Hazer Group Limited (HZR) Earnings Call Transcript & Summary

All right. Once again, good morning, and thank you for joining Hazer Group's Q2 FY '25 shareholder webinar. Presenting on the call today, we are joined by CEO and MD, Glenn Corrie ; and CTO, Tim Forbes, who will run through the highlights of the recent quarter. Following the presentation, there will be a time for Q&A which will begin to be -- will begin with the presubmitted questions we've received. Some questions may have been consolidated where they cover the same topic. [Operator Instructions] The company will endeavor to answer as many questions as possible in the permitted time. Any questions that are not answered on the webinar will be followed up when possible. I will now hand over to Glenn to begin.

Thanks, Ana. We're going to put the slides up, perfect. All right. Brilliant. Okay. Thanks, everybody. Good morning. Welcome to our webinar, happy new year to everybody, as Ana said, joined on the call by Tim Forbes, our Chief Technology Officer. Great to be here. Together we will present the highlights of our report, which went out earlier this week. And I also want a little bit of time at the end to sort of talk about 2025 strategic priorities that we've got ahead of us this year. So next slide, please. Pass on to the agenda, yes. So in terms of the agenda, 2025 highlights, I'll hand over to Tim to talk about the successful test program that we've completed with the commercial demonstration plant He'll talk a little bit about tech readiness, commercial readiness. We refer to those terms quite a lot recently, come back and talk about the commercial projects and the partnerships that we've got, corporate update into the key priorities and the focus for this year, and then open the call up for Q&A. Next slide, please. So turning to our highlights. Solid quarter. And in fact, I'd like to take it a bit further. So we had a solid year. And in fact, a very important year for the company. It was a focus on commercialization about setting that foundation for the next phase of growth for our company. A major milestone during the quarter was the successful completion of the CDP test program. We've provided some information on that in the past, but I want to really ask Tim to provide further details and dive into some of the analysis that we've got. It has materially derisked our technology now and our commercialization strategy. We've had a lot of data come out of that. At first blush it validates our scalability, and it confirms the economic viability of our firm. So there's no change to the assumptions that we're making. I think we're seeing some big improvements in the tech and we'll start seeing that floating through to the economics. But a really exciting place to be. We spent a year to 1.5 years, getting this technology to a place where it's now commercially ready. Of course, we've got loads of other things we've got to do with it. but it's a really important starting point for us as we go into that commercialization phase at the beginning of this year. On our projects, we had a big project milestone achieved in the last quarter with Canada. The successful testing of our reactor pilot rig, which has given us some really important data to inform the design of that larger scale reactor, not forgetting it's a 25x scale-up of our tech into our first commercial project, a very important project. A very important partner, a very big partner and 1 that's going to be a real project to leverage for us into the future. Not forgetting graphite. It's a big part of our value proposition. We've got a very important partnership there with Mitsui. We're extending it for the third year. So that should give you some insight into the positive market feedback we're getting, the value of graphite that's emerging. It's a dynamic market that's got a lot of challenges with it from the supply side, and we're coming to the market with a technology that can deliver a critical mineral for industry alongside of our very low cost and affordable hydrogen product stream. Corporately, robust, and I would say, very flexible funding position. We have around $15 million of liquidity. That's cash. That's grant funding. We very successfully received a $5.1 million cash refund during the quarter. We also were very privileged to receive a $6.2 million government grant. So we had actually a net cash position for the quarter, but that's putting us in a very robust funding position. Costs are a bit down at the moment as well. So that gives us an extended runway as we move the company through some very substantive milestones this year. And then finally, on intellectual property, a big part of our company is about intellectual property. We were very fortunate to receive 2 granted patents, 1 in Japan, 1 in the European Union, very unique and important aspects of our technology, in particular, the catalyst and the graphite. And this just adds to the quiver of IP protection that we currently have, and I'll talk to that very shortly. Next slide. I think this is perhaps where I hand over to you, Tim. No. Sorry, on strategy, just -- I like this slide because it gives you an update on kind of the progress we make. It's great to see that we have now that very strong foundation. CDP performance in the test program gone very well. Graphite volumes, market development, application development is in flight and that pipeline that commercial project pipeline is developing. I talk a lot about the size of it. Today, I want to give you a bit of insight into what's inside that pipeline in terms of the players, the applications and the industries, but now a very solid foundation giving us confidence that we can move into the next phase of this company's growth trajectory, which is the scale up, the monetization and the growth, and that is unlocking value for shareholders through signing license agreements with those customers that we have in the portfolio today, and locking in more strategic customers as we go forward with the technology in the coming years. Next slide. Tim, I'll hand it over to you to give us some insights on the CDP, thank you.

