Koninklijke Vopak N.V. (VPK) Earnings Call Transcript & Summary

Good morning, everyone, and a very warm welcome over here in the room in New York. Thank you a lot for joining us and for making the effort in being here with us today. For the ones that are joining us online, a very good morning, good afternoon, good evening, wherever you are. Great that you join us for our Capital Markets Day here from New York. We have an exciting program for you today, and I'll run you through the program. I'll kick it off with a latest update on our strategy. Michiel Gilsing, our CFO, will detail out the financial elements of our strategy towards 2030. We'll have time for question and answers to Michiel and myself. We have a break. And then after the break, we have Maarten Smeets, who is over here. Maarten is our globally responsible person for business development in Vopak. So he will take you through a little bit of a look under the hood of what business development capabilities we have and how we do that in practice. Then we have Jan Bert Schutrops, who is our global responsible for operations, and he will do the same and tell you a little bit about our secret sauce when it gets to global operations. And then last but not least, Maria Cilliberti, and Maria is over here. She is the President of Vopak in North America, so that's Canada and the U.S. And she'll talk about performance and growth in North America. And then after that, we'll have some time for question and answers to those 3 individuals, and for the ones that are over here, you're gladly invited to join us for lunch after the closing, and we'll have time to still have a discussion on a few things, if you like to do that. But with that, I can tell you the Vopak team is ready. We're excited to share our story today because we have an exciting story to tell and let me get right into it. Shifting gears towards 2030. Main messages I want to share with you this morning, three. First of all, the execution of our strategy so far. We launched it back in the middle of 2022, Improve, Grow and Accelerate. And we've been successful and strong in the progress so far of that execution of the strategy. That's one, and I'll take you through. Second, if you take a look at what's happening in the world and some of the macroeconomic developments on a longer term as well as specific market trends, there is a significant opportunity for growth in infrastructure and specifically in the area where we are active, liquids and gas. And we feel that with the way we are positioned on a global scale that we can offer the best-in-class growth platform for that infrastructure for liquids and gas going forward. Not as nice that we have a platform that is set up very well that we are executing our strategy in the way we are, but we need to have that capability to win as well. I'm going to spend some time on that later today, but I can tell you our capabilities, our network that we have today set us up very, very well to execute in a disciplined manner, the strategy that we laid out for the company. And we feel that there is a unique position, very positive momentum to actually be shifting gears towards 2030. And I'm happy to take you through in the coming roughly half an hour to explain to you why I think that, that is the case. First, what does it mean? So good momentum towards shifting gears. How does it translate into, I would say, the updated version of our strategy? First and foremost, Improve, Grow, Accelerate is going to be with us for some time because we feel that those 3 pillars of our strategy are strategic priorities, explain quite well the priorities and the direction of Vopak towards 2030. So we're going to stick with Improve, Grow, Accelerate. If we move to the left and take a look in Improve when we announced to you back in 2022, our target for an operating cash return, we said it at that time to a little bit above 10%, not a little bit, but to above 10%. After 1.5 years, we increased our target over there and said for the portfolio as a whole, we make it above 12%. Today, we announced that for our portfolio as a whole, we're striving for an operating cash return above 13%. On the middle pillar, Grow, that's the amount of capital that we allocate towards industrial terminals and gas and that's gas both LNG and LPGs, we've already committed more than EUR 1 billion in the past 3 years towards that Grow pillar. And today, we're adding another EUR 1 billion in the period between now and the end of this decade. That means EUR 2 billion in total. And that's because we see that there's exciting opportunities in that field. If we then move to the Accelerate part and the Accelerate part, we renamed to basically say that's actually the infrastructure needed for the energy transition. That's what we are focusing on when we talk about Accelerate. And we are reconfirming today the ambition and the opportunity that we see to in a disciplined manner, execute projects over there to the tune of a total of EUR 1 billion between now and the end of this decade. So that's the 3 main elements of our shifting gears towards 2030 strategy. Now let's dive a little bit deeper into it and put it very briefly into context and context of the period 2022 towards 2030 in three main blocks. The first one that we just left behind, which is 2022 to '24. Main focus in that period has been very much on refocusing the company and improving the performance. So portfolio management, a strong cash focus and actually setting ourselves up for opportunities in the gas and ITL space, which we've, as I said, just now already delivered on for the EUR 1 billion. But at the same time, also using this time to lay the foundation on the infrastructure that is needed for that energy transition. And I think that has been an important period over the last 3 years to actually learn, build the capabilities and be ready for the next phase. So that's the refocus and improve. If we look at the current phase that we're in as a company, the build and deliver the returns, we committed this EUR 1 billion in the Grow bucket of our strategy. And now we are a full execution phase and need to make sure that we deliver on the promises that we made when we announced and when we committed for those investments, total portfolio return above 13%. And the time to also focus investments on the energy transition infrastructure. If you then look at '28 to 2030, deliver and accelerate, contribution from those major projects that needs to really kick in. And we have continued investments in the Growth and the Accelerate part of our business. But you can rest assured that also in that period of time, this Improve part of our portfolio and of our strategy is going to be part and parcel and very crucial to how we look at our business. We need to continue to have that discipline to execute what we do on a day-to-day basis, to do that well and to make sure we can deliver attractive returns for the entire portfolio, as I said, 13% as a target, minimum. So that's a little bit of the context around the three blocks. Now let's dive a bit into the detail of how we have been executing our strategy over the last 3 years. Let's take a look at the left, the Improve side, proportional EBITDA in this period went up with 17%. And that's basically a very strong contribution because we have been so focused on cash and the portfolio optimization over the past years, and you see an increase of 46% in a proportional operating cash flow over this period. And as a result, also because our capital employed was lower because of some divestment, we increased our operating cash return, which was around 10% back in the middle of '22 to above 15% at the end of '24. Now let's look at Grow in the middle. That's the amount of capital that we allocate towards industrial and gas terminals. Now the number over here that I'm quoting is the proportional investment that we've committed over there. In total, EUR 1.4 billion has been committed in this growth area. And out of that EUR 1.4 billion, EUR 857 million is purely in gas, not as LNG in Europe but it's also LPG exports in Western Canada, but EUR 857 million as a total of investments that we've allocated towards gas. Out of that EUR 1.4 billion, EUR 416 million has been allocated to big and important growth markets where we have a strong position, which is India and China. Now if you then take a look to the right, and I said it already at the beginning, the developments in real infrastructure investments for the energy transition have been slower than what we anticipated and hoped for back in 2022. So you may say EUR 100 million is not a lot. I'm actually happy that we used this time, first of all, to be -- and to continue to be very disciplined in the type of investments that we've allocated to this segment, but use it as well to learn, use it to build up our capabilities and use it also to focus, and I'll get to that in a second. What we've done is focused quite a bit on the repurposing of existing infrastructure that goes at attractive returns. And that's an element where we've been successful over the past years with repurposing part of the capacity in 5 of our terminals globally. We've also used this time to secure strategic positions of land in large industrial ports like Brazil, like Belgium. So that's in terms of looking back at the last few years on the Accelerate part of our strategy. I've talked about that active portfolio management. And maybe a few things to highlight over here. This is a snapshot of what has happened since 2022 to where we are today, below the big horizontal line some of the divestments and above some of the investments that we've done in this period. And I think the best way to describe it is the way we've looked at the divestments. Those are all assets where we, on the one hand side, said the vulnerability from a market perspective is quite high. And more importantly, the cash conversion or the cash contribution of those assets has been low to extremely low and sometimes even negative. So what we've done is divested assets in Canada, Eastern Canada, for instance, in the middle of '22. They were in a vulnerable market position, not a lot of growth opportunities, hardly any cash generation at the time and also with the outlook of low cash generation. At the same time, we reinvested in the middle of '22 and committed strongly for the joint venture in India. Well, you know since the middle of '22 to where we are today in India, a large opportunity for growth, a big platform that we've developed over there. Today, you see how we actively manage that portfolio. Another example is the divestment of our assets in the U.S. and the Netherlands on the chemical distribution side. So Savannah and the Botlek assets, they were both vulnerable in the market position, limited growth opportunities and low to very low and sometimes even negative over a longer period of time in terms of the cash contribution to the company. So we sold them and we reinvested that and recommitted it in projects like Reef, Western Canada, in the acquisition of LNG assets in Europe in AMS. So you see that, that's the active way of how we've been looking at -- or basically optimizing the portfolio of our terminals. Then last but not least, on how we look at the execution of our strategy and net safety. You know that's a priority for the company. And the reason that's a priority is it's -- because it's the right thing to do. It's the right thing to do for us to ensure that everyone who works at the Vopak site returns home safely and healthy at the end of a working day. It's the right thing to do for us as Vopak to ensure that in the communities in which we operate, we do not cause any harm as a result of the operations that we have. And hence, the focus that we have when we talk about safety on personal safety and process safety. You see the numbers over here, Jan Bert will talk more about it, then explain it in a bit more detail. But I guess the most important message here is this is important for us in our strategy. We need to make sure that we continuously do better, and I'm pleased to say that over the past few years, we have been able to improve our performance on both personal safety as well as process safety and can compare ourselves to best-in-class performance. If you compare ourselves with our competitors, actually really the best-in-class, if we compare ourselves to our customers, we're getting in a really very strong and a good recommended performance over there. Now safety is not isolated when we talk about our drive for sustainability. We have a sustainability road map, which we've updated, which I would classify as being ambitious, realistic and consistent. That's how we look at it. And next to the topic of safety, greenhouse gas emission reduction is also an important part over there. And since the base year 2021, we've been able to reduce our emissions with 43% with both Scope 1 and Scope 2 emissions. So that's when I look at overall the execution of our strategy so far, the portfolio management, the actual figures on Improve, Grow and Accelerate in our safety performance. That's how I would look back and qualify that we delivered and make good and strong progress in the execution. Now let me move to the next topic, which is the best-in-class growth platform. And let's first take a look at what that platform actually is when we talk about growth. And that platform is, as you know, 76 terminals, 50 ports, 23 different countries. We talk a lot about how diversified that portfolio is. And this is a way to actually put that in a bit of a specific overview. It's by geography, by product groups that we serve as well as by contract duration. So first, take a look at the left, geographical diversification. If we look at the world, probably -- or not probably, but these are the numbers, around 25% is actually of our EBITDA in 2024; 25% comes from the Americas, Canada all the way to Brazil, around 30% from Europe, Belgium and mainly Netherlands, 5% less -- or 3% to be specific, South Africa and then East of Suez around 40%. That's the rough split in terms of our EBITDA contribution. And East of Suez is anything from Middle East, India, Southeast Asia to China. If we look in the middle, the product diversification, you see a nice spread between oil, chemicals, gas and new energy and industrial products -- or industrial terminals that we have over there. And I would say the way to look at this is that all these products serve different end markets. It serves energy end market. It serves transportation. It serves manufacturing and all those different end markets in different geographies actually make up for this diversification in the portfolio. Now then move to the right side, and that's the commercial side, the contract tenure. And there, it's good to note that around 70% of our contracts have a duration of 3 years or longer, 70%. Around 50% have a duration of 5 years and longer. And at the same time, we have around 12%, which is 1 year or less. So it gives us a nice mix, first of all, with long-term predictable cash flows, while at the same time, have the opportunity with the shorter-term contracts also to sometimes benefit from shorter-term upticks in the market that we find potentially attractive to benefit from. So this is the way I look at how diversified our total portfolio is beyond the 76 terminals, 50 ports and 23 countries. Now what does it lead to? It leads to a very resilient portfolio and that resilience is needed, especially if you look at it where the world is today. A lot is changing, a lot is happening in the world. I'm sure it's too much for us to actually try to put it and to capture that in the slide. So I'm sure there's going to be some questions later, maybe at the Q&A, which we're happy to engage in and shed a bit of light on. But the way I was planning to share it with you is to give you a bit of confidence of how we've dealt with major global disruptions over the past few years and how our portfolio, given that it's highly diversified and therefore, very resilient, how our portfolio has actually been able to cope with it. Because let's face it, we've had COVID, major disruption to the global economy and also product flows. We've had supply chain disruptions with interruptions in the Panama Canal in the Red Sea, that caused major disruptions for supply chains of a lot of our customers. And we've seen geopolitical tensions and very specifically, flows being diverted as a result of military conflict and sanctioned products. All of that, if you put that together, it all happened over the past 3 to 5 years. And I think the best way to look at it is to see and what does it then do to Vopak? Well, let's take a look at the global occupancy rate of that network that we had. In this period, our global occupancy rate was anywhere between 88% and 93%. Very healthy, very stable, still growing to the 93% we're currently in. Look at what the EBITDA development, the earnings development has been over that period. I just showed it to you, but it has increased with around the 12% that I shared with you earlier and a healthy operating cash return. This is not to say that anything can happen in the world and nothing will ever happen to Vopak. That's not my message. My message is we have a resilient portfolio. We have an opportunity because of the diversification to compensate pressure in one location, in one market with upsides in other parts of our portfolio. And I think the best way to look at it now, at least is to take a look back at how the past period has been for us in our global portfolio. So that's on the growth platform. Now what are some of these key trends that I find relevant for the infrastructure industry in which we are operating and are active. The first one, population growth and also with it the economic growth that comes with it. We all know population -- global population continues to grow. It will grow between now and 2050, more or less with another India being added to the global population. That's mainly East of Suez. And all these people. Next to that, we have population growth, we also have a massive growth of the middle class. Also, that is mainly happening East of Suez and in Africa. And all these people, they want access to affordable energy, they want access to affordable goods and services and that's what needs to be taken care of. So if you look at the right, there is a growth in manufacturing capacity that is required to serve that. There is a growth in energy demand that is required to take care of that. And the growth in energy demand is not only because of population growth, it also has a lot to do by the increase in energy for data and AI uses, and we all know that. So if you add to that, the political uncertainty -- the global geopolitical uncertainty, then also security of supply and energy security is a key topic. So a lot of, I think what is coming back and what you see in the headlines is super relevant for our industry on a day-to-day basis, for our portfolio on a day-to-day basis. And the last one is the ongoing energy transition. Yes, it may go slower, it will go slower, but it's still happening. We are changing our energy system, and it's going in different levels of speed in different parts of the world with different type of solutions. But one thing is very clear. There's a lot of infrastructure needed and there's very limited space available of where to build that infrastructure to actually cater for these new energy flows that are going to be built up. And one thing is for sure as well, is going to be costly. And if it's closely and there's not enough space, you need to work together and you need to have specialized parties that basically can create economies of scale and can have the opportunity to rebuild and repurpose existing infrastructure in existing ports. So I think if you look at it on what's happening on a macroeconomic perspective and how that translates into larger trends for infrastructure and specifically for an infrastructure platform that we as Vopak operate, I think it some very clear indications on the increased demand for infrastructure. Now how does it then look specifically for gas and industrial? We already have on the gas side, an existing portfolio of 18 terminals, and you see that the demand growth expected for a product like LPG, yes, it's from 2010 to 2040, but there is a CAGR of 4% during that period, that requires flows that are going around the world that need infrastructure in different parts of the world. And the same goes for LNG. There's an enormous amount of additional LNG that is going to be shipped around the world in the coming period, an 8% CAGR. And I think with the way we as Vopak are positioned from an origination point of view and the experience that we have with our current network, positions us extremely well to benefit from that. Just to mind -- to remind you, on the gas side, we're not talking about export facilities from places like the U.S. or the Middle East, we're talking about regasification import facilities that is of our interest. So that's on gas. Then let's take a look at manufacturing. I already shared some of the headline percentages. But over here, you see mainly the impressive expected growth on East of Suez, Middle East, Southeast Asia, China. And also on the industrial side, we already operate a network of 18 terminals. And on the industrial side, although it may be less visible, but there is -- because of our existing footprint that we have, there's a lot of opportunities that come by, I would call it as brownfield opportunities. We already have a presence in the location. And because of that presence, there's a small expansion being added to it. So there's a very natural flow of additional capacity and capital that we can put to work in some of those locations. And every now and then, we also have a bigger greenfield development, like the one we opened in '24 in Weizhou, in China, to serve our global customer Exxon. Let's also not forget when we talk about manufacturing about the U.S. because with everything that's going on at the moment, the drive to add more manufacturing capacity to the U.S. is very loud and clear. And also there is an expectation to grow, and we have a position over here to benefit in many of our locations. So as a result, how do we look at our opportunities in that Grow area? I already told you, it's the additional EUR 1 billion. Why? Because we have that established footprint, because we have and we like the long-term contracts and why are the contracts long term, because the infrastructure is very dedicated. If somebody tells us put this over here and it only serves my particular plant, then it's very hard for us to use it for someone else. So that's a very natural discussion to say, well, that customer, you also have to commit for a long term, because it serves you and it serves us. So that long-term contract is an important element. And last but not least, it's at attractive cash or EBITDA multiples and an attractive cash return. Now that's on Grow and the additional EUR 1 billion on Grow. Then if I move to the focused investment in the energy transition, Infrastructure. I said it already at the start, we've used the period to build up capabilities -- people, capabilities and knowledge. We've used the opportunity also to learn, to learn a lot in different parts of the energy transition or the Accelerate bucket through different initiatives that we've taken. And we've also, therefore, had the opportunity now to say and what is it after 3 years that we really want to focus on more specifically going forward? And that's low carbon fuels and feedstocks, that's ammonia as the hydrogen carrier, that's liquid CO2 and its battery energy storage. And I'll go into a little bit more detail in one of the next slides. Now that's the growth platform that we've defined with our allocation of EUR 2 billion in Grow and our allocation and our reconfirmation of EUR 1 billion in the Accelerate area. Then the question is, are you capable of actually winning and being able to deliver this? And why are you convinced that you can do that? Well, I'll take you through in the next slide on what it means for different segment but on the overall side, I think you'll hear more about that later in the presentations from Maarten, Jan Bert, but our capabilities to deliver all the way from origination to turning an idea into the commercial construct, into the stakeholder management to actually get it permitted, to do the design and the engineering for a new project, to execute a project on time within budget, to actually then once it's in operation, be in all fairness, the best operator in the long term to actually operate these assets, I think, gives us a fantastic capability to be confident in the ability to deliver. Our network -- our existing network with well-established positions in all these ports around the world is another testimony to our capability to deliver. And last but not least, we have the financial strength. We're in a healthy position at the moment, and Michiel will take you through in a minute in more detail, but we have the capability to actually deliver this and to benefit from the significant growth opportunities that are being offered. Now as I said -- let's see. Yes, here we go to the next one. So that right to win in the development of gas and industrial on the energy transition infrastructure. First, on the industrial side. We have that capability. We have the strategic locations. It's financially attractive. And the investment multiple of between 5 and 7 is proven and is what you see today in the delivery. If you then look at low carbon fuels and feedstocks, that is the fuels and the feedstocks for sustainable aviation fuel, for renewable diesel, it's mainly at existing locations where we have brownfield additions or repurposing of existing infrastructure. We have the locations. It's financially attractive, and it's roughly done at an investment multiple of between 4 to 6x EBITDA. Ammonia as a hydrogen carrier. Well, ammonia is the one that we -- when we talk to all our customers is the product and it's a supply chain and the value chain that is most likely to be delivered and to be developed in the coming years. And hence, we focus now when we talk about hydrogen, not so much about liquid hydrogen, not about liquid organic hydrogen carrier, but mainly ammonia as a key carrier for hydrogen. We have the capabilities. We already stored at 6 locations in our network, that's gray ammonia, but it's the same infrastructure. We have the strategic locations in places like Antwerp, in Houston, in Singapore, where we have physically the location. There's no reason to believe that we cannot construct an ammonia terminal for blue or green ammonia in the future that has a complete different financial attractiveness than the ones that we are constructing today, when we did it for gray ammonia. So hence, we are confident that this is attractive and that we can do it at attractive investment multiples. The same goes for liquid CO2. And you read a lot about CCS, we are a believer that CCS is an effective way to decarbonize large industrial complexes. But then the storage is immediately adjacent to the area where you capture the CO2. That's not necessarily where we as Vopak play a big role. Where we do play a role is when the CO2 is captured at a location where you cannot immediately store it and it needs to be shipped from one location to the other location. Example, Singapore. Beautiful island, a lot of industry, needs to be decarbonized through carbon capture, but there's no way to store it immediately over there and to inject it long term. So there needs to be other places in the vicinity to actually ship it to. Well, when you need to ship it, you first need to liquefy it because it's not economic to ship and you need infrastructure for that. You need export infrastructure and you need import infrastructure at the location where you're finally going to receive it. So therefore, in terms of focusing our effort in CCS, liquid CO2 is the element where we are focusing on when we talk CCS. And last but not least, battery energy storage. With an increasing proportion of renewable energy as part of our global energy mix, wind and solar and the intermittency and solving the intermittency challenge that you have with more renewable energy being brought to the grid, you need intermittent storage opportunities. Now that is something that is relatively new for us because we don't store today electricity. We have a first investment in Texas. But it's relatively new for us. But if you take a look at it, although we don't have the locations today because we don't expect this to happen at the major port locations. But from a financial point of view, what we start to learn and understand better and better is that there is a role for an infrastructure player. There is a role for someone that actually puts the batteries, develops a project, gets the permit and basically allows people that want to trade the electricity with the battery actually to pay for the fact that you are the asset owner in a very similar way as what we have in our molecules business, where we are the owner of the infrastructure and people that want to trade with the commodity, basically use our tanks, pay us a decent return for it. And what we see now is on that battery energy storage that there is an opportunity, if we structure that the right way to get long-term commitments to be able to attract debt financing for it and hence, the financial attractiveness becomes actually quite interesting for us as a company. And also the reason that we are, therefore, looking into opportunities, trying to learn, set up our teams and making sure that we can allocate more capital into the battery energy storage between now and 2030. The multiple that we expect from a financial point of view to the ammonia, liquid CO2 and batteries is anywhere between this earlier quoted already 6 to 8x EBITDA. Now I want to reiterate, especially on this Accelerate part and the EUR 1 billion, and you've seen that, I think, in the last 3 years, this is not a goal per se. It's not that we do everything to make sure that we just against all odds make sure that we invest the EUR 1 billion. In a lot of these projects, I think you have to realize that our role, we are not on the critical path, I always say, in a lot of these projects. Supply chains get built, get set up in a way that it's not that somebody basically says, you need to have your liquid CO2 terminal ready before there's any flow of liquid CO2 is established. So we are talking to a lot of parties. We are developing these projects, but we're going in the flow of the development until the moment that we make the final investment decision. And then we have a good visibility on the financial attractiveness. We have a good visibility on how we can structure these projects. And hence, we make a very calculated and a very controlled and a disciplined investment decision. And hence, the reason that I'm confident, these opportunities are there. And if they are there, we will execute on them successfully. So Vopak in 2030. EUR 3 billion of growth commitments, an operating cash return above 13%, a portfolio by then that we'll see an increase in gas industrial but also new energy infrastructure, so that energy transition support. And last but not least, shareholder returns that are progressive in terms of dividend and an annual evaluation of a share buyback. In summary, 13%, EUR 2 billion and EUR 1 billion, those are the key numbers. And last but not least, if you ask me, am I -- where my emotion sits, I'm very proud of what we have been able to deliver so far in executing our strategy. I am very excited for the growth opportunities that are out there and are very confident that we have the capability to win this. Thank you very much for your attention.

