Good morning, ladies and gentlemen. Thank you for standing by. My name is Michelle, and I will be your conference operator today. Welcome to the Fortis Second Quarter Conference Call and Webcast. During the call, all participants will be in a listen-only mode. There will be a question-and-answer session following the presentation. At that time, those with questions should press star followed by one on their telephone keypad. If at any time during the conference you need to reach an operator, please press star zero. At this time, I would like to turn the conference over to Stephanie Amaimo. Please go ahead, Ms. Amaimo. Thanks, Michelle, and good morning, everyone, and welcome to Fortis' Q2 2022 Results Conference Call. I'm joined by David Hutchens, President and CEO, Jocelyn Perry, Executive VP and CFO, other members of the senior management team, as well as CEOs from certain subsidiaries. Before we begin today's call, I want to remind you that the discussion will include forward-looking information, which is subject to the cautionary statement contained in the supporting slideshow. Actual results can differ materially from the forecast projections included in the forward-looking information presented today. All non-GAAP financial measures referenced in our prepared remarks are reconciled to the related US GAAP financial measures in our Q2 2022 MD&A. Also, unless otherwise specified, all financial information referenced is in Canadian dollars. With that, I will turn the call over to David. Thank you and good morning, everyone. Today, we are pleased to report another successful quarter underpinned by our investment in the energy infrastructure needed for the provision of safe and reliable energy service to our customers. For the first half of 2022, we invested $1.9 billion in our system, placing us on track to achieve our 2022 annual capital plan and supporting our second quarter adjusted earnings of $ 0.57 per common share. In today's economic environment, our utilities have been especially focused on maintaining customer affordability by proactively managing energy prices as well as other inflationary pressures through hedging programs, energy efficiency programs and cost reduction initiatives. Today, we released our 2022 sustainability report highlighting the progress made to reduce our greenhouse gas emissions and link sustainability targets to executive compensation and the corporation's revolving credit facility. The report also includes comprehensive diversity data on employees across the Fortis group of companies, which will advance our DEI strategies and inform our objective setting. Overall, the report contains more than 35 new key performance indicators and is fully aligned with the applicable Sustainability Accounting Standards Board or SASB standards. During the quarter, we continued to make progress towards our greenhouse gas emissions reduction targets. In June, TEP retired San Juan Unit 1, removing another 170 MW of coal-fired generation from its portfolio, supporting their plan to fully exit coal by 2032. Earlier this month, Fortis BC announced a pilot project to produce carbon-neutral hydrogen from natural gas through a partnership between Fortis BC, Suncor Energy and Hazer Group, utilizing a new carbon capture and utilization technology that provides a marketable solid carbon by-product. The pilot is being funded by the partner companies and the provincial government's CleanBC Industry Fund. While still in the early stages, it is innovative technologies and partnerships like this that will be necessary to accelerate the transition to clean energy. In June, TEP filed its general rate application with the Arizona Corporation Commission, seeking new retail rates effective September of 2023 based on a December 31st, 2021 test year. The application includes rate base of $3.6 billion, representing an increase of $900 million since the last rate case, largely driven by investments for renewable generation such as the Oso Grande Wind Farm and the Raptor Ridge Solar Facility. The application requests an allowed return on equity of 10.25% and an equity layer of 54%. TEP is proposing to modify an existing adjuster mechanism to include recovery of certain investments associated with TEP's clean energy transition. The new resource transition mechanism, or RTM, is intended to reduce regulatory lag between rate cases. In addition, TEP is requesting to eliminate both the demand-side management and the renewable energy standard adjusters and recover those costs in base rates. The requested non-fuel increase associated with the rate application totals $159 million. As the waterfall chart highlights, the recovery and investments in rate base make up the majority of the increase. TEP's progress in its clean energy transition plan delivers a net reduction offset to customer rates in this case, due to the cost savings from the recent retirement of the San Juan coal facility. The impact of the proposal to eliminate the two adjusters reduces the total revenue increase to $136 million. Earlier this month, commission staff filed a sufficiency letter indicating that TEP's rate application meets all the necessary filing requirements. A procedural schedule was also agreed to earlier this week, with staff and intervener direct testimony due in January 2023. Today, we are reaffirming our $20 billion five-year capital plan through 2026. This highly executable and low-risk capital plan is expected to increase rate base by over $10 billion over the next five years, supporting an average annual rate