Yes. Thanks, Glenn. Hello, everyone. Great to be here today reporting on the successful completion of the CDP test program. So a year ago, we were talking about getting into this. And now we've completed it all. So that's no small feat, operating any plant is very challenging, even a plant that you may have run multiple times for many years, let alone a new plant, new technology. So extremely proud of the team to have delivered this year. So as Glenn said, scale up and commercialization has been substantially derisked. So on the scale up side, the size of the reactor that we're using is at a hydrodynamic scale that massively reduces the commercial performance predictions. So there's no change to the story, and we've taken that leap. That is the biggest step in scale up. The ones going forward will be smaller steps in terms of technical risk. We've made the big leap this year. Continuous reliable operation, 450 hours in our final campaign which we completed, exploring various corners of the operating window. We were very much in control, stable, reliable operations, demonstrating operability of the technology supporting constructability, design, practicality of implementing this technology, which again is no small feat. During the campaign, operations were reliable, very much straight lines with a few minor nontechnology-related hiccups, but very quick to restart, demonstrating a resilient technology, no concerns on solids handling. And then conversion, graphite purity, catalyst addition, et cetera, consistent with the fundamentals of the tech on a large-scale commercial design basis. So this really positions us now with the process derisked, graphite samples in hand to get on with application development and proving out that outlet of our graphite supply. We've got strong interest there. And really that next phase, I'm viewing more as securing the large volume outlets and enhancing the economics as we push on to commercialization. Next slide, please. So I thought I'd share a little bit more about large commercial scale performance predictions. So the results from the test plan provide confidence in scalability and indeed commercial readiness. One of the factors here is around when you get data, data is king, but we always need to rely on models to bridge to the next stage and then reduce the risk. So this is a standard industry practice. What we've done over the last year is built a proprietary reactor kinetic model, which takes the chemistry from the lab scale, combined with literature to define the rates of equations and predict large commercial scale performance predictions. Now there are a lot of words there. What importantly, on the graph on the top right, the model response over a range of conditions, matches the plant data. So going from bench scale to demonstration scale, we can predict the performance and then that gives us confidence in our ability to predict performance at the larger commercial scale. Second important point here on the bottom right is that the performance predictions are consistent with the existing large commercial scale design basis. So what does that mean? It means we continue to deliver on what we've said we will. The technology is performing. And the economic basis of the commercial project is sound and largely validated here. I will just touch on 1 other brief subtlety on the shape of the curve on the bottom right, with that being a very flat curve and meeting design basis conversion with a fair amount of bed elevation or reactor volume to go, we're still positioned on a conservative basis, and there's potential for upside. So that upside on the economics could come in terms of optimizing reactor design in future for reduced costs. But also importantly, the other aspect that I mentioned is the graphite product application development, which we're really going to get into this year. So big picture, it's been a big year. Substantial derisking and then in terms of commercial readiness and technical readiness, reaction kinetics are understood. We've always been strong on IP. Our scale-up is now derisked. We've demonstrated operability, constructability, material selection and the overall design has been validated. So that [indiscernible] largely technically ready. On the commercial readiness side, we've largely validated scale up. That's one of the key measures. And then we see multiple commercial applications there. So we're ready for a large commercial scale deployment, and we've made a lot of progress this year. So on that, I might pass on to Glenn and get him to talk a little bit more about the economics and how we compare versus competition.