Thank you, Dick. And also a warm welcome from my side for those who are attending here live in New York and for those who are virtually connected to us today. The first good news of today is, if you remember, Capital Markets Day 2022, we had to delay it because I fell off my bike. This year, I stayed on my bike, so I'm able to timely deliver on the Capital Markets Day 2025. So let me take you on the journey, which is very much focused on cash and how that links to our growth ambitions, but also how that links to our shareholder ambitions. First of all, if you look at the journey we have taken so far since 2022, we have a proven execution, a very strong track record in delivering our strategy, as Dick already explained, leading to very solid results also from a financial perspective, and I will dive in a bit deeper later on. We have been able to position ourselves and to commit ourselves to significant growth, and that's why we are able to update our growth ambitions. And we have shown a very strong shareholder focus, not only by our progressive dividend but also by our share buyback programs in '24 and '25. If you look at the strategy execution achievements in the three pillars, we work along, Improve, Grow and Accelerate. First of all, let's focus on the left-hand side, which is really on the Improve side, 17% increase in EBITDA performance since 2021, but more importantly, 46% increase in free cash flow generation by the company. And at the same time, we have been able to reduce our leverage with halftime EBITDA in the last 3 years, which means we have more room to grow from a balance sheet point of view. If I then focus on the Grow in the middle, that's a very well-diversified portfolio of growth opportunities. We have reached the EUR 1 billion we set ourselves as an ambition in 2022. And presently, we're constructing around 275,000 cubic meters of gas and industrial capacity which so far, we have spent around EUR 250 million on. But obviously, that will continue that journey in the coming years. And then last but not least, on the Accelerate side, we have allocated EUR 105 million of the EUR 1 billion ambition, so just over 10%. And we have repurposed around 300,000 cubic meters in our existing facilities. And we have decided at the same time to strategically review our position in Vopak Ventures and the options we are looking at is to exit Vopak Ventures because it hasn't delivered what we thought is what it's going to deliver in 2022. So that's a decision which has been taken and we hope that we can give more clarity to the market how we would like to exit that portfolio going forward. We have shown over the last years that we are also quite active in our portfolio management, looking at the portfolio we have. We have been able to rationalize a large part of our portfolio and took in EUR 634 million as proceeds from divestments and I will show you what the free cash flow impact has been of those divestments in the next slide, but the capital employed reduction has been EUR 520 million, so approximately EUR 0.5 billion. We have been able to reinvest that money into projects. Around EUR 445 million has been reinvested in multiple ranges between 4 and 8x EBITDA. So relatively healthy multiples in terms of reinvesting. And that has led altogether to optimizing, as I said, our free cash flow generation with a plus of 46% over what we achieved in 2021. And at the same time, we have also been able to reduce our proportional operating CapEx because we have sold high maintenance terminals and effectively, that has led to a reduction of 25% in our operating CapEx, which then adds to our operating free cash flow. If you look at the impact of the portfolio transition and let's focus first on the waterfall graph. You see that we generated EUR 553 million of free cash flow in 2021 and we have been able to increase that to EUR 806 million in 2024. So effectively, our existing assets generate approximately EUR 250 million more of cash per year. And if you multiply that over the period '22 until 2030, that's somewhere between EUR 1.5 billion and EUR 2 billion extra cash. Then the steps towards that higher cash flow, foreign exchange impact, EUR 38 million. The divestment actually positively contributed to our cash flow. So they were -- these were negatively cash operating assets effectively, which we sold. We reinvested that into positively generating cash flow assets, EUR 75 million plus. And then our existing assets generated EUR 125 million more, mainly driven by the higher occupancy level, but also with a strong focus on cost and as I said with a strong focus on the operating CapEx. That has led to a much more healthier cash return on our capital. We started in 2021 with 10%, we're able in 2022 to increase it to just above 11%; in '23 to 14% and ultimately, in '24 to 15%. And as Dick already explained, our ambition is to at least be above 13% in every year, in every circumstance. So a healthy development as a result of our portfolio transition and also because of our performance. If you then look at the portfolio we have, the contract portfolio, which is underpinning our results. On the left-hand side, you see the EBITDA margins, relatively stable, healthy EBITDA margins, slightly improving from 54% to 57% in 2024. If you look at the middle, you see the contract durations that effectively, the durations are being extended. So in 2021, we had 60% of our contracts, which was above 3 years and longer. And now we have 70%, which is 3 years and longer. So it means our cash flows are more stable than what they were in 2021. And on top of that, also on the right-hand side, you see our inflation protection. So 50% of our contracts has a 100% inflation coverage. So we have indexation clauses in our commercial contracts between -- 20% of the contracts has between 50% and 100% inflation coverage and 30% of our contracts has between 0 and 50% inflation coverage. So we are well protected, not fully protected for inflation, but we are well protected for any inflation development. Is there volatility in our business, that's what people ask a lot. How much volatility is there in your business? Well, there is volatility, of course, because, first of all, the occupancy level of our capacity is a very important factor. We're running at 93%. There is still some potential if we're able to push it to 94%, 95%. But obviously, there is also downside risk because we also have been historical years at around 90% or sometimes even below 90%. So definitely, there is always volatility. And you see very strong oil markets today, weaker chemical markets. So let's see what the world is going to bring going forward, but we still aim for a very high occupancy level. Then every year, we need to renew 20% of our revenues, although we have long-term contracts in place. If you look at the contract portfolio, approximately 20% of our revenues need to be renewed. If the market conditions are good, then obviously, we have a pricing opportunity. If the market conditions are not that good, then obviously, there is some downward risk on the pricing. If people decide to leave us, for whatever reason, we need to find replacement volumes. So we're always busy with, let's say, renewing the portfolio from year-by-year and then looking at the pricing opportunities we have. And then as I already said, 30% of our contracts only have inflation correction, indexation clauses between 0% and 50%, the rest is more or less well protected. And that has also been the basis this volatility in combination with the growth opportunities to set a target above 13%. We're running at 15% today. We obviously aim for very healthy growth projects. But on the other hand, we should not forget that there is volatility in our business going forward. If you look at the performance per share, which for us is a very important metric. And I also start here again on the left-hand side with the proportional operating free cash flow per share. In 2021, we were at EUR 441 million. And in the meantime, we have increased our free cash flow per share with 52% to EUR 669 million, which is a combination of a much higher free cash flow, but also the result because we bought back quite a few shares last year, and we continue to do so. Our earnings per share increase of 40%, EUR 2.38 in 2021 and EUR 3.34 in 2024. So also a very healthy development and that has led to a dividend payout, which increased 28% between 2021 and 2024, increasing from EUR 1.25 to EUR 1.60 million, while at the same time, the payout ratio has dropped from 50%, 55% to 45%, 50%. So a healthy dividend development for our shareholders and also some room to effectively buy back some of the shares. We are well positioned for growth, as Dick already explained. There is an ability to win projects, but there is also an ability to execute in a proper manner. Well, first of all, we have a very solid financial position. We are generating a lot more cash than we did in 2021. We have a very strong focus on upstreaming the dividends from our joint ventures because we have many joint ventures in our company. So that's a very vital part of our strategy. And we have created quite a bit of optionality to fund growth, and I will come back to the India example later on. So a very strong financial foundation to grow our company going forward. Then at the same time, in the middle, we have a proven project execution. So we are able to really execute the project delivery in a consistent manner, in schedule, on time, within budget and with the highest safety standards. And obviously, this is very important because we spend a lot of money going forward, and we're also already spending a lot of money to basically grow our portfolio and grow our footprint in the world. So this consistent delivery and strong project execution is going to help us going forward. And then we are still searching and looking for attractive opportunities that doesn't go without any cost. I just also want to make that clear. Before we come to FID, final investment decisions, we need to spend already quite a bit of money on the pre-FID investments just to make sure that we can take an FID decision. We have strong capabilities. Maarten is going to explain that a bit more on the commercial side and the business development side to identify those projects, but that also comes with a cost. So we have significant business development teams looking in the world. So where are the opportunities for us to really land our capital going forward. Then from the delivery and the position where we are as a company to how can we grow our base going forward. And as Dick already said, we're doubling down on our base in industrial and gas terminals, from EUR 1 billion to EUR 2 billion by 2030. And that's focused on gas terminals because there is a drive in the world for energy security, especially on the gas side. There is also a driver to use more gas and effectively there is also a lot of opportunities to convert coal to gas-fired power plants. So gas is really still a fast-growing market and peak gas is much further away than peak oil it looks like today. On the industrial expansions, we still see a lot of opportunities because we are present in many industrial clusters in the world to expand there as well, to facilitate our customers which are there and to underpin that very much by long-term contracts because industrial terminals as well as gas terminals have both very long-term contracts. So you may expect by putting a lot more capital into this section that our portfolio will also, in terms of contract duration shift more towards the longer-term part than to the shorter-term part. And then on the acceleration towards energy transition infrastructure, we are reconfirming the EUR 1 billion, and it has two major building blocks. First of all, we are repurposing existing capacity. We did an analysis of our oil hub capacity, and we expect that in the coming decades, so up to 2035, around 30% to 40% of our oil hub capacity needs to be repurposed into lower carbon fuels. Very good opportunities for us, attractive multiples, and we expect to allocate between 10% and 20% up to 2030 of this EUR 1 billion. So that's EUR 100 million to EUR 200 million out of the EUR 1 billion. The rest, we will effectively invest in energy transition infrastructure. As Dick already explained, anything to do with CO2, with ammonia, we have good projects hopefully, some battery storage as well. So we see that with good projects with long-term contracts and also with attractive multiples for our investors. Then basically combining the growth portfolio and the ambitious into one overview with all the multiples. Let me start on the gas and industrial side. 5 to 7x EBITDA, that's what we aim for, and that's what we also have seen already in the commitments we have made so far on the projects, the first EUR 1 billion. So we expect that trend is going to continue in the coming years. And on the Accelerate side, so repurposing current assets, we have already proven that we can do that somewhere between 4 and 6x. So anything moving from existing capacity towards low carbon fuels can be done at a very attractive EBITDA multiple and new energy transition infrastructure will come in at around 6 to 8x, potentially starting more at the 8x and once the business is growing, will drop to 7 or 6x. So we see good prospects there as well. So overall, that will mean that we are able, with this total growth portfolio and the existing business, to lead to an operating cash return, which is above 13% in each and every year. And some guidance on the growth CapEx for this year. We expect that it will be in the range of EUR 300 million to EUR 400 million on a consolidated basis, but on a proportional basis, it is going to be EUR 500 million to EUR 600 million, which is quite a large sum which we're going to invest in this year. Then combining the growth ambitions with the strong cash flow from our portfolio, I already explained on the left-hand side, the growth in proportional operating cash flow from EUR 553 million to EUR 806 million. You see also the split between joint ventures and subsidiaries. So at the moment, 45% of our cash flow is generated by subsidiaries and 55% of our cash flow is generated by joint ventures. In the middle, you see the focus on the dividend upstreaming. So the dividend upstreaming in 2021 was around 72%. We have reached 110% in 2024. We aim for a minimum 90% upstreaming of dividends, but we want to make sure that the cash comes in into the holding, so that we can also finance activities from the holding into growth projects. And then on the right-hand side, this is important as well. As I said, we doubled down on Gas and Accelerate -- sorry, on Gas and Industrial. So that's EUR 2 billion plus the EUR 1 billion makes EUR 3 billion, but this is consolidated CapEx. But if you translate that into the proportional CapEx, it is EUR 4 billion. So EUR 2.6 billion for Gas and Industrial and EUR 1.4 billion for new energy infrastructure. And why is that important? Because ultimately, the proportional CapEx will be the value created. So the multiples we are providing to you on these separate investments will effectively need to be tied down to the EUR 4 billion investment. So that's where the value of the company will go. If you then look at the balance sheet of the company, which for us is a very important and first priority in our capital allocation policy. Our balance sheet, in 2021, we were running at 3.2x proportional leverage, so 3.2x proportional EBITDA to proportional debt, of which -- and then you look at the blue part of that bar, of which 0.2 were assets under construction. So effectively, assets which were not contributing any EBITDA at that moment. So that means that at that time, we had a portfolio of operating assets with a leverage of 3x EBITDA. If you look at 2024, that has improved because the existing assets are now running at 2.27 instead of 3x leverage. And our operating assets, which are under construction effectively, assets under construction have doubled from 0.2 to 0.4. So the blue part is under construction, not contributing any EBITDA but will contribute EBITDA over time. The target we have set ourselves in the long run is to run the company on a leverage level between 2.5 and 3x EBITDA. But at the same time, we realize with this massive growth program in place that sometimes we will end up between 3 and 3.5x because it takes time to develop these projects. These are significant projects take into account, for example, the Reef terminal we're building in the West of Canada, which is close to EUR 0.5 billion. It takes 3 years to construct it. So effectively, that means that sometimes we will reach between 3 and 3.5x, but that's more temporary and really linked to the construction period of our assets. Then maybe as a separate example, how can we also create value and one of the things to create value is to also list yourself into a market like India. So what we're trying to do with the listing in India is to unlock the value of what we have achieved in India so far and how we can fund the growth going forward. So to take you along in the journey in India, in 2022, we invested in India, approximately EUR 200 million. Together with Aegis, we formed a joint venture, and we're earning a network now of 1.5 million cubic meters in 6 ports -- 6 vital ports in India. We still see a lot of growth opportunities, and we also see that the market valuations in India are quite high. So we have decided to effectively start an IPO process, which we hope to conclude in the first half year of 2025 to gain, let's say, from the momentum there is in India, to really position ourselves for growth, to attract funds to fund our growth going forward and to make sure that we are not purely from a holding point of view, funding this growth exercise, but that we have the optionality to always tap into the market in India. As I said, we invested EUR 200 million. We sold 3.4% of our 49% stake at EUR 88 million. So that means if you do a quick calculation, you will come to EUR 1.3 billion as a value of the company now. That's obviously what we also hope to achieve in the IPO. So post money with the IPO, this company should be worth of approximately EUR 3 billion. So that's a nice example of how we could also unlock value in our portfolio and to really prove that we are creating value with our assets in certain markets. Let me focus a bit on the disciplined capital allocation framework. We have not changed the order of it, but we have maybe fine-tuned it a bit. First of all, and most important for us is to maintain a very robust balance sheet. That is the foundation for our growth. We want to make sure that we have a healthy, proportional leverage ratio, and that's why we aim for in the long run between 2.5 and 3x EBITDA. Second priority is we want to make sure that we distribute shareholder value to our investors by a progressive dividend policy, and we have shown that we have increased it 28% over the last 4 years to EUR 1.60 per dividend, and that journey will continue. The third element of our capital allocation policy is to really invest in attractive and accretive growth. So anything we do, you may expect that it's going to be based on our ambition of minimum 30% cash return. And last but not least, and this is maybe a change to the last time, we have added to our capital allocation framework, the fact that we will always look at potential share buybacks and will annually evaluate that. So we did that in 2024, when we announced the EUR 300 million share buyback. We also did it in the beginning of 2025 with EUR 100 million share buyback, and we will continue to do that going forward based on this capital allocation framework. As I said, we have a very strong focus on creating value for our shareholders, and you can see the profile in the graph. We have a track record of progressive dividends. So over the time, we have delivered from 2021 with EUR 151 million of dividend. We have almost gone to close to EUR 190 million dividends with less shares outstanding. We've also added the share buyback to the distribution to our shareholders. So overall, over the last 4 years, we have returned EUR 1 billion to our shareholders since 2021. So we hope that, that makes us also very attractive from an investor point of view because we really focus on what needs to be achieved there. Vopak in 2030, Dick already also explained this, but may be good to repeat it, growth commitments, EUR 3 billion, but please be aware, that's EUR 4 billion in proportional CapEx. So that's the real value creation in my mind. Operating cash return above 13%. We have a very well-diversified portfolio. You see in the two bars that effectively of the capital employed, our oil assets will almost half in terms of percentage of capital employed and the gas assets will continue to grow going forward, so from 25% to 35%, 40% of our capital employed. And you also see that the light blue and the dark blue, if you add it and then also add the green to it, that is most likely all long-term based contracts. So it gives us a very stable profile going forward. And then last but not least, repetitive, progressive dividends and annual evaluation of our share buyback program. So let me round it off also where I started. There is a strong driver in the company to focus on cash, strong driver to invest our money, the cash we generate with our existing portfolio into growth projects. And there is a strong focus on making sure that we deliver attractive shareholder returns. What we can say today, at least in the first 3 years, we have a proven track record. So we want to continue on that journey and want to make sure that we prove that we can execute the ambitions we have, that we can deliver on significant growth and that we can deliver on your expectations as shareholders, and that's the reason why you would like to invest in Vopak. So thanks very much for the attention, and we're ready for the Q&A, Dick.