base growth of approximately 6%. Earlier this week, the MISO board approved the first tranche of projects associated with the long-range transmission plan. These 18 projects, which span across the MISO Midwest sub-region, have total investments of approximately $10 billion. With six of the projects located in ITC service territory, ITC estimates investments of approximately $1.4 billion to $1.8 billion through 2030. This is up from the previous estimate of $1 billion to $1.5 billion. Once ITC finalizes the timing of these investments, we will update our capital outlook accordingly. Next, development activities and commercial negotiations on the $1.7 billion Lake Erie Connector project were suspended earlier this week. This was driven by recent macroeconomic conditions that impacted our ability to secure a viable transmission service agreement within the required time frame. We acknowledge the efforts by all parties to bring the project to this point. However, at this time, it is a prudent and appropriate action given the circumstances. This project has never been included in our five-year capital plan. With 48 years of consecutive dividend payment increases, we continue to target 6% average annual dividend growth guidance through 2025, underpinned by our five-year capital plan. Now I will turn the call over to Jocelyn for an update on our second quarter financial results. Thank you, David, and good morning, everyone. Turning to Slide 11, reported earnings for the second quarter of 2022 were $ 284 million or $ 0.59 per common share, compared to earnings of $ 253 million or $ 0.54 per common share for the second quarter of 2021. On a year-to-date basis, reported earnings were $ 634 million or $ 1.33 per common share, compared to earnings of $ 608 million or $ 1.30 per common share last year. Reported earnings include timing differences related to mark-to-market accounting of natural gas reserves at Aitken Creek. Turning to Slide 12, we delivered adjusted net earnings of $ 272 million or $ 0.57 per common share in the second quarter. This is $ 0.02 higher than the second quarter of 2021. Rate-based growth at our regulated utilities and a higher US dollar to Canadian dollar exchange rate favorably impacted the quarter. Timing of earnings in Alberta and Arizona, as well as losses on retirement plan assets at UNS and ITC tempered earnings growth in the quarter. As you might recall, Fortis benefits from limited pension exposure given regulatory mechanisms at most of our utilities. In the second quarter, however, broader market volatility impacted the value of certain retirement assets at our US utilities held outside our defined benefit pension plans. The quarter-over-quarter impact was $ 0.02. For the 6 months ended June 2022, we delivered adjusted net earnings of $ 641 million or $ 1.34 per common share, $ 0.02 higher than the same period in 2021. Year-to-date earnings reflect the same factors noted for the quarter, as well as higher sales in the Caribbean, along with higher operating costs at Central Hudson and lower hydroelectric production in Belize. The waterfall chart on Slide 13 highlights the EPS drivers for the quarter by segment. We continue to see rate-based growth across our utilities, supported by capital investments of nearly $2 billion year-to-date. Our Western Canadian utilities and ITC each contributed a $0.01 EPS increase, driven mainly by rate-based growth. At ITC, quarterly earnings growth was impacted, as I mentioned, by losses on retirement assets, while earnings growth at FortisAlberta was impacted by timing of operating costs. For our energy infrastructure segment, EPS increased by $ 0.01 due to higher hydroelectric production in Belize. Next, a higher US dollar to Canadian dollar foreign exchange rate favorably impacted quarterly results by approximately $ 0.02. At our US electric and gas utilities, EPS decreased by $ 0.01 in the quarter. UNS was down $ 0.02 and Central Hudson was up $0.01. As expected, the lower earnings in Arizona were associated with both the timing of AFUDC recognized in 2021 during the construction of the Oso Grande Wind Farm and losses on retirement assets. UNS did benefit from higher long-term wholesale sales during the quarter, which helped offset higher operating costs and regulatory lags. Central Hudson's EPS contribution was driven mainly by rate base growth and the conclusion of its rate case in 2021. In our corporate and other segments, the $0.01 EPS decrease was mainly due to losses on hedging contracts. Lastly, as expected with our dividend reinvestment plan, EPS decreased by $ 0.01 due to higher weighted average shares outstanding. Year-to-date EPS was impacted by many of the same drivers as the quarter. I would note that the losses on retirement assets at UNS and ITC was approximately $ 0.04 for the first half of 2022. Year-to-date EPS was also impacted by higher costs associated with the implementation of a new customer information system at Central Hudson. Central Hudson does not anticipate any additional significant direct costs beyond the $0.03 EPS impact recorded through June. Turning to Slide 15, we were once again active in the debt capital markets in the second quarter, bringing the total debt raised year-to-date to over $ 1.5 billion, largely in support of our capital program. With the backdrop of a rising interest environment, several of our utilities accelerated debt issuances in the first half of the year, locking in attractive rates to the benefit of our customers. At Fortis Inc, we recently refinanced $ 500 million