Thanks, Tim. Next slide, please. So if you throw all that back into our model, I think, as Tim has said, we've been able to validate a lot of the assumptions that we've been working with over the past 18 months in terms of how LCOH, levelized cost of hydrogen as well as the project level economics. And I think we can confidently say the CDP has enabled us to draw a line under these assumptions and put ticks behind them. So we're in a very good place economically. We're not changing the model at this stage. There's a lot of work to do. And as Tim said, a first of kind is never easy to get data out of it, and it's a big shout out to the team that have worked tirelessly over the last 12 months to deliver the results ahead of schedule as well. And we had 1,250 hours of continuous operation. We finished the program early, we started a little bit later in the year as well. So it's been a big effort over this year. But we've now taken the time to go back to the model. And as Tim said, the energy intensities, the low-energy intensities that we see the high gas conversions we've had to move them to the right because we're seeing good positive results from gas conversions and modeling, as Tim alluded to, as well as the graphite upside, we are 1 of the lowest cost operators or technology providers in the market today. And this chart on the left demonstrates that in the U.S. We deliver hydrogen there, for around $1 a kilogram, that's USD 1 a kilogram. That's 1/3 of the cost of blue hydrogen, and it's comfortably a seventh of the cost of green hydrogen, and that's excluding transportation, and there is upside here as well, as Tim referred to. We don't take any benefit in our economics today for any IRA or subsidies that are in the market. So that could put further downward pressure on our cost, increase the margin for players that are using our technology, no benefit for carbon markets. And I'm certain having what I've seen it coming out of the team and the analysis that we see further improvements in the technology as we move into that large-scale commercial deployment phase and a lot of optimizations to come, I'm sure. Next slide, please. Then in terms of Canada, that was 1 of the highlights that we had. We're moving -- we're making solid progress. Just to remind everybody, it's our first big commercial project, is 25x the scale of Canada. It's 100% owned by Fortis. We're the technology licensor. We don't take any CapEx associated with the project. We have that binding agreement in place, which is giving you the confidence this project is moving forward under commercial agreements. We've got that license fee framework agreed. Canada is an ideal location for Hazer, low-cost gas prices. We've got a very willing partner. We've got very supportive governments and policy behind it, in particular in British Columbia. We've got a very low carbon-intensive grid for the power. So a lot of things come together in Canada for us. It's a strategic location for us. Latest update is they are making good progress with site selection. There's a number of sites being identified, feasibility is underway, and that includes potential applications in blending as well as e-fuels. And we like both of those, in particular, the e-fuel side. So watch this space in terms of that. The revenues are now flowing through. We received more of those in the last quarter through the technical service agreement, and importantly, that project milestone of having that pilot reactor tested successfully giving us heat data, giving us flow through data that informs the design of the larger scale plant and reactors. So we're driving that project forward. Next slide, please. And then in terms of our current portfolio, this is going to grow, I'm sure this year. We're making progress across all of them. I think the big, I guess, inflection for all of these is the graphite. Now that we've got tons of graphite we've been able to supply many of these, if not all of them, large-scale volumes for testing. And that's been now the focus to get graphite to [ Chubu ] for testing in the in the asphalt and bitumen domain, with the graphite to POSCO to test in the steelmaking process, in particular, the electric arc furnace. So that process has kicked off. We've shipped graphite now to all of them, and that testing will, I am sure, lead to further momentum in these projects as that -- as the results of that comes to the fore this year. I do want to give a little bit of insight into what's behind all this because I talk a lot about 30 odd projects sitting in our pipeline. It's growing all the time with the CDP. We continue to get further interest. I would say it's probably over 30 now real projects, and that is projects that we see tick a lot of the important criteria for us to take them forward. If you aggregate the capacity of all of those it amounts to over 1 million tonnes per annum of clean hydrogen production. That is 1% of today's hydrogen market. So you can see the disruption that Hazer can have in the market, and if you follow the market, it's very big. It's got a very big problem. It's all dirty hydrogen and Hazer's technology is a big disruption. So if we can execute all of those projects, we're a big player in this industry. That is spread across North America. It's spread across Europe, Asia Pacific, Middle East, I would say, Asia Pac and North America make up the lion's share of the opportunity set, closely followed by the Middle East as well as Europe, 5 of them in steelmaking. We talked about 1 already, but we've got 5 large steelmaking groups that are exploring our technology then we've got ammonia, chemicals refining, SAF, of course, which is a regulated industry in many countries around the world as well as power. On the graphite side, we have, at the moment, 10 potential graphite offtake discussions going on amounting to, in aggregate, about 300,000 tonnes per annum of graphite. So that gives you a little bit of flavor and insight into how we think about the portfolio and the allocation of it. Of course, we will continue to take inbound and keep those strategic discussions alive. But that gives us the confidence in what we're doing is delivering a clean hydrogen solution for many players in hard-to-abate sectors that are very difficult to electrify. Next slide, please. Then just turning to corporate to the corporate side. In terms of IP, we've got a robust IP protection strategy in place. We started over the last 6 months to provide a bit more context on that. Key patents are being secured in multiple jurisdictions around the world. Excited to receive 2 big patents during the quarter, 1 in Europe, 1 in our strategic market of Japan. Both of them associated with hydrogen production using iron ore as a catalyst and to also in Europe to produce graphite, the Hazer graphite morphology, both very important markets. These strengthen our IP portfolio enormously. We now have over 70 patents awarded and granted and pending in over 30 countries and jurisdictions around the world. So what that all means in simple terms is it's very difficult to copy what Hazer's doing. We've got 15 years of development, a very, very large patent and IP protection portfolio in place, and we spent $120 million on developing the tech today. Next slide, please. I think we had a question that came through in terms of our funding. But to put it in context, I'll come to the ground very shortly, very robust and flexible funding position at this stage. I'd like to think of it as $15 million of liquidity, costs also coming out of the business, [ 9.5 ] or slightly under $1 million of cash, a new government grant from the Western Australian government to the tune of $6.2 million that was received in December, under the lower carbon grant program, which is administered by the government, but importantly, funded by the Gorgon Joint Venture, which is made up of some of the world's largest gas majors, Chevron, Exxon, Shell and others that are supportive of what we're doing, and could be potential customers in the future as well. So a really important grant that substantially funds a lot of our work program this year as well as into next year. And you will have seen earlier this week we unlocked the first milestone payment of that, which was just shy over $2 million, which further strengthens our cash position. So as I said at the outset, very solid funding position that's funding us through some substantial milestones this year. I think -- the next one, perhaps, please, which is the strategic priorities. Look, this year is about accelerating the scale. As Tim said, we're focused now on commercialization. We enter 2025 with a derisked technology, which is commercially and technically ready, we've got a rapidly expanding and growing pipeline of commercial opportunities. We've got that very strong funding and flexible funding position and a market that I believe is much savvier now to the advantages of what methane pyrolysis can offer, relative to green hydrogen and other pathways. So I feel like stars are aligning, there's a lot more work to be done, but we are a global leader in this space, and we're well positioned for this year. Our focus is on 3 things: accelerating scale, meeting demand for large-scale projects. Eighteen months ago, we were seeing demand for 10,000, 15,000 tonne per annum plants. Today, we're hearing demand 50,000, 70,000, 100,000 tonnes per annum, and that's what Tim and the team are working towards to deliver for a customer base that is growing. Graphite is critically important. It's a big value kicker for the company, and it is something that we are very focused on this year in trying to unlock and valorize the graphite product and we've got bags and volumes of that coming out of the CDP. Definitive license terms is key and getting Canada to a definitive point but also the existing portfolio to really unlock the value in the licensing model and show you as shareholders and observers of the country -- of the company that we have a very valuable technology that companies and industry wants to use, and they're prepared to pay for it. So that's a very important milestone for us this year, and we'll continue to secure and explore those strategic partnerships that help us accelerate not just project partners, but those that are going to help us move this technology to market much quicker than we would be otherwise able to do on our own. And that's not just about new license deals but other strategic opportunities. And of course, we're underpinned by a lean organization. We're continuously thinking about improvement and we've got that robust financial strategy. And I think that is it -- that's the investment case. Perhaps I'll just leave that up there for 30 seconds or so. But this is an opportunity for folks to invest in a low-cost global leader on the cusp of commercialization. I think last year was a very important year for us to derisk the technology and give you the confidence that we're going into a commercialization phase with a strong technology behind us. We're not trying to prove the technology anymore. We've got that. Stars seem to be aligning. We've got a very compelling investment case with limited downside now and substantial upside, we've got a number of analysts that now cover the company, and we're looking forward to really unlocking further value for folks this year. I think we'll pause there, Ana, and we'll go into Q&A.