Great. Thank you very much. For the Q&A, we have a microphone over here and a microphone on that side. So if you have a question, please raise your hand. If you can state at least name and where you're from, then that helps us. And then please ask the question, and we'll try to answer them as best as we can. So who wants to go first?

Lampros Smailis from Kempen. So I guess my first question is around the commitment of the additional money on gas and industrials. And Dick, you said it's not really a hard stop. You're not going to spend it no matter what. So I guess my question is why commit that number then and not just be open to what the market offers? I guess that's one point. And then if I see your backlog or potential backlog in Gas and Industrials, thinking the recent Thailand, South Africa, Australia, then you're basically almost EUR 2 billion. So if there is more opportunities, why have that cap? And then when we look at the Accelerate framework, what gives you the sort of confidence that you can achieve those returns? Because when I look at competitors or people that are in the space, they don't seem to be getting good enough returns. So how are you able to achieve that, I guess?

Thanks, Lampros. Maybe the first one on the Gas and Industrial. So the additional EUR 1 billion, we first need to make sure that we land those projects. So South Africa, Australia, they're not there yet. They are opportunities where we are spending time and effort on. It's by no means in the bag or in the bank. Thailand, we've committed for. So that's a project that will be started and will be executed in the coming period. I think it makes -- for us, it makes sense to drive the organization and give direction on how we see the split between Industrial and Gas on the one hand and Accelerate on the other hand of how we look at spending our growth capital in the company. That's the reason that we want to give direction to the market to make sure that you have a clear line of sight of what we are spending our time and effort on and how we look at those significant growth opportunities and how we think we can convert them. As I said in the presentation, both on the Grow side as well as on the Accelerate side, it's not a target that we have to deliver at any cost or especially if the projects are not attractive. So we want to deliver them if and when the projects become attractive and if in the very good situation that we are able to get to the EUR 2 billion for Gas and Industrial earlier than 2030, we will reevaluate and give an update to the market and see where we are then. If you look at the Accelerate side, the confidence, I'm not going to stand over here and say the confidence is there and we will easily deliver the EUR 1 billion. That's not what we're saying. What we have discovered up until now, is that especially in that repurposing, as Michiel said, that's more attractive than what we thought in the past. I think on the ammonia side, there is a lot less hype and there's more realism and some of the ammonia infrastructure terminals, they will get built. And we just want to make sure we get a fair portion of that. And the size of those projects I think for all of the projects that we talk about, especially on ammonia, liquid CO2, because of a lot of inflation on the CapEx side, the size of those projects become also bigger than what we thought they were going to be back in 2022. I think we are well positioned. We are confident, we have the capabilities, and that's why we also are confident to reconfirm to the market now that the EUR 1 billion is something that we're going to strive for. And if we won't get there, I mean we're not going to invest in projects that we don't find attractive. Why do I think that we still will be able to get the returns? Because the opposite also doesn't make a whole lot of sense. Why would we invest in infrastructure for ammonia, let's say, and actually commit for ammonia and all of a sudden because of the fact that the ammonia has a different color label, namely blue or green, instead of gray, we all of a sudden, wouldn't get a similar type of return that we get for the gray ammonia's that we currently store in Houston, in Singapore, in Malaysia? It doesn't make a lot of sense why somebody would do that. And why we would be forced to kind of like in the end then subsidize basically that new product coming in. I think where -- in reality where you will see, as Michiel already said, maybe the volume ramp-up will take a little bit of time. That's why we're probably at the edge of that 8x EBITDA may be at the starting phase and slowly but surely, when there's more volume going through the infrastructure, I think that's where you will see that it will take a little bit of time to catch up, if that makes sense.

Quirijn Mulder, ING. A couple of questions. Can you give me, Dick, some idea about the Oil mark because the EUR 250 million increase of cash flow, in my view, is mainly driven by the favorable circumstances for oil and helped you? That's my first question. With regard to the leverage, 2.5x to 3x, what part do you take into account which is under construction because that can make also a difference there? Small question there. And then my final question is on the share buybacks. How attractive is share buyback when your price is 7.5x multiples, whereas you can build on between 4 and 6x for gas terminals and other interesting projects?

Should I maybe start with the oil side and if you take the other two. Maybe on the oil side, I think if you look at the occupancy rate on oil hub terminals has definitely gone up over the past few years, and that's on the back of simply more flows moving into those big locations, Singapore Straits, Rotterdam and Fujairah. Those are the big movers. We've definitely seen increased volumes, increased volatility as a result of what's going on in the world and therefore, a safe haven and security of supply in those big locations. As a result, we've been able to also have quite a bit of price leverage. So the rates have developed in a healthy manner. I think at the same time, so oil is to the one side, I think we've also clearly explained the fact that we did our portfolio rationalization, the fact that we've, from a cash flow perspective, also looked very critically at our operating capital expenses, so sustaining CapEx. I think that has definitely been a big contributor at the same time as well. And I think for the next phase, we will get the contribution from some of these bigger growth projects that we've invested in. So I think it's the benefit, again, of having a diversified and resilient portfolio that you can benefit from these market opportunities.

Yes. And then maybe on the leverage side, so what we have tried at least to make very clear is, let's say, what is the proportional leverage of the whole portfolio, so taking into account all the joint ventures because we got a lot of questions on how much debt do you have in the joint ventures and how does that actually work? You have seen that we now also identified how much is under construction. We haven't set a target, but what you may expect over time is that once we reach to 3 or go into the bracket of 3 to 3.5%, that the 0.4 will be significantly higher than where we are today. And we want to make that more transparent because with the increased CapEx program, we will see more assets under construction, which are not delivering EBITDA yet. And I think that is very important for people to understand, to put also the leverage into the right perspective. So that's one. And then your last question, Quirijn, was on...

On the share buyback.

On the share buyback, yes. Yes, first, it's a nice balance because we're trading historically quite low. If you look at -- we're trading at around 7x our proportional EBITDA. We have been in days somewhere around 9 to 10x. Yes, we combine it with growth, although growth is more important for us, but then in the priority setting, the share buyback but it's also an opportunity for us to buy our share at a relatively low multiple, we think. By the way, our major shareholder thinks the same because they are not selling. While in the past, they were selling, they haven't sold anything in '24, and they're not going to sell anything in '25. So for us, it is also a nice discipline to have in the company because if people come with projects which are both far above 7x or come with projects of 9x, can we actually pursue those projects? Then for us, the choice is relatively easy and saying, well, why would we do this guys, if we can buy back our own share at 7x. So it's also setting a nice discipline in our mind of moving projects into the right direction.

Maybe just one coming back to the oil side, Jan Bert will talk about that later in his presentation, uptime of our assets. So availability of capacity because of faster turnaround of our tanks has definitely also helped over here. And that obviously, with large capacities that are dedicated to oil has definitely benefited the oil market. And Jan Bert will talk in more detail and have some numbers over there to share.

Thijs Berkelder, ABN AMRO ODDO BHF. A couple of questions. First, on your Slide 20, at least in my package 20, but probably 19 on yours. You show a portfolio mix over the different categories, '24 towards 2030. But the total size of the capital employed shows flat. My question is what kind of growth in capital employed should we expect from '24 to 2030, given your CapEx plans?

Quite significant. So it shows flat because it's -- the bar is percentage. But obviously, the percentages in 2030 are of a much higher capital employed than what they are in 2024. So effectively, if we take the proportion of capital employed and we are going to invest EUR 4 billion, we have committed EUR 1.4 billion today, which we not have spent yet. So if you deduct from the EUR 1.4 billion effectively what we have spent already and then go back to the EUR 4 billion, then you can approximately assume what the capital employed is going to be in 2030. We haven't disclosed that, but it's a significantly higher capital employed than where we are today.

Something like EUR 7 billion versus EUR 5.5 billion?

Yes. I think it'll be even above EUR 7 billion, yes.

Clear. Analogical question, given your, let's say, lifting the floor on the operating cash returns from 12% to 13%. What can we expect for '25, lower than '24, flat, roughly flat or higher than '24? What's it, a logical easy one for you?

We haven't given any ambition. So the ambition is to at least be above the 13% and we haven't given any indication for 2025. We will not do that on the cash return. We have done it on the EBITDA levels. We have done it on the operating sustaining CapEx level. If you make your assumption around capital employed, you could do -- run the number yourself, but we haven't given that indication.

But what needs to happen to make it clearly lower than '24 given your debt levels, inflation high...

So let's -- well, what we don't expect in '25 is that we have a massive drop in our OCR, but this is a long-term target. So this is up to 2030. So anything may happen in the oil market, anything may happen in the chemical market, so that may impact our cash flows if occupancies really drop. So that -- as a result, we have said, okay, let's at least increase it with 1%, the floor, but let's also make sure that we are not providing a statement to the market that in any circumstances, any development in the world, we will always have a sustainable strong cash flow. There is certainly some volatility in our portfolio.