in debt that was due in 2023. ITC Holdings Corp. previously entered into interest rate swaps of $450 million to mitigate refinancing risks associated with debt due later this year. During the quarter, we also entered into a one-year $500 million non-revolving corporate term facility and amended our existing $1.3 billion revolving corporate facility. Our revolving facility was amended to extend the terms to 2027 and establish sustainability-linked targets related to board diversity and the reduction of scope one emissions. Lastly, we continue to maintain strong investment-grade credit ratings. In May, DBRS Morningstar confirmed our A low issuer and unsecured debt ratings and stable outlook. The recent debt issuances, coupled with almost $4 billion available on our credit facilities, places us in a strong liquidity position, supporting our $20 billion five-year capital plan. In addition to the TEP rate case that David spoke to earlier, I'll spend a moment on some recent regulatory updates. First, ITC continues to wait for a final rule from FERC in relation to the Supplemental Notice of Proposed Rulemaking, or NOPR, on transmission incentives, which proposes to eliminate the 50 basis points RTO return on equity incentive adder. Next, FERC issued two additional NOPRs in June addressing interconnection queue reform and grid reliability in extreme weather, both of which stem from the initial advanced NOPR released last year. While ITC continues to evaluate both NOPRs, any FERC actions that help streamline the interconnection queue will be positive for all parties involved. ITC also supports FERC's continued focus on grid resiliency and expects to be active in the rulemaking process. Reply comments on both proposals are due later this year. Also in May, the Iowa Coalition for Affordable Transmission filed a complaint with FERC seeking to lower ITC Midwest's equity ratio from 60% to 53%. The complaint alleged that ITC Midwest no longer met the three-part test which authorizes the use of a utility's actual capital structure for rate-making purposes. We believe the complaint is without merit and should be denied. ITC filed reply comments in support of its position in June. While the timing and outcome remains uncertain, a decrease in ITC Midwest equity ratio to 53% would reduce annual EPS by approximately $ 0.05. Lastly, in British Columbia, the generic cost of capital proceeding remains ongoing. The proceeding is expected to continue into the first part of 2023, and the effective date of any change in the cost of capital remains unknown. That concludes my remark. I'll now turn the call back to David. Thank you, Jocelyn. With the successful execution of our capital plan, our exit from the San Juan generating facility and key regulatory applications, we are in a strong position heading into the second half of the year to deliver on our growth and sustainability goals. Our local management teams will continue to work with their customers and regulators to manage through this time of high inflation and energy prices while still making the investments needed to deliver a clean and resilient energy future. I will now turn the call back over to Stephanie. Thank you, David. This concludes the presentation. At this time, I'd like to open the call to address questions from the investment community. Thank you. Ladies and gentlemen, we will now conduct the question-and-answer period. If you would like to register a question, please press the star followed by the one on your telephone keypad. If your question has been answered and you would like to withdraw your registration, please press star two. If you are using a speakerphone, please lift your handset before entering your request. We kindly ask you to speak loudly and slowly to ensure all participants can hear your questions. One moment please for your first question. Your first question comes from Maurice Choy of RBC. Please go ahead. Thank you and good morning. My first question is a follow-up on your comment about MISO spending timing, and specifically I'm trying to understand the moving parts in the months ahead. I know that the MISO staff on Monday noted that on August 8, they will indicate what goes through competitive bidding and what will be assigned to incumbent utilities. They also indicated the expectation that many of the 18 projects will come online by 2028. It's a little bit of a tight deadline, so to speak. Is the classification on August 8th what you're waiting for in order to get a better idea of what all this means to your next CapEx update, or is there something else? Yeah, thanks, and good morning, Maurice. Yeah, so we still have to figure out the exact timing. Obviously, there's estimates of timing that of those projects that are part of the original filings, et cetera, but there's still a fair bit of process to go through, working with the other transmission owners because some of these projects we actually are splitting with other transmission owners. So lots more of detailed, you know, engineering, planning, et cetera, that needs to go in to our calculus here before we can put it into our capital plan. I do appreciate that, you know, some of those projects look like they're earlier, but those are also probably a bit stale on the dates because this process has been extended a couple of times. But don't worry. As soon as we get a good feel for where those dollars lay out from a capital plan perspective, we'll be putting that out. Great. My second question, this is not a follow-up, but I assume there are still limited details so