Yes, I'm back. Let's start with a couple of questions that we received already. But just as a reminder, we're going to move on to the Q&A, but you can still ask the questions if you want to. [Operator Instructions] And again, like I said, we're going to try to answer as many questions as we can. We'll kick off with some that we've received. One is, one of the controversies regarding the use of gas to produce hydrogen is methane leakages, given their much greater climate impact than that of CO2 emissions and hence, can we have a major counteracting contribution to the process? How are methane leaks managed to maintain the benefits of the Hazer process, throughout the entire hydrogen supply process from reactor to distribution of graphite and hydrogen.

Yes, I'll take that. So I guess, there's a little bit to unpack here. Firstly, within the Hazer process, there's not a lot of pipe that has methane at any significant pressures. So we have a small amount of leak locations. We'll apply standard industry approaches, including monitoring around flanges with acoustical imaging technologies to maintain that. But really, this is more of a gas supply challenge, which will be the upstream producers and transportation networks. And that is something that they are working on and can address. Clean gas is obviously important. Now importantly, what Hazer does is we help them address the problem that they can't address, which is the emissions associated with burning their product. So great question. I think others are working on it, will use standard industry practices to manage it on site. And more importantly, we solve a much bigger problem than that, by decarbonizing the gas itself.

Glenn, do you want to add anything?

I think that's a very good question, very good answer. Look, we are zero Scope 1 in the process. So as Tim said, we're a solution for big problems like the oil industry that can convert gas. We decarbonize gas, take the carbon out of gas and use it and convert it into a product that's usable and a clean product. So it's a big solution, and I think, Tim, you addressed it well.

All right. Next question. It was mentioned that specific process performance data from the CDP has been collected and is undergoing detailed analysis. At the end of this process, will this information be shared? And further to that, from what I understand, TRL could be subjective, what milestones are you using to determine when Hazer process has moved from -- move to TRL 8? Will moving to TRL 8 help accelerate customer discussion.

Tim, you okay with that one as well?