Then on the -- you're looking for an exit from Vopak Ventures, probably your EBITDA. So a divestment price 100x EBITDA or so, whatever. You're targeting reaching CapEx savings by listing the Indian joint venture at 40x EBITDA. Those savings and proceeds will they be used for share buybacks, additional share buybacks? Is that an option or already discussed?

It's always an option because it's not part of our capital allocation framework, and we will evaluate it at the year-end. First of all, we still need to determine the exit possibility for Ventures. This is not a portfolio which you sell overnight. It's like approximately 20 investments in smaller ventures. So -- and obviously, a lot of companies are selling their venture portfolio at the moment. So it is quite crowded in the market, I would say. So that first has to be realized. Secondly, we need to realize the IPO, which has a benefit for us because ultimately, we will be able to get back our shareholder loan, which sits into the joint venture. And we're not -- no longer need to fund, let's say, the India venture going forward from a holding point of view. And then once all this is being realized and looking at the growth progress we make this year and the cash we have available by the's year-end, we will look at it again and say, well, is there for us sufficient room to buy back our share? Do we still think it's a very attractive thing to do? And that's how we look at it. And that's why we said, let's annually evaluate because there's quite a few things which still have to be concluded, of course.

Yes. And for now, final question. Is it logical to assume the timing of peak leverage somewhere in '26 given the range of projects then coming close to delivery?

Peak leverage. Yes, that's -- it's a bit depending on how quickly we can commit the additional EUR 1 billion. So if you would think of the existing commitments, yes, then peak leverage is somewhere between -- somewhere in '26 because a major chunk of the cash for the Western Canada project goes out this year, and we're delivering on the fourth tank of gate. But if we're able to land new projects, then obviously, yes, if we land a project like Australia, which will have a significant cash out, then maybe peak leverage is later than 2026.

Jeremy Kincaid from Van Lanschot Kempen. I'll just start with the New Energies portfolio. Obviously, there's a difference between repurposing and also brownfield developments. So I was just wondering when it comes to repurposing existing terminals, the 4 to 6x investment multiple, does that also include the lost earnings that you'd have from repurposing an oil terminal?

Simple answer, yes. So it's basically the investment that we have to do and the additional EBITDA that we are generating over and above as a premium of what we take the things out of service for us.

Okay, sure. And then what sort of return would those oil terminals be generating when you decide to take them off-line or repurpose then, I should say?

You mean the overall return of the oil assets? Or you mean, let's say, that particular part we're going to repurpose?

That particular part. I'm just wondering at what stage do you think this return is not sufficient anymore and it's time to repurpose it.

It's more depending on what kind of opportunities we see. So what kind of low carbon fuels demand we see in the market. So take an example, in L.A., we had a very good opportunity to bring in sustainable aviation fuel and renewable diesel. We had few oil in those tanks, which was a 1-year contract, we could replace it by a 7-year contract, and then we look at the economics of the case, saying, well, okay, effectively, we need to invest to limited some of money versus, let's say, building the whole infrastructure new, that is going to contribute EBITDA -- additional EBITDA and it's also leading to a longer contract duration because why would we convert capacity for 1 year contract. That's not what we're going to do. So you see these opportunities also in Rotterdam, in [indiscernible]. You see these opportunities in Singapore. You see the opportunities in Brazil. So, step by step, you see all kind of pockets of opportunities. And then case by case, we will evaluate. Is it a smart decision now to convert this capacity into a newer, lower carbon fuel or should we wait for another 1 or 2 years? And obviously, you continuously need to look at what's the best timing and is it delivering the right return. But we have seen already and that's proven that with these kind of investments, we can make attractive returns.

Okay. Clear. And then on lifting the floor of the proportional operating cash return. Obviously, there's the EUR 250 million uplift in the proportion of free cash flow and you have that helpful table which decomposes the breakdown. Obviously, there's the divestments and the investments, which is about EUR 90 million of uplift, and that's here to stay and probably permanent, but then, obviously, there's about EUR 40 million of FX impact, which could reverse potentially. And then within the existing assets, there's EUR 125 million there, and you called out occupancy operating cash -- CapEx and cost savings, which has driven the uplift, occupancy sort of at the top end of your target range you alluded to. And then sort of the other components, operating CapEx and costs. Could you just talk to those dynamics and just give us some color on how permanent do you think those lower levels of costs and OpEx could be going forward?

Yes, from me end and Dick will add, well, what we're trying to do is at least be very critical on, let's say, the way we organize our company. So do we have, let's say, the right setup of the company to be successful? In 2023, we decided effectively to take 1 layer out of the company. So we had operating companies division and then global. We changed the company to global business units. We will continuously critically look at, is this the right setup to be successful? Can we make sure that we are a lean and mean company? That's what you may expect from us first of all. The similar thing we will continuously do on the sustaining CapEx to really look at, okay, is this the right investment to do? But more importantly, are we still continuing to deliver on asset integrity because that is vital for our industry. We don't want to have any spills, any serious fires or whatsoever. So that is what we stand for as a company, but we will continuously look at cost and sustaining CapEx to just make sure that we keep our margin also while we're running at high occupancy levels. Because we know that, let's say, there is still some upward maybe in this, but the upward is maybe more limited than we were 3 years ago when we were running at 88% of occupancy. So that's a difference. And that's why we also need to focus very hard on OpEx and on sustaining CapEx.

Maybe the only other thing to add is on the top line. With the 93% occupancy, yes, there's a bit of a potential downward risk. There's also upward opportunity if we price our services well. Because if you're continuously high at 93%, we're also now -- well, we've done that, but we're also putting more effort and organizing ourselves towards really making sure that we capture potential opportunities to value base our pricing much more than we might have done in the past. And I think that's definitely also an area where we expect quite some positive from.

Andy [indiscernible] Cohen and Steers. Can you talk about what you're seeing with private market valuations in the context of you trading at 7x and based on that, any desire to do incremental investments to capture some of that or Incremental divestments, sorry?

Yes, if you look at the private market transactions, this is -- it's quite different than what you see in the public market in terms of trading multiples. Very recently, MOL bought the LBC Network, which is a network of 7 terminals. It generates approximately EUR 140 million EBITDA. It was sold at 18.5x EBITDA multiple. Of course, there is some growth in this business. Most likely, it will grow to somewhere around EUR 200 million. But if you compare it to where we are trading at 7x, that's a big, big difference because we also have a nice growth trajectory ahead of us. So yes, it is sometimes hard to understand the difference between the private market transactions and the public market transactions. Obviously, there is one opportunity, as I showed in India, to also play the public market, which effectively, if you go to the Indian Stock Exchange, it is cheaper than debt. So the trades at a very attractive multiple. Yes, we will continuously look at our portfolio. Our ambition is not to get smaller. On the other hand, obviously, some of the multiples are quite attractive. And we have seen it, and you have seen it also in our divestment. Selling a negative free cash flow of EUR 15 million for close to EUR 0.5 billion is quite interesting for us as well. And these were also private investor type of transactions. So yes, we continuously need to look at it. It makes acquisitions for us very hard with trading at 7x if we would buy something at 12x, people would ask us why are you doing this? Because the synergies in the business are most of the times quite limited. If you buy another network, it's not like you can takeaway defense or you can reduce, let's say, your CapEx significantly or you run completely at a different operating cost base. That's not happening most of the time. So yes, it's a very different market, sometimes the public market and the private market.

I think the -- maybe the only thing to add here, Andrew, the individual transaction for an individual terminal has proven to be in the private market, different and lower than small network. So the LBC one is a platform, Europe presence, U.S. presence that has definitely fetched even a bigger premium. We don't have -- on your very, do we have active plans now to consider any of our assets like we stood here in 2022 when we had some plans already to critically look at it. That's not in the cards at the moment. Now we always have a critical look at the assets where we think that we have vulnerability from a market perspective or from a market position as well as the ones that from a cash perspective, are not performing in the right manner. So from a performance element, we're looking at that and considering it, but there's not a very active play that we have now because we also -- as Michiel already said, we want to make sure we maintain scale with 76 terminals in the presence that we have, that gives us the opportunity to actually get a position potentially in South Africa, in Australia, in all these markets for the new -- for the energy transition infrastructure. So we're also quite attached to a minimum level of skill that allows us to play in those markets.

[indiscernible], KBC Securities. Maybe first, a question for Michiel. I mean your product mix in terms of terminal types is shifting more and more towards gas industrial terminals. You have your leverage target, 2.5 to 3x, maybe sometimes higher, depending on the stage of investments. But eventually, the share of terminals covered by long-term contracts will only grow. I mean, if you were in a situation where you only had gas terminals and industrial terminals, what kind of leverage would you feel comfortable with running the company? That's the first one. And then on Reef with everything going on in terms of tariff war between Canada and the U.S., I recall that 70% of the costs were fixed of the investment. Any chance that these tariff situations can lead to a force majeure and no cost overruns? And then finally, looking at the political situation in Germany, the CDU was very vocal about adding additional gas-fired power plants. I believe it was up to 50 in Germany. Is there any substantial business development going on at Vopak in -- for this particular market?

Shall I do reef and maybe the Germany part?

Yes. On the leverage side, yes, it's an if question, if we would have that portfolio, we would look at the leverage. But maybe to give you a bit of insight, if you look at LNG type of projects, then normally you can stretch the leverage to like 80% of the total investments of 20% equity, 80% of the debt. If you then assume that we do a gas investment of 5 to 7x and then multiply that by the 80%, then you come to the debt level of these investments. Would that -- then automatically, if we would only have gas and industrial terminals, would it also be automatically the leverage we would aim for. Yes, I find that very hard to answer. We haven't sort of studied that. We have looked at our existing portfolio, what do we think is a reasonable leverage, which also still gives us some strategic flexibility because that's also what you would like to have, you don't want to stretch yourself to the limit, yes. So I can't give you a specific answer on it. The only thing I can give you is a bit of guidance on what type of leverage these projects normally can hold.

Maybe a brief, Christophe. So execution of the project is going according to plan as we see it now. Towards the end of '26, we expect to be ready with the expansion. If your question is much related to once it's in operation, what are the cost levels? I'm not too concerned about what could happen over there. If it's related to the current CapEx that we are going through, there's -- the majority of it is already covered and committed for and the main elements of that CapEx is very much related to local labor and is very much related to some of the off-site fabrication of main infrastructure that is going to be shipped in from China. So I don't expect anything in that area that would dramatically affect the CapEx for -- and I mean it's already being fabricated as we speak. So I don't think there's exposure over there. Actually to the contrary because you could imagine that with everything going on, Teh Reef, as being a facility on the West Coast of Canada, with only 10% utilization of the marine infrastructure that we're currently building and a lot of land that is still available. Maria will talk about that later. But I'd rather see it also potentially in the current construct as an opportunity for further development in that particular area. Then to Germany, we've had quite a couple of journeys already in Germany to look at LNG import in the north of the country. And we -- before the geopolitical crisis with the Russia-Ukraine war, we abandoned the project in the north of Germany, because we didn't feel that it had any commercial legs to stand on. There's continuous discussions on individual projects in the north of Germany, with developers that have already advanced in the development and look potentially for someone to come in and to help in the operation and make the next step. Yes, we are individually looking at those opportunities. But if you would ask me, I think for now, I'm very happy with what we have in Gate. I'm very happy with what we have in Eemshaven and the opportunities to further grow from there. And I think we have to look at it case-by-case on any opportunity in Germany. From a capacity point of view, pure capacity, there's already quite some capacity available. So the question then becomes how attractive is it for us to step into the development of someone else already? We'd rather do it ourselves then. And there's no active plan to do that in Germany at the moment. I hope that helps.

Yes. John Mackay, Goldman Sachs. I wanted to go back to a question that I think Lampros asked a couple minutes ago. Just in terms of the forward growth plans, you're talking about a lot of projects, a lot of different geographies. Could you frame up just for us the competitive dynamic you're seeing out there? Are you seeing kind of more bids for these projects you're working on or fewer? And then when you're talking about the Vopak advantage, is it all about the brownfield? Is it your ability to work with maybe one customer in multiple geographies? Just frame that up for us.

It's probably a combination of a few. I would say, let's frame it up first from the grow part of our business or the Industrial and the Gas side. I think there, we have a pretty strong market position, especially on industrial. It's a specific skill set and it's the confidence and the track record that allows companies like, for instance, ExxonMobil that when they invest $10 billion plus in a big cracker facility in China, they want to make sure that the industrial terminal is handled by someone that has the experience. So I think never say never. There can always be competition, but I think we have a pretty good position on the industrial side. If you look at it from a geographical point of view, I think, for instance, in India and in China, big growth markets, we have a very strong position from a competitive point of view. Because a lot of the, I would say, more global international competitors that we have, not with the network that we have, but smaller in size, they're not that active anymore in China and in India at the moment. So we have a very strong position with local presence. I think what's the secret sauce to call like what makes us then, so specific for sure, Maarten and Jan Bert will talk about it and give you a bit of a sense over there. But it is the fact that we have existing locations because that's where a lot of it will start. It's the fact that we have long-term relations with a lot of the parties and they know us over a long period of time. It's the fact that we then have hard core capabilities on products, on origination, commercial elements of it. But let's take Thailand, a recent example, we've been in Thailand for 30 years. We've been working with our partners in Thailand for 30 years. We went together through a renewal of the concession a few years ago. And we sat together and basically said, once we go through this, we're going for the next long phase of investments in Thailand. We are committed to it. They are committed to it. So then it's a very, I would almost say, a relatively natural step to then say, if there is a big growth opportunities, we do that together. And hence, we were able to secure that. If you take a move to the Accelerate part, that, in a way, is kind of like open again for everyone to claim their position. Everyone can say we do liquid CO2. Everyone can say we want to do ammonia. So I think it's a bit more competitive over there, but we're confident that with our experience, with the trust, with the locations that we have with also the depth that we can work on a few of these projects in different parts of the world. Again, you need scale over here. You cannot -- I mean, it's difficult, as Michiel said, it's a big investment. It's a big organization that you need to get going to be able to do a project in Singapore, to do it in the Middle East, to do it in the U.S., to do it in Europe. You need people, you need to make choices. And I think we have the breadth and therefore, also the confidence that we can deliver that.

Rajeev Saffar from Sprucegrove Investment. Just on the occupancy, if I look at your portfolio, it's moved to Industrial and Gas which is dedicated infrastructure, long-term take-or-pay. Then even on the Oil and Chemicals, the big chunk of the portfolio is very strategic. It's not like really speculative what it was 5, 10 years ago. So theoretically, what would you say that what percentage of the overall portfolio is pretty solid in terms of occupancy? Like people -- the customers don't have really an option to switch, would you say?

Well, good morning. Good to have you here. I think the best way to position it is probably to go back to what Michiel shared on the volatility in the current portfolio and the brackets in which we operate in. Yes, there's still at this high level, there's -- every year, there are certain elements of the portfolio that need to be renewed that go through natural renewal. Now we might be very confident that we are -- that we can go through those renewals because it's people that have been there for a long time. The flows are there. It might be that sometimes the name changes from one company to the other. It is sometimes that we make a different choice, we say we'd like to focus on a different type of product in this location. But by and large, if you look at it from a historic perspective, anywhere between that 88% and 93%, we've been sometimes between 85% and 88%, but I think definitely, we're at a very healthy level at the moment. And yes, it could drop a few percentage points, but I don't expect it to drop with big numbers.

And then, say, given you have a pretty solid 85% to 88% as the floor and you're right now at 93%. Even if we assume in a normalized condition, your occupancy do drop 1% to 2%, do you have the levers in terms of pricing or other levers so that you can maintain that 13% target on the cash flow?

Well, yes, I think if the occupancy level dropped with 1% or 2%, we should definitely be able to reach to the 13% cash return. That is something we can state here. Well, if occupancy levels dropped much more than that, obviously, then there is more risk also on the pricing side, because that means that markets are probably going to be a bit more softer than what they are today, especially on the oil side. That could have a bigger impact, but we're still confident that we are able to deliver above 13%. And that's why we also said, well, in any circumstance, in any market, we are able to deliver, let's say, above the 13%. And we know that we're running at 15%. We know also what we try to contribute with the growth. Because the multiples, if you convert that to the cash returns, you can also do that math and then you see that some of these growth projects will deliver 12%, but others will deliver close to 20% return. So that in the mix has given us like, well, this guidance took at least above 13%.