far on the Inflation Reduction Act that was announced yesterday. Whether this, the climate portion of this bill, is a slimmed-down version of the Build Back Better initiative or something entirely different. Any thoughts on which parts of your business might benefit from this new bill if it becomes law? If any changes to taxes might offset that. It is extremely early, so that crossed the wire there as we were all finishing up our notes for today. We do like the fact that it includes $370 billion of, you know, investments in energy and climate. We're not exactly sure what that breakdown is yet. We'll be looking at that today and, you know, going forward to see how that might apply to our companies and the things that we have in play. I think probably one of the, you know, at least on one of the press releases that we saw on this bill was the reference to permitting reform. That's and obviously they referenced transmission in that commentary, and that's always a welcome news when there can be additional help for us to get some of these projects permitted, because that's obviously the one of the bigger things that we have to do that slows down us doing the transmission projects is getting through the siting and permitting processes. But we haven't been able to digest that completely yet, but we will very soon. Great. Thank you very much. Your next question comes from Robert Hope of Scotiabank. Please go ahead. Good morning, everyone. Thanks for taking the questions. Maybe a broader question. We've seen, you know, I guess what we could argue is the Lake Erie costs go up. We've seen the MISO transmission projects increase there as well. When you're taking a look at, you know, we'll call it, you know, plain vanilla transmission projects, how much inflation are you seeing in those projects, which could yield a higher capital plan? Two, you know, are you worried that the higher capital costs could defer further investments similar to what we saw with Lake Erie? Yeah. Thanks, Rob. So it's really hard to judge inflation on a longer-term basis because that's what we do in our capital planning process, is we obviously have to make some assumptions on where inflation is going and frankly the shape of that curve. The things that we have in flight, say, this year's capital plan, et cetera, you know, we typically don't see a big inflationary impact on those because they're already in flight. We have the materials, et cetera. As we go forward, we're going to have to, you know, obviously adjust on the fly as needed in those capital projects to, you know, bring them in on budget as best we can. We don't see long-term inflationary pressures that would cause us to adjust our. I'll say, so there's two different questions, right? Because there's the capital plan, as in the total for the current projects you have, or is your budget going to get bigger, and you're going to continue to do those capital plans, meaning which is going to give? Are you going to keep the capital plan the same or keep the number of projects the same? The capital projects that we have are ones that are needed for, you know, the safe and reliable service for our customers. We're going to have to do those projects. We will have to manage the capital budget accordingly. That goes to the other side of the ledger, right? As we see some of these capital cost increases, as we go, we'll have to look for efficiencies, not only in the capital process, and in the construction process, but also look for efficiencies on the O&M side to help mitigate some of the rate impact as these projects go in. There shouldn't and we don't see any reduction in the number of projects, but we still are continually updating those capital plans to make sure we're capturing inflation as best we can. That's something that, of course, we'll do in the fall, when we put out our next five-year capital plan. All right. Appreciate the answer to that broad question. Maybe a little bit of a narrower one here. In Arizona, what's the initial feedback been on the filing as you're starting to engage stakeholders, you know, realizing that that's not due for quite some time here. Then B, in a higher yield environment, are stakeholders willing to agree with a higher ROE? Yeah. Robert, I actually missed the first part. We're getting those a little garbled, but I did catch the last part on the ROE. I mean, the ROE is, you know, that's—it's the formulas that have been used and the conventions that have been used for 100 years. You know, as we see interest rates increase, we do expect ROEs to be following that, you know, in some manner. We typically see a little bit of a lag down, and we'll typically see a little bit of a lag up. But the ROE, particularly in Arizona, since I was the one on the stand last time, Susan's sitting next to me, she gets to sit on the stand this time. She'll do better than I did on the ROE arguments because, you know, I think in the middle of COVID, when we were at the end of 2020 and doing that case, you know, we feel that we got a little bit of a, you know, reduced ROE because of that. Now, when you look at the situation from an interest rate underlying, you know, calculus that again goes into the ROE, I think we're going to come out in a better spot. What was the first part of your question? Just initial feedback on what the rate filing has been in Arizona. Any feedback from stakeholders so far? Yeah, I'll turn that over to Susan to answer. Hey, Robert, this is Susan. Yeah, I think it's pretty early to tell. The intervener testimony won't be filed until