Yes. So 2 parts. So sharing detailed process data. I mean, really, our objective here, Ana, is to deploy the technology and monetize it for our shareholders. So we understand people are very interested and curious and we want to share as much as we can and help promote the technology, but we need to protect the shareholder value and protect the proprietary in-house know-how and detailed knowledge. So we'll share information at similar levels to what we have been, I think, I know some folks will want more, but really, we're looking after their shareholder value. On the TRL side of things, TRL 7 demonstration end-to-end CDP test program completion. To me, that's pretty clear. There will always be debate about what scale. It is a continuum. And then TRL 8 is first commercial deployment that we're working towards now. So hopefully, that's about as straight an answer as you'll get on TRL. What I would also say is that we're getting to the high end of the scale, and really, it's becoming more a question of, can you get an FID over the line because we're getting close. And that's really the important measure. Can you sell the license, secure the FID, deploy it and monetize it. And that's more how I'm thinking about it at this point, and we're close.

Yes, it's just about -- it's less about the number. It's more about the commercialization stage. The TRLs are very important in the early stage. I think we're moving very quickly now up to a very mature technology. and 7, 8, 9 of the commercialization pathway, so a strong position to be in.

And then I might just comment because we have the commercial readiness questions as well. I might reiterate on that. So for the commercial readiness scale and people can look up the arena, scale is a good example. You first need to be technically ready and then you go out for a commercial trial small scale. So that's whether that's CDP or around that scale. Then you go for commercial scale up, so the first commercial deployment, then you go from multiple. And that scales 2, 3 and 4, we have line of sight to multiple applications. We have strong interest, as Glenn has alluded to. So again, on that CRI scale, I think that paints the picture of where we're at in that 3 to 5 -- working on the 3% to 5% range.

Okay. We've received a couple of questions about the Mark II reactor. So the first 1 is you have indicated that the Mark II reactor is designed for 2-kiloton per annum hydrogen. How soon can we expect some movement from [ ENGIE ] with 10-kiloton per annum [indiscernible] ?

Yes. Okay. So good question. I'll take that as well, Glenn, you can jump in if you've got anything to add. But the technology is substantially derisked with the test plan we ran last year. That confirms hydrodynamics, conversion, operability. What we're now moving into is demonstrating the hardware employed in the next-generation reactor, and we've actually tested those heating elements in a hot fluid bed of Hazer graphite in the last couple of months. So that's off-the-shelf components, no new tech in the Mark II. Concurrently, we have a design effectively complete from a technology perspective with a 2,500 tonne per annum. And this year, we'll be moving into developing designs for 10,000 and beyond. I do want to reiterate that the big step with scale-up is the 3-inch pilot plant to the demonstration plant. So I think we've taken a very big step. Moving forward, we're taking smaller steps, albeit they'll have a big impact on the financials of the company.

Yes. But I think we talked in our reports, Mark II is being developed for at least our next-generation reactor scales of up to 30,000, 40,000 tonnes per annum. I know we can probably be a bit more consistent in the messaging around the, but that's the where the demand is going. And Tim, you talk a lot about Fluid Bed Reactors and the scales of them. And I think that's 1 of the real advantages of our technology that we can scale to large scales with a single train capacity.

Yes. I mean absolutely. So yes, Glenn, I'm always talking on what have we done? What's the next step? And we're moving incrementally. But absolutely, the demand is there. And if you look at realistic, I mean, I'd say, in the medium to longer term, 100,000 tonnes is line of sight per single train is very realistic. And in contrast, other methane pyrolysis technologies may not even have an aspiration of that. And that's all back to fluid beds have proven to be scalable, widely deployed. That's not the new technology component.

Okay. Next one, the technology is achieving an impressive LCOH. As you implement the next generation reactor, what should we expect to happen to the LCOH? Is the next-generator actor more energy-intensive and for that matter, costly? Or will this be mitigated by the scale of output.

Yes. I'll have first crack at that one as well, Ana. So the next-generation reactor is actually slightly less energy intensive. So there's less heat losses. But what I would say is that the economics are based on the next-generation reactors. So they're already incorporated. What we do expect is as over time, we improve performance, and single train capacity as we grow from the 2,000 to the 10,000 to the 40,000 tonne per annum and beyond that those economics will improve. But I'd say we're already very competitive. The other angle that we'll be working on to improve economics is a graphite application development and outlet, which we see as a key differentiator.

Great. One of the questions that came through was, is Fortis FID contingent on the next-generation generator performance and what is anticipated time frame for installation and the goals for this year test program?