Good to know. And then lastly, just on the Russia, Ukraine situation, in case the Russian gas starts to come back into Europe. Do you see any risk in any of your gas LNG projects which you're executing? Can that have an impact?

Well, that's an if and if and if. So there's a lot of things that need to happen. So from maybe not so much from a company point of view, but it's hard to imagine as a European that you could see that happening very quickly and that the alternative to Russian gas would be abandoned. And, as a result, I think that the current position that we have with the assets is, in my view, strongly protected because of the fact that Europe, no matter what, with or without Russian gas in the future, still wants to make sure that it's a sufficient availability and alternative supply opportunities out there because of security of supply, I think that's one. I think the second one that is important to realize, if we talk about two specific projects that we're looking at, Australia and South Africa, with all due respect of whatever happens with the Russian gas that doesn't solve necessarily the issues that South Africa have today with load shedding and blackouts. It doesn't solve the issue that Southwest Australia have with the fact that they need LNG in the coming years to cater for the drop of gas production. So -- and those are -- so there, we don't play necessarily the global markets with the big flows, but there we really are basing the logic of a project very much on what's happening in those local markets, and those are different circumstances than what's is being determined by global markets.

Last question?

Last, okay.

I did the first and the last. So yes, one kind of follow-up is kind of where -- and maybe which locations do you see as the most promising for repurposing the oil assets? And would that be for kind of biodiesel biofuel that we've seen before? Or do you see repurposing also for other products? Maybe that's the first part. And then the second in relation to the recent Thailand, if I'm not wrong, I think it was on NGLs. Maybe if you can give us an idea on how do you see like the NGL market, especially in Asia because we've seen recently some weakness and maybe you can explain what's your exposure to pricing of propane and ethane? And if that has any impact on your business et cetera, the whole project?

Maybe I'll start with the second one. So in Thailand, it's an ethane deal, it's a long-term commitment from the local customer, our partner, PTT GC, to commit for imports from the U.S. and I think it's much more of a play of local supply of feedstock that is running out. And they need an alternative to keep things going. And this is, in the long run, mind you, these are long-term 15-year-plus contracts. And there are -- there's infrastructure that is being built in the U.S. to export it. There are ships being built to transport it specifically and then infrastructure for the imports. So this is not necessarily playing what's happening in the market over this quarter, next quarter and last quarter. This is really a long-term strategic decision that PTT GC has taken. We see that actually happening in some markets more. We've seen a smaller, much smaller investment, but also in China, the people are also in charging -- changing from a local feedstock to ethane and the ethane flow is actually moving from the U.S. to places in Asia. The spreads that you're talking about that's much more for us in a market like Singapore where we have an LPG tank where our customers over there are playing much more on like how many cargoes do we bring a year, maybe a cargo more or less because it's attractive to bring it in. They were a little bit more subject to above a certain level to market development. But for these large industrial deals, it's long-term take-or-pay, long-term strategic and I actually see this displays with depletion of local resources and therefore, imports that are required for different products, ethane, but LNG in Australia is a similar play, what I said in China. I see that that's definitely a market that could develop. And then maybe on the first?

Repurposing of existing locations, yes, it happens for indeed bio-based products, but it also happens for other type of products. So you see a lot of appetite for sustainable aviation fuels. You see some for renewable diesel, but you see also, for example, pyrolysis oil. So those are the opportunities as well. So it's a bit of a mix. How that will develop over time is hard to see, but we continuously follow the market and see where the opportunities are. But it could be a wider mix and only biodiesel. Where the markets are? Well, we see it in most of the mature markets. So we see it here in the U.S. We see it in Europe. We see it in Singapore. We haven't seen it too much, for example, in South Africa or Indonesia or Australia, where we also have oil assets, but that will happen over time as well. So definitely, if you -- we do jet fuel, for example, in Sydney, that will be, to a certain extent, sustainable aviation fuels at a certain moment in time. So yes, we follow it, and then we will repurpose locations once the opportunity is there.

With that, we conclude at least this first part. We break for coffee and any refreshments outside over here. We're going to be back 11:15, I would suggest. So a little bit less than half an hour. 11:15 sharp, we start over here with the second batch of presentations. Thank you.

Thank you. [Break]

Thank you, and welcome back to our Capital Markets Day 2025 here in New York. Welcome, everyone back in the room. Great that you all stay for the second part of the presentation. That's always nice. And welcome to everyone back home to listen into the second part. My name is Mark Schmidt. I am responsible, as Dick said earlier this morning, for business development within Vopak. What it actually entails is that myself, together with my team that is both located in Rotterdam and in Singapore are supporting the 9 business units in delivering upon the growth ambitions of the company and the 2 plus 1 that were just highlighted. And I want to talk to you today about some of the questions that actually came up earlier. So hopefully, we get a little bit more depth into those on the business development capabilities that we possess as a company, why we believe that we are capable of delivering on this 2 plus 1. And actually, those are 3 critical capabilities that come to mind that we really want to focus on. First and foremost, our ability to originate strategic locations across the globe. We have a network of 77 terminals, 50 ports, 23 countries. and we are keen to do more. Secondly, our customer base, highly diversified, actually from 2 angles, we believe. It's over 1,000 customers, ranging from state-owned entities to large corporations to commodity traders and to small-scale chemical or biofuel distributors. But also, we store 250 products across the globe, ranging from crude oil to LNG, from biofuels to ammonia. And nowadays, even we started small scale though, but with electrons. And thirdly, our ability to make deals, to make attractive deals at attractive returns, whilst at the same time, ensuring that we service our customers in a safe, efficient and reliable manner. So how are we finding these locations? What are we doing actually? Here you see a map of which we have many in our company where we constantly look at trade flows and trade developments. Here, you see the trade developments that we have seen over the last 5 years. And actually, what we have seen is that trade continues to grow. It has been growing already in the past, and we foresee actually that it will continue to grow. The red line is indeed a trade flow that disappeared to a large extent due to some sanctions. But overall, that is being replaced by other flows, have product coming from further requiring infrastructure to land again. If you then look at the outlook that was also presented by Dick this morning, you see that actually across the board, energy demand will grow by a few global trends such as growing population, growing GDP. And that will actually result in additional demand for energy, which will grow 2%. Oil will actually grow, even the crude oil 1%, we still foresee, plateau maybe throughout the next decade. Gas, LPG, LNG will grow significantly. Biofuels will grow significantly, 6%. And if you then see that new products are also coming into the mix, all that requires infrastructure. And all that requires infrastructure in port locations because if you want to ship liquids in large volumes, you do that via waterways. You go via open sea connections, bring it from one region to another one. Where are we finding then these new locations? These are new locations that we have, but also our existing locations are still quite well set up to capture further growth going forward. If we zoom in on the new locations that we have, we have been delivering throughout the last couple of years. Here, we have delivered a new industrial terminal in China, marking our seventh terminal there and our 18th industrial terminal within our network. We have delivered in India, where together with our partner, Aegis, we now run 12 terminals across the country in 6 ports, like highlighted also by Michel. And with these 2 -- in these 2 fast-growing markets still because they are large and they are still growing, even China is still forecast to grow and companies are still investing there, especially also due to the fact that China wants to be a bit more self-sufficient and wants to be less dependent on imports. We have a #1 position, and we still see ample opportunities to do more in those locations. If you then look where is the growth actually in gas and industrial terminals, where do we foresee that? We are actively working on projects in Australia and South Africa. As highlighted by Dirk earlier today, we're very much dependent on the depleting local reserves that are there. And we see that in other countries coming up as well. But what we have also have seen is massive investments in LNG export capacity, liquefaction capacity in the Middle East and the U.S. that we won't invest in. The capital there is too unbalanced. That liquefaction part versus the tank part is too uneven. So if we then just want to invest in the storage part, people will say, well, you need to carry a bit of the risk of that liquefaction capacity, we can't carry that. So that is why we not play a role there. But with all that product coming to the market, that needs to land somewhere. And especially Southeast Asia seems to be quite a good destination where we expect that more of these products -- projects will happen over the future. So in our models, we forecast that in the next 10, 20 years, 20 to 30 new LNG import terminals will arise in Southeast Asia. If you then look at the industrial terminals, given the fact that the world still is growing, has a growing demand for manufacturing, you see that new industrial terminal complex will probably arise in 2 locations -- in 2 sort of can be segmented in 2 buckets. Those who arise actually in locations that have feedstock advantages like the U.S. and the Middle East, where we have a footprint, but where we would like to do more, but also in the end markets that are still growing, depending on -- and those are predominantly East of Suez in Asia, where still there is a growing population and a growing economy and growing demand for products. If you then look at the accelerate part, so the energy infrastructure to facilitate -- of the infrastructure to facilitate energy transition, we are actually focusing on 3 lines of businesses there at this stage in time. The fourth one, the repurposing, we see a little bit more opportunity towards our new -- sorry, towards our existing facilities. But for the new part, we are focusing, like Dick earlier said, on liquid CO2, where we have a project in Rotterdam, the CO2 next one that is now in the FEED phase and which we hope to further develop in the upcoming period. But we see more opportunities there, Northwest Europe, but also in the OECD countries in Asia, the Singapore, Japan, the South Koreas where people want to pay for this decarbonization. That is liquid CO2 that also then goes to somewhere to locations where there are sinks, Japan, South Korea don't have natural sinks. So they will look for location in the region. So there we could develop import facilities. If you look at ammonia, it's following sort of more or less the same track. It's the regions that can pay for this decarbonization like Northwestern Europe and the OECD countries in Asia, where there is demand for import facilities in that space. We are developing one in Antwerp. We have an open held an open season there, later a bit more about that. And we're looking for other locations to do this. If you look for the export facilities, so where will that ammonia come from, you again look for feedstocks. Nowadays, for feedstocks, the ammonia is predominantly produced from natural gas. But in the future, that might be green. So nowadays, we see particular export projects happening in the U.S. and in the Middle East. But also our Indian footprint is quite interesting in that sense because they are one of the most competitive producers of green ammonia going forward. So we see actually in India with that entrance that we made there, ample opportunity to, in the future, develop export projects that can then go to markets where we also are active on the import side. And the last one are the batteries where we are making our first steps. I will at the end of this presentation, have a slide where we go a little bit deeper into that. But we are focusing there on the markets where there was a large influx of renewables, but also where we are a little bit comfortable on settles, the Netherlands, Belgium, Texas and California. So markets where there is a large renewable influx, 30% of the energy is a minimum from renewables. I think Texas today at 30%, California, 40% the Netherlands 50%. Belgium is a little bit below that. But the large dependency on renewables, the volatility that comes from that is something that we deem to manage via these. If you then look at once we are in the right location, there is always still enough of things to do. So where did we deliver upon? We delivered upon LPG growth. Maria will talk later today a bit deeper -- a bit more on REEF on what we are doing there. Earlier today, what we mentioned was the ethane tank in Thailand. But what we also have delivered is the fourth tank in Gate, building additional import capabilities to bring in more LNG. And we are now with that capability, also highlighted to the fact that someone asked a question on Germany. With those 2 terminals, we actually can foresee the total gas demand of the Netherlands. Would we just be solely independent on imported LNG. But these terminals fulfill a rider a wider role actually within the network, a lot of the gas goes via our terminals into the German market. We have delivered on industrial expansions, both in the Middle East and in China. Jan Bert will tell later today that this industrial location that we have over 500 connections, pipeline connections with our customers. And we keep on doing -- adding them on a continuous basis because once you are there and once you're integrated, it's easier to integrate more. And we have done various investments in low carbon fuels and biofeedstocks, where we already have 25 terminals where we handle these products. Is there more to do at the existing locations? Yes, there is. At this stage in time, on the LNG side, we are trying to further debottleneck our asset in Cartagena in Colombia, where we have a floating LNG terminal. And by further debottlenecking that, we can sell extra capacity into the market. We are developing a fourth jetty at Gate in Rotterdam, building on the momentum on the small-scale momentum that is developing where markets are now bunkering largely oil products. In Rotterdam, we have a large position on LNG bunkering. And with this fourth jetty, we want to capture the growth in that market. And also in the industrial side, there is way more things to do. If you then look at Accelerate, there is tons of stuff to do still on more low carbon fuels. There are more and more products coming into the feedstock mix. And especially at our oil platforms, like highlighted earlier, because with those platforms, we offer services to customers that are predominantly in marine, aviation and petchem feedstocks. And those markets all need to decarbonize, pushed by regulations at different levels. So let's work that out in a further example also tapping into what are the products that can be stored in the future there. So if you look at our key marine locations that we have in our network, those are in Fujaira, Rotterdam and Singapore. And here are the relative market shares that we have in those markets. So we have a significant footprint there. If you look back in the days and for a very long time, the marine market was predominantly served by customers using high sulfur fuel oil. that has been the fuel of choice for many, many years. Then regulations kicked in. So with IMO 2020, low sulfur fuel oil came into the mix, and we invested in that at our existing platforms because there, we had the capabilities to serve these bunker markets to understand what these customers required. So it made sense that at these locations, we started transforming those assets. A new product came into the mix of LNG. We developed it at our Gate facility, adding the third jetty, and now we are building the fourth jetty to capture the growing demand in that space. Fairly recently, we see biofuels entering the mix in that space. So at all the locations that we have now, we have facilitate bioblending into the bunker mix. And even new products are coming into the mix like methanol and ammonia. Those are products that we are fairly well familiar with. Ammonia, we are storing at 6 locations around the globe already. Methanol, we have been storing for over decades at many locations around the world. So it's a product that we are familiar with. It's an end market that we are supplying already. So it makes sense for us that our customers when they talk to us that we say, hey, we have the structures, the contract structures in order to facilitate these markets. We understand the business. We know how to handle these products safely. So that gives us the opportunity to keep on investing and keep on evolving at our existing sites while serving the same customer and the same end markets. And we see similar trends for the aviation sector where the sustainable aviation fuel kicks in and also for the petchem sector where recycling kicks in and pyrolysis all brings in a low-carbon feedstock there. So it's adding those products to the mix, there is blending capabilities necessary. There is new infrastructure necessary, and that all allows us to repurpose and make our assets more resilient towards the future. Michiel, I think you highlighted that's around 10% to 20% that we foresee of our capital landing there at attractive returns. But next to the locations that we all have, the second part of our -- of the capabilities that we believe are truly unique for us is our tremendous network of customers. Whilst we are around for over 400 years, we are in liquid storage for roughly over 100 years. That means that we had 100 years of time to establish relationships and gain the trust of our customers working together with them. Nowadays, we are serving 1,000 customers globally, ranging from, as I said before, from state-owned entities to large corporations and so forth. With a handful of them, 2 or 3 handful of them, we have really deep strategic relations because we know them. We know them very well. And that means that we share earlier on market insights with them, that we share where we want to invest with them and they share similar information with us. And that enables us to often have a first-mover advantage, knowing where these people want to go because they often go to countries where they also don't have the experience because they want to enter markets where they might have not a physical presence, but that based on their supply-demand analysis, they have seen that is quite attractive because there was a short because there's a refinery closed or there is a growing demand and the local industry is not picking up fast enough. We can then be a frontier for them. So that deep relationship helps us actually to develop these new locations. And in some cases, also as highlighted by the Tank example, we are actually ending up with our customer as a joint venture partner, highlighting the deep trust that is there. Second to that is also the network effect. Many of our customers are not storing only at a single location with us or with one product with us. So you see that once they start working with us, we start to do more. And with these larger customers, had the strategic customers, actually, we store roughly around 13 to 15 locations around the world with them. So that is really contributing to the fact that we're working together, understanding each other, appreciating each other and driving the business forward. So with this customer base, we feel quite well set up also to deliver on the future. And then the third part, the deal-making capabilities. Well, in this country, we can say, right, we didn't write a book about it, but we know pretty well what is -- how to get it over the line in this -- over here. First and foremost is because we are long term in the business, we have been serving many businesses. We have future-proofed our commercial capabilities. We understand the dynamics that are going on in the market. We understand the risk reward that we need to manage, but we also what our customer wants us to deliver on the operational side. And thereby, what we can do is learn from what we have learned in one market and apply that to the next market. So if you see there, the LNG contracts that are now into play today form very much the basis for the discussions that we have with customers on ammonia and with hydrogen because we will be integrated, it will be a long time, it will be long term contracts. And a lot of people from the LNG industry moved actually to the hydrogen side of the business. So they have the familiarity with these templates. And that actually allows us to recycle many of the things that we have been doing. The second part is that we are fairly well capable of structuring the contracts in such a manner that they become bankable. I'm happy to have Monique here with whom we are working closely together, who is heading our treasury department, but with the treasury team and the legal team, we are continuously scrutinizing the contracts and developing them in such a manner that they become bankable, actually adding to the flexibility of our financial framework to go out for financing at attractive rates. And the third part is the commercial foundation. Given the long-term relationships that we have with many customers, it also allows you to set up certain ways of doing business with each other and that makes -- that is easy to multiply instead of that a customer needs to go to a competitor of ours and says, hey, can you develop this framework for me, where there is an existing framework in place that we then can use and multiply. So those 3 things actually, the location, the customers and the deal-making capability set up for success. And we have -- now I want to talk to you about 2 cases where we have applied that so that you see a bit the journey that we are making in that respect. So the first one is the Vopak site in Antwerp. In Antwerp, we were a long time already present. We have 3 locations there for a long time. And when the energy transition sort of starting to get pace and when we sort of started to look at what will be required, how much infrastructure will be required coming again out of this analysis, we saw that in Antwerp, we might be a bit short of storage space with the 3 locations that we have. So then we said, let's start looking for land. So we scanned the port. We saw sort of how the waterways were, how the railways run, how the pipelines ran. And we identified a land where one of our large customers, a global commodity trader had a mothball refinery that they didn't intend to start up again. So we approach them. And in the end, we were able, with the support from many of the stakeholders also from the port to strike a deal there and buy over that asset. What we have done since is we have removed the refinery. We have removed the tanks. We are cleaning the site as we speak. We have reached agreement with the local authorities on how to sort of sanitize the soil. And now 2 years in it, I'm happy and proud to say that we are still within budget and everything is going as planned so far, so on time and in budget. But in the meantime, what we also are doing is developing new things. So we launched an open season for ammonia tankers in Antwerp to fulfill the increasing need for the imports of low-carbon product. We launched that last year, and we are now working through it in order to see if we can mature the project further. Secondly, we have signed an agreement with Veoneeo, which is an A.P. Muller venture on producing low carbon of fossil-free plastics, where they want to produce polypropylene for methanol, another chemical that we are pretty well familiar with. And those are just the things that have actually reached the public domain. Below the radar, we are working on a few more things. But the fact that we have 100 hectares of land that is now cleaned purpose for industrial use gives us actually quite an advantageous position going forward in the Port of Antwerp. Then we also -- am trying to get a sense of new markets, the electricity market, where we have made the first steps into the battery storage market. What we have seen is that there is ongoing electrification and increasing imbalances in these energy grids. And for that storage solutions are required. We are dipping our toes in the water, so making our first steps carefully. But when looking at the markets, we see a lot of characteristics that we are seeing in our liquid markets. The storage assets are managing imbalances. The customers active in that space that want to sometimes benefit from that imbalance are the same commodity traders that we come across in other businesses. And what we have seen actually is that location also matters there. You need to have the grid connectivity in order to connect the battery and to be there. Looking at a few of the fundamentals of the market, so far from what we have seen and what we have studied is that the returns are fairly much in line with what we have seen for other long-term businesses that are in that energy transition infrastructure space. So those 6 to 8x EBITDA multiples are achievable. Secondly, the investment sizes are sufficient for us. As a reference here, we set a project of EUR 100 million, but that relates to, of course, the size of the battery. So there you need to think of 100 to 150-megawatt battery for 4 hours, that is roughly around EUR 100 million. And that's a sizable project. The price of lithium ion is, of course, very important there, and that has been going down over the last few years rapidly. So once we need to start buying this, I think timing will become of the essence. But that is something that we need to pick up. And the funding part. So overall, it is the contract structures are set up in such a manner that they are also long-term bankable, helping us again, feeding into the capability that we have already developed over many years and together with our colleagues that we will carry them forward. So also there, you see the business development journey on a new location, but also now on a new market that we are quite excited about. So what I want to leave you behind with is the following. We are well set up to deliver on that 2 plus 1. We have the strategic locations. We have the customer base, and we have the deal-making capabilities to deliver on that 2 plus 1 ambition by 2030. Thank you very much. And I'm happy to introduce Jan Bert, who will focus on the performance part.