January of next year. I think, you know, our initial conversations as we were planning to file with staff and commissioners and some of the various stakeholders were very positive. I feel like, you know, we have a lot of support for the new adjuster mechanism. I think the economic situation supports a higher ROE, and so we're anticipating a great outcome. Thank you. Your next question comes from Ben Pham of BMO. Please go ahead. Hi. Thanks. Good morning. I wanted to go back to the Lake Erie, and you've characterized it as you're suspending the project. I'm curious, where are you with conversations with the IESO? Is it effectively stopped at this stage? Is there really any outcome here where you could start working on the project again? Is it inflationary inputs that would drive that project going forward? Yeah. Thanks for the question, Ben. I got to tell you, this is a tough time for us to try to lock down a project. We probably couldn't have picked a more volatile, you know, 3-6 months of inflation interest rates, et cetera, for FX, in order for us to try to lock in, you know, the economics that we would need to go forward. We obviously have had very close conversations with IESO through this process. It's just the timing. It's a situation where, you know, we just—we have to make the prudent investments, and we can't get the, you know, the return that we need for this type of project in the current environment, absent, in essence, sort of restarting those negotiations. We have told the IESO that we are suspending the negotiations. You know, that doesn't mean that the project is canceled, but it also, you know, it means that we would have to have a pretty big restart for us to get moving again. That doesn't mean. That doesn't say that it might not happen. Right now, our view is it's suspended. You know, if it comes back, it won't be soon, and it will take a lot of things to align again. Okay. That's great. Maybe on your capital plan and looking at the one where you show all the wedges and that $20 billion between distribution and clean energy, all that stuff. I mean, how do you think about when you factor in Tranche 1, and there's some upside in RNG and even transmission, do you expect any meaningful moves in those wedges as you think of the next 6-12 months? Ben, you're trying to get a little preview into our capital plan that we'll release here in the fall. I'll save the answer for that when we put all that together. We're obviously working hard behind the scenes pulling those pieces together. I can't really divulge any of that right now. I mean, the best part about that existing plan are needed by our customers to improve you know their reliability and of course the clean energy investments that we expect to continue to increase over time because of the transition that we're doing in Arizona the additional renewable interconnections that we're gonna be doing in MISO. It's you know, hopefully with that, once that log jam gets freed, we'll start seeing a lot more interconnections in ITC's footprint. That's great. Thanks, David. Thank you. Your next question comes from Mark Jarvi of CIBC. Please go ahead. Thanks. Good morning, everyone. First on the MISO transmission projects, can you clarify whether or not the numbers you've provided, the 1.4 to 1.8, is net to ITC or whether or not there's any sort of partnerships on any of those projects? Then for Jocelyn, with these incremental investments, can you—I know maybe it's too early at this point, but can you comment on how they would fold into your sort of funding plan over the next five years? I'll take the first part. That one point, our new estimate for the MISO long-range transmission projects, that's our estimate for our dollars, right? It's. It doesn't depend on someone else to come in. Now, obviously, we have to be discussing the overall projects with the partners that we are gonna be splitting some of these with, but those are our dollars and our portion. Mark, with respect to the funding, I believe, I think I caught your question on the funding, particularly as it relates to, you know, bringing the MISO long-range transmission plans into fruition. That's still a bit hard to answer because we don't know the full timing. As you know, assuming it's over a certain period of time, I mean, we do have room even within our DRIP program. It is something we'll have to evaluate when we actually get a chance to see the timing. If it's a little bit, I guess, lumpier, then— Can you give some sort of context in terms of when you submitted your application, where you were on inflation expectations now, since you've submitted some of the updated numbers, and what is the mechanisms by which you would update your application for new inflation expectations? Since we have a historical test here in Arizona, we don't really get to update inflation as it were. What we do. It's because it's based on the historical 2021 test year expenses. What we are able to do is put in some adjustments on a going forward basis for labor and some other known O&M with things that are known and measurable that go into that calculation. We don't have an interest rate tracker or anything like that in Arizona. You know, that is the one jurisdiction that as we see inflation increase, you know, between rate cases that can have an impact. also on the other side, it's, you know, regulatory lag that works both ways as inflation will come down the other side, you'll see it. You know, you'll see the higher inflation built into rates. Overall, it kind of evens out over time. From