Yes. Good question. I'll have the first crack at that, Tim, and then you can jump in. I think, look, we're making, as I've said, we're making good progress with Fortis with -- there's no reason why we can't hit the main milestones this year. We don't control the time line because we're a licensor of the tech, but there is good visibility now on the project time line. We've had some of the team in Canada as late as December of last year to work through the 2025 work program for that project as well as to see that test rig and that reactor were completed. We are effectively now in a stage with this project that it is almost fully completed FEED, okay? So that is a big part of the work already done. The test rig has already the big derisking event to some extent for the Mark II. Mark II and the next-generation reactor will go into CDP first half of this year, and that will help inform the next stage of development. But we're sort of integrating our work programs as well in Hazer with that project, is vitally important for us to push that forward. and we keep that dialogue going. But they're well across the reactor development and all of the derisking events that have gone on with the first generation, the CDP, the test program, the test rig in Canada, all of the flow data and the modeling that's being done today, Mark II is in some respects, the last event that effectively will be a key technology milestone, but there's a lot more to be done to take an FID for a project. It's not just about technology, it's all about the commercial side, the licensing, the permitting, the site and other things. So there's a lot of work streams with that project that are driving forward at this stage.

Great. Thank you. We received a couple of different questions about the lower carbon grant. One of them is, can you give more details on the milestones that are linked to and the time line of receiving the funds. And does the grant allow you to pull forward some investment? Or are you treating it more as a cash buffer?

Well, $6.2 million. So it's a sizable grant and it's a -- lot of it's front loaded. You will have seen that the first $2 million was already unlocked in the early part of this year. So that's a big start to the program. It's -- most of it's front-loaded. So you'll see a lot of that coming through in 2025. There's a little bit that trickles into 2026, and it covers a lot of the work program that we do in particular, around the next-generation reactor, the CDP as well as any future sort of technology development work that we do. So it's a really important source of funds for us. It's non-dilutive. It's mostly front loaded and gives us, again, with our strong cash position, that buffer that we see in the market to enable us to get through some of these very substantive milestones that we've got. And with that $15 million of liquidity that we've got and that lower spend at the moment. We've got an extensive runway forward.

Great. The other question about that is, will the new grant funding program make it easier for you to get an exposure across Australia and hopefully improve your chances of securing an Australian customer?

I think so. I mean, the pipeline has got a lot of Australian opportunities in it. And the grant, again, just puts the visibility on the company and what we're doing supported by some of the world's largest gas players. So Australia is a big gas nation, relies very heavily on it, and this has been another event that again shines a very positive light on Hazer and its ability to take gas, decarbonize it and use it in industry much faster than electrolyzers or blue hydrogen, they're all fair processes. Some are more expensive than others. But I think this starts to shine the light on the attractiveness of Hazer relative to other projects that are not going so well. We've seen a number of big players come out of electrolyzer and green hydrogen projects and arguably pivoting across to what we're doing. So those -- that discussion is going on. This is just another example of where not really but government is supporting what we're doing to get a clean hydrogen and affordable clean hydrogen solution to market quicker than others.

Great. Thank you. Different question now. Does the company have any plan to provide a catalyst to customers, therefore, having another income stream?

Sorry, Ana, I'm losing you here.

Glenn, I'll take that one, and then I heard that 1 clearly. So we probably won't provide anything definitive on this call on that one, Ana. It's a good question. And there is a potential opportunity there. What I would say is with us being a small company, it's important for us to stick to our strengths and really focus on that deployment and delivering the pipeline, the strong pipeline of opportunities that Glenn talked about. We would obviously be involved in selection, qualification, testing of catalysts, and we may or may not do the actual supply, thank you.

Great. Next question is how can partnerships advance scale up?

Yes, that's a great question. It's a short one, but a good one. We've got a good answer for it. I think what it does is it forces us to accelerate what we're doing as a company. As I've said, I saw the question coming up from 1 of the listeners. Like I said, 1.5 years ago, we were hearing about demand for 10,000 tonnes per annum, 5,000, 10,000, now we're getting inquiries about how do we get to 50,000 or even 100,000 in 2030 to '35. And so that's forcing us, Tim, in particular, and the team to think about how do we get there, how do we get bigger, how do we get faster at doing it and how do we get more efficient to deliver a solution of that scale. And I come back to the technology that the fluid bed reactor enables us as a core technology to deliver that. Of course, we're [ speeding ] it up in a very different way, but that's what partnerships do. And it's not just project partnerships. It's also engineering partnerships, picking the right partners. We're a company of 25 people and bringing on board large-scale engineering firms to support the development of our tech, bringing the resources to bear, people and financial resources and horsepower to help us accelerate is one of the competitive advantages that I think is going to push us to the forefront of this industry. And we could develop this tech in-house forever. But what we're very, very eager to do is unlock this strategy by delivering this solution to market much faster than we would be able to do our on our own, and that -- not just project partners, but it's also engineering partners, and we've got some of those already that we're very public about like Hatch and Wood Group and others in Canada. But we've got others in the pipeline that we think could make us go even faster. So that's the focus on partnerships that we think we can bring to bear to accelerate the technology development.

Great. Another question we got is, will the capacity of this treatment plant provide sufficient feedstock for the new reactor? And if not, are there any plans to connect the plant to a natural gas supply.