Thanks, Martin. Good day, everyone, here in the room and everybody online. Pleasure to be here, and I think super nice that all of you have taken the time to join us today. I'll talk a little bit about our track record in operating all these assets. And in doing so, I will also zoom in on what we think are the unique capabilities that make it possible for us to perform as we do. And with that, I also hope to explain that these capabilities are not only important for our existing business, but actually make us very credible in being able to achieve our growth targets has been explained this morning. But before diving into the performance, just a few dimensions on the size of our organization. You heard the number of terminals 77, 35 million cubic meters of capacity in total, which is about 220 million barrels of storage capacity, spread over 5,500 tanks. 500 industrial pipeline connections with our customers on the back end of these pipelines, we have plants that are running with massive investments. So solid, solid relationships there. 400 births and jetties across the globe. And with these assets, we handle 4 million barrels a day. That's throughput approximately that we do as a company worldwide. So I think we all know the total sort of like oil barrels a day that will consume to give you a bit of an idea of the size of our company. Obviously, we handle more than just oil, but to give you a bit of a perspective there. 750,000 trucks a year, 30,000 ships, close to 30,000 railcars. Impressive numbers, but how good are we at operating all of this? And I'll zoom in on a few, for us, important performance areas, asset management, our commercial occupancy and what customers think of us, our greenhouse gas emissions, but I'll start with our safety performance. Dick touched upon it earlier, key in our industry. But first and foremost, key to ourselves. We want our people that work for us, including the contractors on our terminals to go home safely every day. Strong intrinsic motivation within our company shared across all our employees to make sure that we operate safely. We don't do harm. We fundamentally believe that every incident can be prevented. But safety is also good for business. And some of you know this has been saying already for quite a few years. If you think safety is expensive, try an accident. We are handling enormous volumes of hazardous materials, right? We're not in the business of being 99% safe. We have to be an organization that's truly reliable, not only to make sure that people go home safely at the end of the day, but also to make sure that customers do trust us. That authorities trust us. Can you imagine storing ammonia? We all know that's a toxic material. You want to deal with companies that have a track record in doing that in a safe manner. But I would say also towards our investors. Your license to operate as a company is at stake if you don't perform at a very, very high safety performance level. If you look at our performance, and that's on the graph, you see trending down on personal safety, and you see it trending down in process safety. There's two indicators that are used to benchmark companies also. One by OSHA, one by API on personal safety, that's the Department of Labor in the United States. They have a way to actually compare companies in that sense by measuring it in what we call a total incident rate. That's every incident per 200,000 man-hours worked. And our performance in '24 of 0.21 here is actually outperforming our competition, and very much in line with our customer base. And if you have a sense of what this means. If our average terminal is over 100 people. It means one personal injury in 5 years. That's what 0.21 means. And a personal injury that counts here is also a sprayed ankle when somebody steps off his bike. And so it's a small incidents are part of this as well. So having a one and 5-year on average for every terminal, that's sort of like the level that we're performing today. And if you do that for process safety, it's even once every 12.5 years, for a spill that could take place at a terminal. So this is not 99% point safe. This is 99.9% and a few 9s after that. That's a sort of like robustness that you need to have in place in order to be able to get to these numbers. And the chart actually indicates how we perform to the outside world. Something that motivations intrinsically, but also something that we're proud of. And it really sort of like shows us who we are. A few words on asset management performance. There's a significant cash out. We have a capital-intense business. So there's a huge cash out when we invest. But over the years, to maintain these assets in a decent way, also to make sure we have excellent process safety performance, by the way. But to maintain it over the years, that cash out is significant. And what is on this chart? It's not only our sustaining CapEx, but also the operational cost and maintenance. Depending on how this is accounted for, the total amount actually here is set against the replacement asset value. And that's a benchmark that you could use to compare how much we are spending compared to other companies that are of a similar nature. And you see 3 lines in here based on McKinsey data that benchmarks that a little bit, underperforming if you spend around 5%, well run around 3.5% and best-in-class somewhere around 2%. You see our performance has improved in recent years significantly. So we were about 3%. We are now at 2% of our replacement value. That compares well to the benchmark. Noteworthy here is that part of our sustaining our operating CapEx is also what we need to invest because of new regulatory requirements. And that is not the same in the whole world. There's countries within our network where these regulatory requirements are relatively limited. There's also countries where that's not the case. And one of the countries where the regulatory framework is amongst the strictest is the Netherlands. A second country where that's the case, surprise to some is China. A lot of that has to do with emission control. The demand in some of these countries are significantly higher than other countries. And for us to continue to operate, we have to invest in these emission control measures. There's no choice. It's part of our license to operate. In a country like the Netherlands, this could be 1 percentage point of the total 3% that we are spending. A country like the United States, country like Singapore, that's almost close to 0. So it also means that if you benchmark our performance in this area, for instance, with U.S. midstream, you have to correct for this anomaly. What you do see, although on this chart is that this license to operate is regulatory sustaining CapEx we have to spend actually has been trending down in recent years. So a few very, very big investments have taken place, especially in the Netherlands. And we're getting a little bit to the end of that because of the regulation that took into affect. It doesn't mean that no new regulation can come up again. That has to make us investing. But in the outlook right now, we will see a little bit of a downward trend in that area. Then our performance with regard to rented capacity. You saw the 85% to 93% in our commercial occupancy level. That's obviously a good number to be at. But I'd like to add to that also our own performance on reducing our out-of-service capacity. And there, you see an interesting line that drops the 5% out of service that we had in 2019 to below 2% in the year 2024. And that basically means that in these years, we had 3% extra available to customers, right? And if you -- so you have to take a look at those numbers almost at the same time. If you only have 2% out of service capacity, you're able to rent up 98%, right? If -- you look at the years before, we only had 95%. So as a percentage uptick that we have in revenue possibilities, yes, this is material. We are pretty convinced that we're going to be able to run around this 2% to max 3% out of service capacity in the years to come. And that shows a little bit of upside that we have, right? Because all that revenue that comes from the extra capacity available almost goes straight to our bottom line. In the third graph, also something to be very proud of. By the way, I realize that I talk about all this good stuff, but I've been working for this company for so many years, and I really like it, right? So if I'm maybe a bit over the top, then apologies. But something I'm proud of, too, is how customers actually value our services. We have an NPS score of 80 in the year 2024. Some of you are familiar with NPS, some of you are not. If I explain it in a simple manner, it is the question, are you recommending Vopak to a good friend? Would you recommend Vopak? And people ask that question on the scale -- answer that question on the scale from 1 to 10. If you're scored at 9, 10, you're a sponsor. You're a promoter. If you score 1 to 6, you don't really like it. If you're 7, 8, you're like passive. You don't really care. It's like when you go to a restaurant, right? Was it fantastic? Was it 7? Probably you won't go back next time, right? If somebody really forces you, you want to, but if it is your pick, you wouldn't go. Only the 9s and the 10s are promoters. And the NPS score is calculated by the percentage promoters, 9s and 10s, subtracted by the percentage detractors to minus 1 -- sorry, the 1 to 6s. So if we score an NPS of 80, it means that the biggest majority of our customers on that question actually give us a 9 or a 10. And if you compare that to the benchmark for the logistics industry, that its at 40. We score 80. We're on track to deliver our target to reduce greenhouse gas emissions, 43% since year 2021. That's the moment in the year '22, we actually set that target to achieve 30% reduction by the end of this decade. We're already at 43%, and that actually allows us also room for growth because this is not a relative target. We didn't come up with the greenhouse gas intensity target. We said we will, in absolute terms, reduce our target of 30%. And that's on top of the increased growth ambition that we have already said, that actually means that in our existing business, we need to reduce by 60%. Energy efficiency, procuring green electricity, making sure that our growth projects from our greenhouse gas emissions are minimized. That's what we're going to have to do. So on a number of dimensions, I've just been able to share with you that our track record has been pretty decent. And whenever we can benchmark it to the outside world, we look favorable. The question is, I think, how we were able to do so? What is the reason that we have been able to perform? And in my opinion, that's because we built something unique in our company, something that is also sustainably competitive. That's giving us an advantage not only in our existing business, but it's also a reason why partners want to work with us in new projects. And we call that the Vopak Way. I will briefly touch upon 10 interrelated ingredients, which I think together in their relationship actually gives us competitive advantage. We don't have patents, right? We don't have molecules, but we have a special source. The technical depth and technical width to run terminals is actually quite impressive. If you drive by a port and you see a tank, we need people that understand corrosion. We need people that understand how to work with minus 162 degrees LNG terminals. We need people that understand pumps. We need terminals that understand automation. We need people that understand coating. We need people that understand -- and I can go in every engineering area they do understand all that. And at the same time, I gave you the example with safety performance. We have an average terminal on which we have 100 people. If you have 100 people, of which the majority is loading trucks and loading vessels, how do you organize for that technical depth and technical width, right? The network that we have in place, the experience that we have is actually providing us here with a competitive advantage. Because if you're a small player in this, how is it possible that you know this all? Let me talk you through the stand ingredients. The first thing is we have a whole set of global standards, 80 standards. Standards on tank design. Standards on static electricity, standard on our safety management system. All on the shelf for our existing business and a very good starting point for our new projects for our partners also. Technical specs. If we need to buy a valve, we need to buy a pump, if we need to buy an actuator. In the past, we were dependent on suppliers without having specs ourselves getting delivered what they thought was necessary for us. In the meantime, that's all defined in our organization. In recent years, we upgraded our IT/OT architecture, and I like the analysis from a [indiscernible] type setup to a [indiscernible] layered structure, which means that you can add applications that you can get to your data in a decent manner. That's all in place right now. Our core processes have been blueprinted whether this is maintenance, whether this from the moment a truck arrives until it sends out, from the moment we receive an order until we sell the invoice. All these processes have been blueprinted. And on top, we built a digital layer with applications that, again, is readily accessible for any new terminal. If we were to build a new LNG terminal in South Africa, we would work with a local partner. It is very likely that these partners are not operating an LNG terminal today. Us having this ability with the applications on top, makes us an attractive partner, right? A whole set of tools and programs to improve performance continuously an onboarding and learning capability, which is strong, again, this 100 people terminal. If we employ a new maintenance manager [indiscernible] Brazil, how do we get him, or her, to hit the ground running, right, in the specifics of our industry. The thing that I think here is most important is actually the strength of our network. Our collaborative culture are 5,500-plus colleagues over the world that are able to work together having communities of experts. If I'm a terminal manager in Ningbo in China, and I come across a certain problem, it's very likely that for me, this is the first time. If we have 78 terminals, it is, however, very like very -- you can reasonably expect that it probably happened already somewhere else in the world. So learning at the speed of 78, a phrase I often use, 78 terminals, I don't have to make the mistakes myself, right? I don't have to invent the wheel every time. I can use the best practice somewhere else. So the collaborative culture that we have as a company, in combination with the 78 terminals and the 5,500 colleagues actually means that, that strength of that network is actually quite unique. A clear set of KPIs on top to measure performance and data analytics and AI layer on top, which is evolving in order to make sure that we continue this performance that we have shown in recent years. So to close off at the end of my presentation, our business really requires a proven track record and even more so in the future than it did in the past. And ammonia is a fantastic example. The ability and the track record to deal with ammonia is an entry ticket to develop a business -- to develop a project that involves ammonia. The same for LNG. The same for LPG. We know how to run that well from a safety, from a service and from a financial perspective. And as I said, I think it's a convincing argument why we can also be successful in landing these growth projects that we talked to you earlier about. Thank you very much. I'd like to ask Maria to take over. Maria?