a long-term perspective, it kind of gives and takes, you know, throughout the years. Yeah. I guess I was most interested in the labor and the O&M stuff. Is there an opportunity to resubmit updated expectations for those items? I don't know of any way of doing that. We also have never been in an environment like this. When you have high inflation and it changes from the time, you know, basically on a historical basis. There's a lot of different ways that you can get that consideration for that during the rate proceeding. There may not be as, you know, as a keen eye on expenses when the commission and the interveners realize that inflation has increased. There's also ways of managing it, right? Susan and her team down in Arizona will be, you know, managing O&M expenses as best they can to offset that impact, whatever it might be, as we go forward. There isn't a standard process, per se. Now, if you get into settlement negotiations, there's, you know, that opens the doors for a lot of different conversations that are typically not available to you if you're going through a standard, fully litigated process. That makes sense. I think one more in here. Just at TEP and the rate case, I think one of the commissioners submitted a sort of a novel idea of sort of capitalizing some of the, I guess, power purchase agreement costs. Any initial thoughts on that and what that means, I think, from a cost mitigation for your customers. Yeah. We're actually pretty happy to see that conversation take place. This was the chair, Lea Márquez Peterson, who put out that letter. It's a good way to look at things because PPAs versus ownership have to be looked at on a bit of, you know, be looked at on a level playing field. You know, we feel that ownership has a lot of, you know, not just financial, but intangible benefits related to the ability for us to dispatch, say, renewable energy, battery storage, et cetera, exactly how we need to instead of trying to figure out how to get a contract priced right to give you the full flexibility and unfettered access to the value of those assets. One of the things that PPAs do is it leans on your balance sheet, right? It's imputed debt. Having a recognition for that to, in essence, you know, level that playing field, I think is helpful. Now, all that being said, I'm looking at Susan and seeing if she nods. We have no idea where this is gonna go because it was just a proposal by one commissioner. You know, we don't know if this will get any traction with at least two others. She nodded— Okay. In agreement. That's good. Okay. Thank you. Your next question comes from Andrew Kuske of Credit Suisse. Please go ahead. Thanks. Good morning. Maybe if we could just look back at UNS and Arizona more broadly, because obviously there's a wealth of Arizona-related experience on the call today. The regulatory environment, it's ebbed and flowed at times, and maybe just give us some perspective on where you see the dynamics right now from a, you know, positive standpoint versus maybe less constructive, you know, in and of itself, the history of Arizona, and then also just as you see it versus other jurisdictions where you have exposure or just more broadly. I'll turn this over to Susan to talk, you know, about the kind of the current situation. If you want the history of the world, I can give you the last 27 years that I've been in Arizona as well. But I think the most important piece to answer here is kind of the current situation, and Susan's got her pulse on that. Yeah, I think that, you know, our three companies have had some positive outcomes, regulatory outcomes just even this year. If you look at our last rate case, other than maybe a lower ROE, we did have some positive outcomes out of that case. We're feeling like there is regulatory support for UNS. I think some of the more extreme negative outcomes have been directed more at one company. We feel like that is unique just to that company, and we don't expect that to be the case for UNS or for this TEP rate case. really how it compares across the rest of the footprint, which was in your question there. I mean, you know, I might be biased because I came from Arizona. You know, I always thought that it's a very constructive environment. When you get past, you know, some of the headlines and some of the kind of one-offs, you know, we have a very good relationship with a very strong staff up there. That's really the group that you know, is there from year- to- year. Having those relationships building up, the trust through transparency is how we've operated. You know, there might be little, you know, minor rulings, et cetera, that, you know, that we might not be fond of, as Susan mentioned. You know, I guess the ROE in the last case. I mean, you have to realize in the scheme of things that it's still a very, in my opinion, a very constructive environment. As we go forward, I think others will start seeing that as well. Okay, appreciate that. I'm gonna refrain from naming that one company. When you look at the— As did we. That was noted. You know, if you maybe look at just the drivers within Arizona and you know, you mentioned the 27 years. When you think about economic growth potential that has been robust on a historic basis, how do you think about the growth drivers? Even in the event of a negative outcome or something that's less favorable from a regulatory standpoint, does the overall growth environment in Arizona really support the business there? Yeah, that's really one of the key underlying principles in any jurisdiction