in the call, but the policy tailwinds are an important part of our business. The balance that renewable natural gas has in enabling Canada to export a diverse set of either low carbon or higher carbon intensity energy at a time where the world needs all of the energy that it can get. I think RNG is a great lever to blend into LNG as an export product and really have a customer base that's broad across the globe. Valuation gap, I think important to note, there's sort of 3 levels that we see, our current share price and market cap of $10 million, where the majority of our capital has been raised in the last 12 months at $0.60 a share is one level, one step up from that, and that's come from support of investment from our larger shareholders. And then above that, our asset value. So we've invested over $80 million into hard assets in BC and Alberta, and we believe that the cost -- the replacement cost of those assets is even higher than the capital that we invested. And then finally, the scale and the interest in our platform. I can't underpin enough how appealing our platform is to private capital. And ultimately, we think that there is a significant runway for EverGen as a developer, owner and operator of RNG infrastructure. We've been able to showcase our operational expertise with the improvements in our gas production over the last 12 months, and we look to replicate that repeatable model into other acquisitions and other growth projects across Canada. Looking at our portfolio, I'll just touch briefly on this because it has only been about a month since our year-end call. And really, the near-term focus for us is on the Pacific Coast Renewables, RNG expansion. This project, we received an approval to proceed from the Agricultural Land Commission. That was an approval that we had in the works for over 2 years, all things considered and an important milestone for the project. We're now working towards a final investment decision, which involves updating work on the project that had been previously completed as we waited for the permit, and we're excited for the work that we're doing in the remainder of the year here as we progress that project. As we look across to Fraser Valley Biogas, GrowTEC and Sea to Sky Soils, I think what's important to note is all 3 of these facilities have projects that we believe can significantly grow the footprint in terms of the organic waste that we process in the RNG that we produce at Fraser Valley and GrowTEC as well as the processing capacity of Sea to Sky Soils. So all 3 of those projects will provide growth organically to the company in the future as well. Touching on milestones. I think our most important milestone that we reached other than continuing to showcase strong operational performance in Q1 was getting the FCC asset-level debt facility closed which really delevered the corporate balance sheet as well as closing a second tranche at $0.60 for approximately $2 million which occurred subsequent or effectively at the same time as the closing of the debt facility. Those 2 transactions materially delevered the balance sheet and have given the company the flexibility to grow in a number of different directions as we look to bring projects to FID and as we do optimization projects within the portfolio. And then finally, why now, I guess, is what question that we often get from investors. I think we touched on it before, but one of the things that is really compelling about an operating platform like EverGen is that we're already in the market selling renewable natural gas from existing facilities. We are not developing concept projects. We have a portfolio of organic growth as well as larger scale growth projects like Project Radius and Ontario that are greenfield. And all of this at a time where Canada is really having its moment as potential energy superpower or trying to take back that status that maybe it had 10 or 20 years ago at a time where the AI boom is driving all forms of electricity being required and all forms of energy being looked at. RNG sits right in the middle as a fuel that can be directly blended as a drop-in into the existing gas network and lower the carbon intensity immediately of any project that uses natural gas. And I think that's something that's very unique to RNG and probably the only reason that it's not talked about more is just that it is a relatively smaller source of energy and smaller footprint dollar numbers in terms of news flow and announcements than, say, nuclear or other forms of energy, but it is one of the fastest ways to enable decarbonization of our grid. And again, I think that's important for a number of customers that are either buying electricity or buying energy from natural gas-fired power plants in North America or through the export market. We've seen a continued interest in low-carbon LNG from Asia, and we think that will eventually pull-in gas out of North America and increase the demand for RNG and the pricing for RNG long term. So with that, I will wrap it up in terms of our formal presentation and turn it back over to Laura for any Q&A.

[Operator Instructions] Thanks so much, Chase and Maria. We have a couple of questions here in our Q&A. First one, you strengthened the balance sheet this quarter by closing the new FCC credit facility and paying down corporate debt. Can you talk about why this is important for EverGen and how it puts the company in a better position for growth?

Yes. I think this is an important question in terms of why does it matter? I think first and foremost, the 3 things that we wanted to do with the recapitalization of EverGen was stabilize the base, and we did that through our refinancing transactions. When we say that, what's the financial impact? The financial impact of moving the $13 million approximately of debt at the corporate level down to the asset level and terming that debt out effectively saves the company approximately $0.5 million in debt service costs annually. So meaningful immediate cash flow impact but I think more importantly, provides the flexibility for future growth. And the way that happens is the farm credit facility is secured at the Fraser Valley Biogas asset level, leaving EverGen flexible to look at other forms of financing corporately as we go to expand other projects or acquire other projects or build greenfield projects.

Great. Another one here. The PCR expansion reached an important regulatory milestone with approval to construct the anaerobic digester. What does this milestone mean for the project? And how does it support EverGen's long-term RNG growth plans?

The approval that we received was an approval from the Agricultural Land Commission that we have been waiting on to work its way through the British Columbia framework for approximately 2 years and actually longer than that if you include some of our initial attempts. I think one of the things that we're really excited about given that approval,is the permitting landscape in Canada is complicated. It's a blessing and a curse from a benefit perspective, once you get these assets built and one of the reasons that we're proud of our portfolio that we've got approximately $80 million invested into over the years is that once these projects are built, there's a moat that's driven by the fact that it's really difficult to permit new projects. So our existing assets in BC sit next to the largest metropolitan center in terms of Vancouver, Greater Vancouver and Metro Vancouver. And so we're well positioned to service our municipal customers as well as our commercial customers as well as our agricultural customers. And so getting this permit really just allows us to build best-in-class infrastructure with our PCR RNG expansion project and moves us closer to FID.

And we'll do one more here. With the 20-year Fortis BC offtake agreement at Fraser Valley now in effect, how does this improve revenue certainty for EverGen? And what does it mean for shareholders over the long term?

The way we look at developing projects is to underpin the base with long-term contracts and then to leave flexibility for participation in other markets that may give higher valued RNG, which we see as a fuel source, a drop in fuel that will have greater and greater demand in the coming years as there's more and more connections to global customers that are demanding blended LNG or low carbon fuels. So I think it's a fantastic validation of EverGen as an operating platform. It renews a contract that was the first gas grid connection for an RNG project in North America with one of the strongest utilities in North America. And it gives us that flexibility to then go seek value for RNG in the future for other projects that maybe we can achieve higher pricing, given that we have protection on the downside with long-term contracts on our base.

Great. And thanks very much, Chase. With that, we will wrap up Q1. Thanks, everyone, for joining us today, and we hope you have a lovely day.

Thanks, everyone.

Thank you.