Thank you. It's nice to be able to speak with all of you who are here in New York as well as all the folks who may be online in the webcast. I'm Maria Cilliberti, the President of Vopak USA and Canada. And many of us who see a gentleman on TV would always say America first, but in this case, it's America last, as your last presenter today. So hopefully, maybe it's the best for last, but I'll leave that judgment to you. So let me share what's happening in the U.S. and Canada business unit. The performance of the North America business unit has improved with solid operating cash returns of over 15% as well as our occupancy rates, you've heard this from many presenters today, we're actually at 96% occupancy. Strategic significant investments are already underway with almost EUR 500 million of capital committed to projects in both the gas, which we'll talk about REEF, the industrial terminals business, but also in infrastructure for new energies. And we are well positioned for growth at both our existing locations as well as new locations in North America. If we look at the network we have in the U.S. and Canada, it's really quite well diversified, going across the United States Gulf Coast to the United States West Coast and up to the Canadian Pacific Northwest. In the U.S. Gulf Coast, starting in the Lower Mississippi River, we have terminals there that are serving a key petrochemical industry cluster, which then feeds it up into the Midwest. In the U.S. Gulf Coast, over in Texas, where we have many assets, we actually have two that are on the Houston Ship Channel, which is the busiest port with regards to tonnage out the door and in the door. So we are in a very strategic location. And then continuing on the West Coast -- Yes, -- is this...

It's really like...

Is it...

I'm not sure what it is...

Super. That's even okay. Great, then I don't have to worry about taking this off. Perfect. Is this okay for everybody? Thank you because it was -- I also heard it. I don't know if it was -- anyway. Thank you for your patience on that. But let me continue, though with the West Coast, which is actually a fantastic place to be. And we have 2 terminals on the West Coast, one in Los Angeles and one in Long Beach, which serves the key markets at a very key location. And then, of course, you've heard a little bit about it, but in the Pacific Northwest of Canada, we have one terminal already today existing, and we have one being developed, which I'll speak more to. These terminals are serving the Asian markets. So the U.S. and Canada business unit is already delivering on the corporate strategy of improve, grow and accelerate. And let me take it step by step. On the improved side, over the last 3 years, we have improved the -- our EBITDA 29% to EUR 184 million last year. We've also improved our operating cash return over 5 percentage basis points. And as I mentioned at the beginning, our occupancy has gone from 93% 4 years ago to now 96%. Our major investments are underway on the growth category with our REEF in the LPG infrastructure, which I'll speak more to, but also in the industrial terminal space where we have pipeline connectivity to customers, particularly I want to highlight later in Freeport, Texas. And we have our first major proof points in new energies and infrastructure there with the rebuilding of -- I'm sorry, repurposing of our assets in Los Angeles and also underway in Deer Park, which I'll talk to a little bit here as well. And then the United States actually is the company's first investment in our storage of electricity with our battery energy storage systems also in Texas, but actually, there are 2 systems we've invested in with a joint venture partner. The portfolio of the U.S. and Canada has been actively managed. And actually, some of our improvement is a reflection of that, the improvement I spoke of earlier, the 29% on EBITDA and the OCR 5.5 percentage points. Specifically, we have divested in the oil distribution terminals in Canada, and you can see that here on the chart in the orange at the bottom. We also divested a chemical distribution terminal in Savannah, Georgia. Those proceeds are what is funding the investments in growth, whether that's the gas and industrial terminals but also new energy infrastructure. And I would like to just share with you the recent repurposing that's going on now in Deer Park. I think you've heard about Los Angeles and the sustainable aviation fuel and the renewable feedstocks. But let me talk a little bit about what's going on in Deer Park. We are repurposing assets there as well for vegetable oils. We've already repurposed some of the tanks. It's in total, 78,000 cubic meters of storage, 28,000 cubic meters are already been commissioned. And this year, we will complete that with another 47,000 cubic meters being in commission. Total between these 2 projects between Los Angeles as well as our Deer Park repurposing in the growth space, it's EUR 58 million. And this is contributing to our improved results, as I mentioned at the beginning. Looking on a large scale project, which is a very exciting project, our LPG project in Western Canada, this is a real proof point, the Ridley Island energy export facility. The ability for Vopak to manage this process from start to finish. This is a very long process and very involved all the way from originating the location deciding we want to be there based on product insights, but then working with authorities, whether it's support authorities or it's the department of fisheries. And then working also with our partner and in this case, a joint venture partner and clients to take the product in the Asian markets. But not to be forgotten is all the stakeholders, the communities, right, the local community in the port of Prince Rupert, along with the First Nations, working with them to get their endorsement that we could proceed with the project. All of that has been done over many, many years with consistency by Vopak. And now we are in the execution phase. RIEEF, the Ridley Island Energy Export Facility will be in commission by the end of 2026. But I want to share with you, this is just the beginning. This is just the initial phase. We see expansion opportunities, and we're already in discussion on that. But I'd like to now also segue still in growth around the industrial terminals. We are pipeline connected to many, many customers across the U.S. and Canada business. And in particular, our Vopak IIA joint venture where we have 3 terminals, one in Texas and 2 in Louisiana. Here, over the -- we are sitting inside existing industrial manufacturing facility, which is quite different because it was already there, and it was a carve-out, as you may recall. We are already investing in multiple small projects reactivating tanks that were not in service from the prior owner, adding modalities as well as pipeline connections to processes of our clients inside that industrial parks. However, we have a significant investment underway as we speak, and it's in Freeport. That represents approximately EUR 37 million of CapEx. And here, we are connecting with a process that exists already for years. And I want to share with you, and I loved how Jan Bert was talking about our capabilities, being inside an existing industrial facility, which I used to spend my life as a producer. It is a lot of skills that have been learned that are not the same as operating outside the fence line even if you have a pipeline between. When you're inside the fence line, there's new challenges. But I'm very happy and proud to say that the Vopak organization is gaining new skills and know-how and bringing that as an advantage for other clients, whether they're in that industrial park or future parks that are already existing that makes Vopak the partner of choice in such settings. And there is a number of momentum -- a lot of momentum in the United States, particularly in the Gulf Coast with regards to the petchems, should we all look at more carve-outs. And that unique skill set is very valuable. Yes, it's brought challenges, but our learnings is tremendous. And I want to say, even though you may be thinking these assets are at 96% utilization or capacity, we have more land, particularly in this case with Vopak IIA terminals. We have 40 acres of extra land, and we have some tanks still to put into service. So more growth to come in this space. Of course, we all wanted to go faster, but it's on its way. And I want to just switch over to the Accelerate pillar and the new energies. We -- capturing new energy opportunities is paramount. And we've completed the huge project over in Los Angeles, of which we've repurposed 150,000 cubic meters of capacity and switched it over to sustainable aviation fuel and renewable diesel. So you -- hopefully, you see we are evolving with the markets. And now we are entering into new space, as Maarten had mentioned, in the storage of electricity. And we've taken steps now with an investment in Houston with 2 battery energy storage systems. This is short-term storage [ hours ] lithium-ion technology. Now this is relatively speaking, small in scale, but it's a phenomenal opportunity for us to develop our capabilities, understand the lifetime of a number of assets tied with battery energy storage systems. All meanwhile, while employing similar contracts, long-term contracts with clients under the conditions you would see in our normal business with gas and industrial. And the good thing here is we are in the grid, and that learning was not something I would take for granted. Being in the grid in the case in Texas, ERCOT, it's very important to be able to have that access. It's similar to our business at marine, it's location, location, location. So I would like to just close by saying the performance of the North America business has improved with solid operating cash returns and increased occupancy rates. Several significant investments are underway for growth as well in our gas and industrial terminal business, but also infrastructure for new energies. And we are well positioned for future growth, whether it's at existing locations or new locations in North America. And I want to thank you.

It's going to be busy up here because we are the 5 of us. So please come on over here, guys, so we can organize ourselves. We have a few questions that came earlier also from the webcast.

I'm sure you're going to give that to us in a second for Jon. Before we do that, we probably first go and ask for any questions that you might have given the presentations from Maarten, Jan Bert and Maria just now. So please. Who can I give the mic? Can we get the mic? [ Costas ] again.

Let's not break tradition here. So when I look at Slide 64, where I see the locations of North America. I guess 1 question around the kind of the Texas part with so much LNG that is coming on stream on the regas side around [ 27 ]. Do you see more opportunities that you can capture on the storage side? Do you see more runway for growth there. Then on RIEEF, I think first phase LPG. We know that Canada now is pushing for LNG exports on the country. Do you see like the second phase possible for LNG, I guess? Any opportunities there? And then if I go to the last slide, you showed that battery energy storage in Texas. Can you give us a bit more color on how that works? Is it directly with like a renewable operator? How does that contract work? Just a bit to understand how the business case or your underwriting, I guess, or how do you think about that?

Maybe just to make sure that we get the right people answering it. So although it is a question on Texas, the first 1 on LNG, Maarten, maybe you can say a few words on LNG export. Maria, you can take the reform and say a few words on the batteries also complemented by Maarten. Yes.

So first -- so on the LNG export part, right? And there was tremendous liquefaction coming on stream in the Gulf Coast. What we see is that those projects are often developed by developer with liquefaction and the terminal or servicing 1 another. And they wrap that then with the project financing around it. If people read that, that means that you need to start giving cross guarantees if you sort of unravel that part. If you look at sort of the CapEx that goes into the liquefaction part versus the CapEx that goes into the terminal, that is a factor 10 to 20. So we can't carry that weight. So that is why there is at this stage in time, limited opportunities for us to invest in export facilities for LNG. So at this stage in time, we are not part of those investments, neither in the Gulf Coast, neither in the Middle East.

And just speaking here with the discussion on the Ridley Island Energy Facility. And is there an opportunity with LNG. I think a lot of what you just answered fits as well in Canada -- in Western Canada. But I would also say, in Western Canada, with the infrastructure being put in place, the opportunity to leverage that infrastructure also is our intent and basically common infrastructure. So I would expect we're going to do more expansion in regards to more LPG potentially, but also other chemicals that are in the area. So that's really the intent with the expansions foresight, the future with regards to the Ridley Island Energy Facility location. And then your question with regards to BES, the battery energy storage. We are right now in those discussions with some offtakers, yes, renewable energies is in the mix for sure. And getting through the permitting process and the certification by the utility agency has taken quite some time, but we have not closed all those deals, but they look very similar in that setup as a long-term arrangement.

Quirijn Mulder from ING. For Bert Jan, a question back, sorry. It isn't the first time.

Sorry, sorry.

With regard to the productivity. One of the most interesting productivity gains you can make is, let me say, to have the ships in and out very fast that -- it's very attractive. And I thought we would discuss that in your presentation, but I haven't heard anything about it. So that's my first question. And my second question may be somewhat more difficult. We have new management since 2022 -- senior management since 2022. Can you give me or describe some differences there.

So we need the room. I won't even go that later. -- that's okay. I guess should. On the first question, on the ship turnarounds, we had to make a selection given time. So there's a whole set of key performance indicators, which we look at to see how -- whether we're managing our business as well. And indeed, towards our customers, having good ship turnaround times, having load emerge as a result is an important indicator. Also there, I think we are driving performance in the right direction. It just didn't make it in the presentation because of time. On the new senior management, that's a very good question. That's a very, very good question. And I think with senior management, you mean the Executive Board because I do believe that -- it's also us and some of our other colleagues are part of senior management that collaborative spirit between our Executive Board and the rest of the organization is super strong. And it is one team. And I think, yes, Performance here speaks for itself. I think we've had a few very, very good years, and that was only possible, I think, because of the leadership of our organization. But what did you expect me to say on this question in the first place.

Thijs Berkelder from ABN AMRO ODDO BHF. First question for Jan Bert. On your slide, what was it 58%, your Net Promoter Score, going up, going up, going up. As an economist I tend to adjust your prices are too low as your clients are so happy. Yes, you have huge upside potential in your pricing. So what can we expect there to happen? Then the hot potato in the room, of course, the Trump government. And what can be expected from a Vopak perspective there to happen in the U.S., whether you preparing for in terms of scenarios. Third question also related to geopolitical stress in Europe. Do you see increased activity in terms of cyber-attacks your facilities and/or maybe physical attempts to disturb your operations.

Let me -- the first 1 is for Jan Bert. The Trump one, I will say a few things. If you can probably say a few things also on cyber and what we see in that particular area. Jan Bert.

Upside of the NPS. I think first and foremost, RMPS is a super good score to land new projects. I think that's where this is indeed excellent. If you dissect our NPS and we look at the different stakeholder groups, those with whom we negotiate the rates actually scores the lowest. They actually pull it down. And those with whom we work with in our day-to-day operations, they score us even above 80 because, obviously, we know to who we send out the NPS survey. Whether our rates have upside potential, I think that's also on the back of alternatives. So having high utilization is important here. Having a high NPS is important, being in the right place is important. So I think if markets are favorable, yes, there is this upside. And this was discussed, I think, earlier today. Without that high NPS you would not have that chance. So yes, it's a good starting point. Maybe that has an answer.

We have to earn it every year. So you start with 0. It's not that you can carry the 80 of last year into the -- so you have to basically earn the loyalty of your customer every single day that you start performing in the new year. Maybe on the term side, there's a lot that we can discuss on it. I think a few things to put it into perspective. First, we are in the long-term business. So our investments, our contracts, our assets on the ground have a long-term view on the markets that we want to play and the logic that is behind it from us to invest. I think that's one to keep in mind. So anything that would happen in the shorter-term. might have an impact. But in terms of our longer-term trajectory where we see things trending towards is not very subject to what happens in the shorter-term. I think the second thing to put into perspective is the potential impact that it has on your existing portfolio the way you run it today. And then separate that from the growth ambitions that we have. Uncertainty, if you look at the existing portfolio uncertainty, is never a very positive element in terms of making business decisions going forward. And that's what you hear in the business community, loud and clear that the level of unpredictability in the current administration is what puts people off. I think if you translate that into what that means for demand for storage, generally speaking, uncertainty needs to quite a bit of volatility. It leads to stocking up at locations where you have trust. So you might, at a high level, even think that might be potentially good news for demand for storage in certain locations. Then your question is, do you see that already? It's way too early. We don't see -- if we see any changes in flows, that will take time before they actually settle in. I think the other element to keep in mind and put the U.S. as an entity into perspective, we have 7 terminals in the U.S. that we operate out of the 77 that we have in total. Now it's an important part of our business, but that's more or less the main capacity that we have. By and large, if you look at [ VEH ] and if you look at Corpus Christi and if you look at [ VH ] long-term contracts, no matter whether that's import or exports, that's going to more or less continue in a very natural way. But if you take a place like Deer Park, I think it's very important to realize that the level inbound material that is coming into Deer Park, 90% is domestic. 90% is domestic production in the U.S. that is being shipped inbound into Deer Park. Yes, there's going to be 40%, 45% that's being exported outside of the country that goes to Brazil that goes to Mexico, goes to other places that might be subject to retaliation if you go for the tariff war that still remains to be seen how that's going to play out. And then maybe the only last portion of the way to look at it, that's towards the future growth. I think if you listen to the story that we've said this morning that we shared with you industrial capacity East of Suez, gas, LNG, LPG East of Suez. Yes, it's easy to say and I gave it as an answer earlier as well when I got the question about Russian gas potentially flowing back. Even the tariffs, it doesn't solve an even hesitation, I would say, in big investment decisions that people or companies are making at this moment, simply because of the fact that you don't know exactly where the world is trending to. That doesn't solve the LNG import problem that South Africa has because of blackouts. That doesn't solve the lack of gas that is coming from the shelf outside of the coast of Melbourne, that is the main driver for potential LNG terminal in Melbourne. So I'm not -- it's not all doom and gloom for us, but obviously, we're carefully watching. We're trying to see how that develops over time. And yes, if it has an economic impact for a global economy and puts GDP numbers under serious pressure. And as a result, inflation and interest is subject to a lot of pressure, then we be come into a different territory, which we also should monitor at that time. But by and large, the way we look at it now, monitoring, gives opportunities, and we need to stay very close to it.