Short answer, yes, it will be provided from the wastewater treatment plant. No plans for extended operation on natural gas, but wouldn't rule it out as an option, but we'll go for the cheapest, fastest approach that's adequate to help deploy the technology.

Great. Just a question on cost of hydrogen. Does the 1/7 the cost of green hydrogen include the comparative cost of the feedstock, water versus methane as well as the other products produce oxygen and graphite and carbon credits? Or is just energy input.

It's all in. The short answer is all in, we don't have great visibility on green hydrogen. What we do have is quite good visibility on the headline cost of it. The 1/7, I think, is quite generous. That excludes the cost of transporting green hydrogen. And so you could easily see green hydrogen being $10, $12, $15. We've seen those sorts of numbers. So it's an economically challenged pathway and we've seen the evidence of that with a lot of withdrawal out of that sector. And we take some credit for carbon, we have to. The best way to do that is we're going to sell a very valuable critical mineral, in graphite to market. But what we don't do is we don't take credit today in our economics for carbon markets and carbon offset, which we think is also upside. So if you start layering on all this you start to see the economics of Hazer technology improve even more. So we're trying to take a conservative approach $1 to $2 a kilogram is still very competitive in the market. We see further downward pressure on the cost which is going to be important for us, but we're a data-driven company that wants to substantiate what we do with strong supporting data. And I think we're in a good position today. There's more to come, but it's a very attractive cost to start with, and that's what's drawing a lot of the attention in the technology.

Glenn, I might just quickly pile on to that a little bit. I mean the thermodynamics of splitting a water molecule relative to a methane molecule. It's a fact that it's 8x harder to split a water molecule than a methane molecule. You're doing the reverse of the combustion reaction. It is always going to be very, very hard to compete -- for electrolysis to compete against Hazer in a green electron constrained world, which is for me, I see as the foreseeable future. The second part, which you touched on a little bit is with the transportation, supply chain, conversion, liquefaction, whatever your method of transport, that level of certainty in the green is a very high level of uncertainty, whereas conversely, our feedstock costs are delivered gas today that is available at the gate of the facility at the point of view. So our level of uncertainty in the cost is much, much lower. So I think that just further strengthens the case.

Yes. Very good.

Great. We just have another comment about FortisBC. So when do we expect revenue from the FortisBC project?

We're receiving revenue already. I think I might have mentioned that during the presentation under the technology service agreement, that's ramping up as we continue to provide services to Fortis, technology services to them, and that's something that will continue until FID. And that's the model that we are deploying for all of our commercial partnerships. Of course, we start early with an MOU. We move then into a definitive -- more definitive commercial agreement under which we provide services into the project owner and we get compensation for that through the technology service agreement. So you'll start to see that model be more and more deployed and that will be the revenue streams for us in the first phase of the company. As we get to FID for each of these projects, you start to then collect license fees and royalties as you get into production. So it's a tiered approach to licenses. I think the fact that we're now receiving revenues from our Canadian project is -- it's an important milestone for the company to turn the corner in terms of we're not just spending, we're actually making money now, albeit small. But as we start to aggregate these projects, they all add up and take -- start to offset the cost base that we have.

Great. We've got a couple more questions. [Operator Instructions] So what do you envision the full potential of Hazer technology from a commercial and financial perspective, the journey to get there and the estimated time line to get there?

Great question. I can see it there from [indiscernible]. Look, our vision is to have 10 plants in 10 years. And I love this vision because it's a hard one, and we are effectively driving towards trying to deliver that. If you put 10 plants in 10 years, which is only 0.5% of the world's hydrogen demand, it's a small amount. This could very simply be a $1 billion platform. Every project that we have at scale delivers somewhere between $80 million to $100 million of license fee revenue to the company. So it doesn't take many, if you add 10 up and we've got, as I've said already, 30 in the pipeline and growing. We see a pathway to get 10 in 10 years. That's why the partnerships are important. That's why the technology has been important to derisk it and get it out into the market and get first mover advantage with a number of these big players that we're talking with. So that's the vision and that's the prize for us. And I think we'll start to see, as we get some of these early-stage projects to FID, the confidence will build and the ability for the company to secure further contracts. The first one is always the hardest, yes. And that's why we've been working very hard with Fortis and also our other partners and having a portfolio approach is very important to mitigate risk, but that's effectively the strategy for us. And I think it's a wonderful question to ask in terms of what the size of the prize is.

All right. Next one, how confident that the auctions will be in the money? And if not, will the company consider a repurchase offer for loyal investors.

Well, we're hoping they're going to get there. They're a February trigger. So we're doing everything we can to get closer to that. It is another source of funding for us. So it's obviously an important 1 for us. And we will just continue to drive forward our work program and hope that the market starts to see the benefit in what we're doing and they are important for our shareholders. So we're doing everything we can to deliver under that.