is that, you know, we serve, you know, we're regulated utilities. We serve lines, you know, load within lines on a map. It's really important for our growth that the lines on the map within which we serve are growing. In Arizona's always been one of the highest growth states. I wouldn't say always, but I think it's out of the last, you know, four or five decades, there was only one decade where Arizona was in the top four fastest-growing states. Even in economic downturns, net migration into the state, the business environment that we have, you know, constructive business environment from a tax, you know, business-friendly perspective. You know, just flat out, it's a good place to live, and people like to move there. You know, weather is a consistent positive in Arizona, and that does bring in, you know, net migration to the state. The underlying growth is there, and I think you'll see that within the overall numbers when you look at Arizona versus the other states, and we expect that to continue. It is something that, except for that, you know, big downturn in 2008, it was only for a few years after that we didn't land in one of those top spots for statewide growth. If I can sneak one more in, and it's an area we don't talk about that much more, whether or not as positive as Arizona, but there's a lot of percolating positives in Atlantic Canada. Maybe just talk about any kind of emerging opportunities that could surprise to the upside in the portfolio. In Canada, is that what you asked? Really in Atlantic Canada. Atlantic Canada. You know, while we're all sitting here in Alberta today, when I was in St. John's just a month or so ago and seeing the economic vibe in Newfoundland related to some new projects, particularly in the oil and gas, which you know is a big part of that economy over there. You know, a couple big projects that were announced, both an expansion and a new project, that was a big deal. I think that that has given a little bit of a boost to people in Newfoundland in particular. I think probably the broader conversation around, say, the Atlantic Loop and the opportunities that that might bring, wind development that's being talked about in Newfoundland and Labrador, all of those things are additional positives for growth opportunities in our sector. It's Atlantic Canada, you kinda have to look at as, well, if you get something like the Atlantic Loop, you have to look at it like an integrated, you know, like an integrated resource plan for the region. That means all of us need to do a little bit different resource planning, and it's gonna include transmission, renewables, maybe some additional hydro, et cetera. There's a lot of development opportunities. It's a resource-rich area. You've been there, and you know how windy it can be. Wind is definitely gonna be a component going forward. You know, we may be able to even invest in some of that wind. As you also might know, solar will not. Okay. Thank you for that. Your next question comes from Matthew Weekes of iA Capital. Please go ahead. Good morning. Thanks for taking my questions. I think I just have one and just wanted to ask if you could provide sort of any comments at this point on you know progress on the GCOC proceeding in BC, just in terms of you know developments, how that's been progressing, timing, and maybe how those conversations are going with the regulator at this point? Sure. I'll turn that over to Roger Dall'Antonia. He's here as well. Thanks, Matthew. The proceeding we're through the information request process for the most part. We just had a procedural conference early in July. We are awaiting the order for additional process. There is a potential for an oral hearing in November, and should the oral hearing proceed, then we'd likely be getting. Early 2023 with the decision to follow, but we're waiting for that. As far as the process, nothing surprising. We did put forth a request for higher ROE and capital structure. The intervenors, of course, are suggesting something less than that, and there are really no surprises so far in what we're seeing in parties, and we look forward to really soon here. Okay, thank you. I appreciate the update. I'll turn the call back. Thanks. Thank you, Matthew. Ladies and gentlemen, as a reminder, if you would like to ask a question, please press star one at this time. Your next question comes from Michael Sullivan of Wolfe Research. Please go ahead. Hey, everyone. Good morning. Good morning, Mike. My first question was just around the FERC complaint on the equity ratio. I understand that you're pretty confident that you ultimately prevail here, but just in terms of process, would it be surprising if FERC at least took it up and set it to hearing? I think when this came up a number of years ago, they just outright denied it. Is that the expectation this time, or would it be not surprising if they did at least take it up? Well, our desire would be for them to outright deny it, which we think would be the right process. I'll turn it over to Linda Apsey to answer that one. Yeah. Good morning. Thank you, Michael. Absolutely. As Dave said, we certainly, you know, would hope that FERC would dismiss the complaint outright, just given that, you know, how we set our capital structure is directly according to the FERC's three-prong test. This would be a significant departure from FERC precedent, if they were to grant the complaint. Certainly our hope and desire that they dismiss it outright. Certainly the comments that we have provided in the docket certainly lay out our case, and