Then the cybersecurity. Well, definitely for ourselves, it's important to focus hard on the cybersecurity because it is an ongoing threat and effectively increasing threat in the world for our customers, but also from a government point of view, in many locations, we are considered critical infrastructure. We have doubled the team effectively last year to focus on cybersecurity, put extra money at work to make sure that we are doing the right things. We do dry runs in many locations where it's really vital to keep the -- both the IT but also the OT infrastructure up and running. Yes, these are important steps, and we have also decided last year to do an external check. So we have had all the terminals are being externally checked now by a reputable party who gives us effectively a different source of data? Are we assessing the cybersecurity rigs properly ourselves? Or do we see any weakness areas. We have identified a few areas where we still need to improve, working hard on that, so have prepared an action plan for that, making sure that in the coming years, we also closed that gap, and -- but this is a continuous journey. So this is not over, and it's -- ain't going to be over because with AI, the number of security attacks or cybersecurity attacks is cyber-attacks is improving -- increasing quite rapidly.

Christoph.

I was just wondering in Antwerp are you still interested in potentially being involved in cracking the ammonia? Or would it be only storage is cracking ammonia, something you can make a difference or you can be competitive? And then regarding the IMO strategy on greenhouse gas emissions, what's your expectation of the outcome of the MEPC meetings this year? Do you think it will be -- have they will come up with ambitious targets? Or will they water down ambitions? And when do you think the shipping industry will be ready to use like ammonia properly as a propulsion fuel?

Maybe on cracking, you want to say a few words, Maarten, and then also give it a start on greenhouse gas and bunkering?

Yes. No. So on the ammonia part, we are solely interested in the storage part of it. We won't enter into cracking. We don't have that IP. We don't have that capability today, where we work together with people who have that very much so. But we will stick to our core as we are today in developing that terminal infrastructure, ensuring that ammonia can land safety in the port of Antwerp and then at a certain battery limit, transfers a flange and then goes to the cracking facility. So we are in close contact with all the developers of those facilities, trying to understand what they need, trying to understand what the reliability is here because there will be dependency on one another, but at this stage in time, we don't see the necessity to invest in that.

Bunkering.

Bunkering. Yes, there is a bit looking in the crystal ball, unfortunately. So you won't get a very clear answer for me. But what I can say and what I tried to say with the story that we just had, is that whatever fuel comes in the end, bunkering will happen in ports, and we are at locations where that bunkering will take place. So whatever fuel product goes into the mix, infrastructure will be required for that. And what I think is fairly important to also understand is that the energy density of the new products being used in that energy mix as a shipping fuel, are way lower so you will need more volume to go that same kilometer then based on the products that are being used today. So even if there are coming new products into the mix, probably we even need to build more infrastructure to facilitate those markets.

I think maybe to add a few things on ammonia because that's where a lot of discussions on ammonia bunkering -- ammonia for bunkering has talked about and remains to be seen later in IMO this year starts to give their directions on it. Our view is that it's going to be for a long period of time, a mix of a lot of different fuels that are going to be used. But if you look at it from an ammonia perspective, it's important to realize that the ports that Maarten just spoke about, so let's say, Fujairah, Singapore or Singapore Strait, Rotterdam. Currently, bunkering is taking place simply by small little vessels, barges, picking up product at a terminal like ours and then physically going around in a port, hooking up with a hose, 2 big vessels to actually start bunkering that. People sometimes forget about the manual and the labor-intensive nature of that. It's not that you have large container vessels that sit at the dock and that basically get supplied by hard pipe product connections to actually do the bunkering, which basically means, can you imagine in the port of Singapore, 40 -- what is it hundreds of vessels that are going to be bunkered with ammonia with small little barges that goes through the port of Singapore, hooking up hoses going back and forth. I think that's a serious safety concern that will exist in a lot of those locations. And therefore, it's been talked about much more when you talk about point-to-point pipe of connections. So it's a ship from Australia that goes back and forth to the same port in China. And it's like 100 times a year, there you could potentially think, but that's in the total mix of bunker fuels, that's a different proportion, I think, so you have to also look at the practical impact of what can be done and what cannot be done in terms of physical bunkering of ships.

John Mackay, Goldman Sachs. Thanks again. This might be a quick one, but I just wanted to touch on it. U.S. and Canada right now, 15% of EBITDA. Do you have a target or a general framework of where that could go from here? And then maybe specifically, we kind of know what RIEEF looks like touched on batteries, but it sounds, at least from an EBITDA perspective, good return, but smaller right now. So what would those bigger items be to kind of change that mix?

Do you want to say something on the first one?

Sure. I think -- I don't know if it's on. I don't know that we have a percentage of the mix in total for the company by 2030. I will tell you we have a very aggressive growth plan going on at the division or the business unit, I should say, better English and there is a number of what we call mega projects in the list. But I don't think we are at a state that we have some sort of goal that the U.S. and Canada represents from 15% to some other percent. But there is aggressive goals as well as a lot of opportunity, particularly in this part of the country where this part of the world, I should say. So without getting into too much detail, unless you would like me to, I'd be happy to, but I'm not sure -- I just would say we have a very aggressive program underway in the business unit for growth.

I think John is [indiscernible] Yes, go ahead.

Yes, maybe a few words on that because if you look at what we have committed so far, a large chunk grows into the U.S. and Canada. So that's well above the 15% capital employed we have. So it's hard to exactly tell what is -- where is the rest going to land, depending on the funnel, but you may expect, well, at least it's going to be 15% going forward because already close to 30%, 35% of our existing commitment sits in the U.S. and Canada. So if we continue on the journey, which, yes could happen, could also not happen depending on where we land the projects yet, then obviously, the capital employed sitting in the U.S. and Canada will grow beyond the 15% we have today.

Maybe just one more specific on that understand it might be commercial sensitivities I'm not talking about the next projects, but maybe just frame up like the products, right? Is it LPG side, chems.

I mean I'd be happy to say so we have actually a plan behind and it really fits in the grow and accelerate, let me say, so it's gases and industrial terminals heavy, which is, obviously, it's primarily in the state side, I would call it petchems. And then on the new energies infrastructure, there's the pillars of which I think Dick and others have shared right? Of course, electric battery storage is one of those, but also low carbon ammonia is in the mix. And at this point, we don't have as much opportunity for holding intermittent storage of liquefied CO2, but that is even being explored in the U.S. because there are certain locations where even though we have many places where it could go into CCS as a region that's not all aggregated. And so there is some exploration going on even in that space, what I would call the new energies. But heavy, which I would say there's the low carbon ammonia activities along with battery energy storage. But more so, if I had to put numbers to it, I'd say there's more 2/3 on the growth, 1/3 on the accelerate, which exactly fits the 2 plus 1, very much aligned.

We can go with the webcast.

Maybe Jeremy, sorry. [indiscernible] has a question and then we go for the questions that came from the web.

Jeremy Kincaid Financial Kempen. Maarten, you talked about 20 to 30, I think, LNG import terminals potentially in Southeast Asia. I was just wondering if you could provide some context around who might be the biggest competition in developing out those potential assets in that region? And then the second question, just on these LNG projects in South Australia and -- sorry, Victoria, Australia and South Africa. You've made a total good story around how those markets that need this product, there's depleting resources and load shedding, et cetera. So what would be the biggest hurdles to get those projects to FID?

Yes. So I do a reversal. So in the end, has sort of countries needed, but the countries also can decide to postpone it and to wait for it. So in the end, someone will need to sign up for it, need to commit capital, enable for us to build that infrastructure. If you look in South Africa, for example, today, we can build a terminal, but where is the gas then going to go? There is no power plant yet connected to it, had the connectivity to the Hinterland gas grid, where the gas is being consumed in the industrial cluster there is a little bit around Secunda and Sasolburg. Sasol is a large industrial user of gas. Those connections are not in place. So that all needs to fall in place plus the regulatory environment before we really can take the FID there. And that similar hurdles are sort of in Australia coming along. So I had the regulatory environment needs also to shape up because many of these countries had these resources for many years themselves. So they need to change also their legislation and their regulations in order to facilitate new energy sources into the mix. So that is something that we coming more into the gas space are also getting more confronted with the political elements over all. So does that answer your question to that extent? And then the other one was on -- the LNG infrastructure. Yes, so if you look at LNG competition around the world, we are sort of the largest independent operator of LNG assets. So competition is often very much from local developers that develop projects because you need again to have a knowledge of the local lay of the land. You have a group of companies that provides infrastructure solution. The FSRU providers but they are often being chartered in. So we don't deem that real competition because we at locations where we are chartering also these vessels here. So we have, at this stage in time, handful of floating locations around the world. So we are mainly competing there with local developers.

I made 2 additional questions.

From management again or...

No, no, no. So speaking correctly. So Jan Bert, maybe you gave your -- on Page 58, you gave the out-of-service minus 2%. Can you give an idea what happens when the utilization rate goes down? Is there any connection between them and between the utilization or occupancy as you call it, and, let me say, out of services. And a question for Maria on the use and ship channel and the ambitions with regard to the ammonia plants there because I think it was -- if we speak about the mega project, I think that's one of them. Maybe you can update us on that situation.

There is some correlation between occupancy rate and out of service. Obviously, if a terminal is if market demand is low, you want to optimize for cost on your out-of-service capacity. If the market demand is high, you probably want to optimize for revenue. So we want to be smart about it. But there's an element in out-of-service capacity also that this is sometimes regulatory driven. You need to take tanks out of service in order to be able to operate in the first -- to be allowed to operate in the first place. So yes, there is some correlation. You want to optimize for cost or you want to optimize for revenue. But there's also an element here that certain tanks by a certain time, have to be taken out of service. And that could be because of the fact that you have a risk-based inspection scheme that tells you, you need to take it out of service or it could be that in a certain country, there's just clear regulation, you can only have the tank and service for so many years. So some correlation, but not 100%.

Maria, do you want to say something on the ammonia.

Very happy. We're very engaged. And actually, there's a number of projects in discussion some, of course, in the Houston Ship Channel, one in particular I'll speak to. I would say that, first of all, the cost economics versus other countries, there is very favorable advantages producing and taking it export-wise. With respect to the one we've been public about, which is a collaboration with actually 4 legal entities. That program is very much moving forward. We are actually, together with these different partners looking at value engineering that program, and we are in -- under letters of intent that are extended to continue that process. So this is still progressing as -- but there are others as well. And I think very confidently, there will be exported low-carbon ammonia out of the U.S. Gulf Coast in the future.

I think maybe to add to that, probably Quirijn, it's that in the end, there's maybe not so much the question of whether it will happen is much more of when it will happen and what type of supply chains are being connected? Is it the U.S. export play to Europe? Is it a U.S. export play to Japan, mainly and that's slowly but surely getting sufficient funds in on the receiving end or drivers on the receiving end to make those supply chains work. And I think as Maria rightfully say, we're very confident that we have a good location because we actually saw already the ammonia on the site in Houston next door, which is the joint venture that we have with Exolum. And that's the side where we are developing and again, it's more a matter of when than whether. Fatjona.

Three questions from...

Great that you are here, by the way.

With the business profile gaining towards more long-term contracts, should the leverage capability of the company not be higher than just 2.5x to 3x. Or are the covenant restriction of that? And if so, what are the opportunities to renegotiate those covenants. Looking at EUR 1.4 billion proportional CapEx committed, what is the percent of contingency, so covering for the potential cost increase that you have included in that? And the third and the last question. You have already spent a lot of growth CapEx in the last years with not much terminal capacity growth. How do you envision the terminal capacity growth in '25, 2030 timeframe, especially in the light of very large CapEx ambitions.

You are going to go for the covenants and I will look at the other.

I think that's the question for me, indeed, on the leverage and the long-term contracts. Yes, we looked at the leverage in such a manner that we would like to have, on one hand, sufficient room to grow the company. On the other hand, you don't want to stretch yourself too much because you still want to have certain flexibility if certain opportunities come along. We have given ourselves a bit of an opportunity to reach to the 3x, 3.5x while assets are under construction because of this massive growth ambition. Is there a risk that we reach the covenants? No, there is no risk that we reach the covenants because if you look at our covenant is at 4x, which is then the consolidated leverage while we are running at 2.2x effectively, if you exclude the subordinated debt, which doesn't account for covenant purposes. We have an internal management target. So we always want to make sure that we have sufficient room in case anything happens to protect ourselves. We don't want to be in the hands of banks and noteholders. We want to make sure that we have sufficient liquidity and sufficient room under our covenants. So that's -- that's how we looked at the leverage, and that's what we also would like to maintain because that is the strong foundation for us as a company.

Then on the contingency for the EUR 1.4 billion, roughly, I mean, it depends. We have different contingency levels for all the investments based on what we think is at the right time, the right risk-adjusted level of contingency. But if you want to take an average, it's roughly around 10% of what we put in our budget as a contingency level at the moment that we take an FID, which is part of that EUR 1.4 billion. And then last, the growth capacity. I don't expect -- so if you look at it, the way we are developing the portfolio now, the capacity versus the CapEx that we're doing looks a little bit off from what we've historically done. Look at 95,000 cubic meters in Canada for the amounts that we are investing over there. So we're not that much focused on the amount of capacity that we put to work. Also if you look at LNG, with some of these bigger gas projects, but much more at the setup, the CapEx that we have to allocate versus the commercial construct and hence, the returns that we can make for it. So it's hard to say and it's also not be almost not very relevant for us to put a capacity target out there in 2030. It's much more how much capital do we want to have allocated with exposure to certain markets with stickiness in terms of long-term contracts and more importantly, the return that we make with it. With that, the last question. Of course again.

Thank you, Rajiv. And I think this is a question maybe for Maria or Dick. On the Dow terminals, the VIA, obviously, it was done before you guys there on the senior management side. Has that been -- would you say has that really performed as per expectation? Because when the last -- when the deal was done, there was a lot of talk about it, you can expand it beyond Dow, but the expansion has been slower. It's -- so is it a kind of probably some hindrance from the BlackRock side or from the Dow side, just how can you basically expedite that growth which you are talking about?

Maybe I'll give the first part of the answer here, Rajiv. I think the expectations when we did it was definitely that we thought we could copy and paste the model of carve-outs to different entities in especially the U.S., but also in other parts. It's not for the lack of trying. So we went through a lot of different entities to pitch the idea. And the idea makes a lot of sense. It resonates, but there's all kind of practical sometimes reasons why it doesn't work. And one thing is for sure, you need a certain trigger the one who is currently owning the assets, you need either a big growth CapEx that the plant is going to do and therefore, you want to optimize and reutilize space there may be a lot of or maybe a strategic reason, we haven't found there's also not other deals that have been done that we missed. So we keep on following and tracking that. It's not for the fact that BlackRock has been not supportive, I would say, to the contrary, they actually really want to see how we can grow this vehicle together. And from that sense, I think it gave us, for sure, the positive, as Maria also indicated, carving out from existing infrastructure, these type of terminals is not as easy as it may sound. So it's -- we've learned a lot. We are continuing to learn quite a lot on this. And we still keep on pushing on some of the mega projects that Maria is talking about. We're giving it also a new push to put this concept in front of a lot of people that find it interesting. So we keep on moving forward to it. Is the growth what we had anticipated? No, it's not. It's not at the level that we would have expected and would have hoped it to be when we started it. So we're going to continue pushing for it.

If I can just address on the growth side. I think what we are finding is that its growth will be more inherent with the, I'll call it, existing tenants right? And there are multiple tenants within the fence lines of these industrial parks in many cases due to the legacy past situation. And there is where a lot of our project pipeline is coming from. External clients, yes, we are in discussions right now, particularly in the Louisiana, Mississippi River, as I mentioned. So there is a potential also with diversification of a customer base, but I would anticipate we'll have more growth with the clients within the fence line, but we will also have some clients that will come from outside the fence line. But it is -- the pace is maybe not what we had put in our initial investment plan, but we see -- we can see the funnel coming together that it will -- it takes time though. But it's -- and the learning has been very helpful as we do the next big project. That's what's key because it will make it more efficient. The next big project and the next big project.

Thank you. With that, I think we're at the end of our Capital Markets Day. So I want to first close out the people that are online and have been following it. Congratulations. You said it through for the full almost 4, 5 hours that we set out for you. Thank you a lot for joining. Have a good rest of your day. And if there's any further follow-up questions, you know where to find our IR department with Fatjona and then ask any questions for the ones over here. Thank you a lot for also staying patient and staying with us for this morning. I hope you found it interesting enough. Apparently, if not, you wouldn't have been staying over here. But we invite you -- happily invite you for lunch and have the opportunity to still continue. So thank you.