Great. Just 2 more questions to go. When might we hear more about this year's CDP testing program?

Yes, sorry, you go, Glenn.

Sorry, yes, I was going to just say, well, most of the test program is complete. So that was last year. I think what you're going to hear more about is the scale up into the next-generation, and really, that's the commercialization of our business. It's not about testing anymore. It's about getting that commercial scale reactor into the CDP and demonstrating it for the commercial roll-up of projects up to 30,000, 40,000 tonnes per annum. Sorry, Tim, did you want to add to that?

Yes. Yes. And I was going to say it's actually going to not be that exciting because we've passed by a lot of the exciting stuff where we in the last year, completed the demonstration plant, test plan. The story hasn't changed. We're now looking forward to monetizing it. the next-generation plan is going to be something along the lines of demonstrating the -- further demonstrating the heating elements that we're using, extended operations, graphite production to just continue to build that pressure to push towards commercialization. The more data you get, the more that you've done it, the easier it is to convince people to commit to the projects, so it's going to be a little bit more of the same, focusing on that commercialization.

Yes.

Great. All right. Last question just to close it off. Is the new Trump administration going to hinder the global adoption of renewable and clean hydrogen technology.

D*** good question. I hope I've got a d*** good answer. I don't -- the answer is I don't know. I think it's a bit early to say at this stage, given that Trump and the administration has only been on seat for a week. I think we're starting to see sort of signposts coming out. I will sort of reiterate that it is early. On balance, I think it's positive. And I'll tell you my view of it. You might have a different view. He has a drill, drill baby drill mentality, which is domestic manufacturing and domestic focus on increasing oil and gas and security of supply of energy. And that includes critical minerals by the way, into the graphite as well. So with more gas supply, my view is that should put further downward pressure on gas prices in the long run, which, of course, is feedstock, which will make our LCOH or a levelized cost of production even lower. So it should drive us to even the lower end of the cost curve, which we think in the long run should be very positive for us. Notwithstanding, the hydrogen industry is a massive industry with a massive problem. We talk about is 100 million tonnes per annum, but it's 1 billion tonnes of CO2 that's associated with that. So it will always need a solution having the lowest cost technology is a big advantage for us. So I see this change as spurring for the demand for Hazer Tech. It's a strategic market for us. As I've said, we've got a deep pipeline and many of those are sitting in North America and the United States. So we'll continue that dialogue. I've spoken with many of them over the last 3 or 4 weeks. I was recently in the U.S., and there's a shared view about certainly gas prices and what that means for industry. It might be challenging for green hydrogen. And that's 1 thing I will say. If this talk about subsidies being removed, again, coming back to our low-cost position, you never really want to rely on subsidies to make your projects and your technology economic and being, again, low-cost $1 a kilogram in the U.S. is a very strong place to be as subsidies are removed, if that's the case. So we think we're in a good position in the U.S. and North America that is, in some respects, part of the reason why we get a lot of inbound from many companies in the U.S. and graphite is also a critical mineral on the list like it is in Australia and the U.S. They don't supply any domestic -- in fact, they don't produce any domestic graphite at the moment and probably into the future. So there's a security and supply issue there. Again, Hazer can contribute to that sort of domestic strategy and removing some of that sovereign risk. Big market, big problems still need a solution. And I think Hazer is well positioned for there, but we'll keep an eye on it, and we'll continue to work with the partners and stakeholders that we have in the United States.

All right. I think we're just about done with our questions. Got a few that we will address later, but we're running out of time. So I'll just get back to you, Glenn, to close off the webinar, if that's okay.

Yes. Well, thanks, Ana, and thanks, everybody, for being part of the call today. I think some of the questions really speak to the maturity of we've got -- where we are as a company. If I sort of wind back to my first webinar 2 years ago, we were getting a lot of questions around the technology and is it going to work? And I'm very pleased to say that the hard work is starting to pay off over the last 2 years of derisking this technology. I've absolutely never thought we would be here this quickly. I'm very proud of the team. I think we've got an amazing technology. We're getting that validation from market. I wish we could go faster. It's my inclination to go faster, and we are pushing as hard as we can to unlock the deep value in this company. We know we're not where we want to be from a shareholder, a share price perspective. But we see the value. I think [indiscernible] question was very, very important and the value is there, the tech is working. We start this year, derisk strong funding position, deep pipeline. And I think we've got a market that's starting to get it. So we're very excited about this year. and we thank you for being on the journey and part of this really exciting company.

All right. Thank you, Glenn. Thank you, Tim. This concludes today's investor webinar discussing the second quarter results. The recording of this webinar will be available on the Hazer website in the Investors page in the coming days. If you do have a question that we are unable to answer today, please e-mail to us, and e-mail is just at the bottom of the announcement. So thank you so much for being here today. Goodbye.