we are hopeful that FERC will take the appropriate action. I would note that there is no timeframe required for FERC to act, so we don't really have any visibility into when we might get a decision from FERC. Okay. If they don't outright deny it, should we be worried or it's still possible you can ultimately prevail? Well, I think if FERC does not, FERC would have to take action. You know, if they don't deny it or dismiss it, there are two other possible paths. One, they could grant the complaint, and, you know, yield their own decision through an order. Or through an order, they could set the matter for hearing, which would ultimately, you know, sort of take us off into a different track, before an ALJ, and we would certainly be down the hearing path, which, with presumably the expectation that there would be some settlement or at least attempted settlement. I think it's far too soon to know or tell, you know, what the outcomes might be. Again, we're hopeful that this will be an outright dismissal of the complaints given that we follow FERC precedent. Again, you know, I think as we've mentioned before, you know, this would have broader industry impacts, as other utilities have similar equity components in their capital structure. This would certainly have much broader concern from the industry's perspective, and that's why I think there were other interveners in the docket to that effect, reminding FERC that their precedent, nothing has changed. There's no change in facts or circumstances. Again, we remain hopeful that this will be an outright dismissal. Okay, great. That's super helpful. Thank you. Wanted to also just shift gears to the quarter and the trust asset performance drag. It looks like it's been about $ 0.02 a quarter so far this year. I mean, if the market continues to kind of hold where it is, obviously that's a big if, but should we expect that to be like a sustainable drag through the remainder of the year? Yeah, Michael, that's right. If the market holds, then we shouldn't see any further impact of these assets. As you know, the market's still moving around. If the market holds where it is today, then we probably would keep the $ 0.04 impact that we would have. Okay. No incremental year-over-year impact in future quarters. Not expecting, no. Okay. Depends on the market, of course. Great. Thank you. Your next question comes from Dariusz Lozny of Bank of America. Please go ahead. Hey, good morning. Thank you for taking my questions. Just a quick one on your sales trends that you reported for the quarter. Looks like Central Hudson came in fairly robust, double-digit increase on residential. Can you talk a little bit about what kind of trends you're seeing there? It looks like you're not calling out weather specifically, so it looks like that might be organic growth. But just curious if you could unpack that a little bit. Yeah. Let me turn that over to Charlie Freni. He'll have some more details on, you know, the load impacts in this quarter. Charlie, are you there? I am here, Dave. Thanks for the question. You know, in our service territory, north of New York City has really prospered with the, I wanna say, the migration exit from the city. We're seeing, you know, pretty robust housing development, more housing development I've seen in a long, long time. You know, people are moving to the area. You know, obviously, when mortgage rates were low, a lot of starts and purchases were taking place. From a residential perspective, we're seeing that. We're also seeing, you know, a fair amount of conversion to heat pumps. The heat pump programs in our service territory, as well as some of the other service territories in New York, have been, for the most part, you know, stripped of all of their funding because there's been such strong demand for the heat pumps. You know, more and more electric vehicles are in the area, as well. You know, I think there's a number of drivers there that have supported the residential growth. Great. Thank you for that. One more, if I can, and this is just a follow-up to a response that you gave to another question. I think you said that, in response to seeing some of the pressures on capital costs and things like that, you might look to efficiencies on the O&M side. I'm just curious if you'd be in a position to perhaps quantify those expected O&M efficiencies on any future updates. Yeah. In the future, we will. This is something that we've been, you know, having conversations throughout really the past year, on ways for us to find ways of reducing costs, you know, to allow us the headroom to make the needed investments we need and the infrastructure that our customers need. We're continually trying to figure out how to best gather and display that information for our investors, and for ourselves. We'll continue to do that and continue to refine that and get it in, you know, some of our IR materials and decks and conversations going forward. Great. Thank you. I'll turn it back to you. Thank you, Dariusz. As there are no further questions, I would like to turn the call back to Ms. Amaimo for closing remarks. Please go ahead. Thank you, Michelle. We have nothing further at this time. Thank you for participating in our second quarter 2022 results conference call. Please contact investor relations should you need anything further. Thank you for your time, and have a great day. Ladies and gentlemen, this does conclude your conference call for this morning. We would like to thank everyone for participating and ask you to please disconnect your lines.