NET Power Inc. (NPWR) Earnings Call Transcript

Thanks, and good morning to all of you, and thanks for joining Net Power's conference call covering the fourth quarter and the full year of 2025 results. Joining me today are Danny Rice, who serves as our Chief Executive Officer, and Marc Horstman, our President and Chief Operating Officer. Our earnings release came out yesterday, covering the fourth quarter and the full year that closed on December 31st, 2025, and we also posted a refreshed investor presentation. You can find both of those on our Investor Relations site, ir.netpower.com. On this call, we'll be making some forward-looking statements. Because of risks and uncertainties tied to our business, which get covered in our SEC filings, actual results could differ materially from what those statements state or imply. We're not taking on any duty to update forward-looking statements; so with that, I'll hand things over to Danny Rice, Net Power's Chief Executive Officer.

Thank you, Bryce, and good morning to all of you for being here. Marc and I are happy to take part, and there's a lot for us to get through. Please bring up the investor presentation and follow along while we go through it. Once we finish our prepared comments, we'll take questions from the line. Let's begin on slide three, and before diving into details, I'd like to provide some context. Looking at the executive summary on slide three, you're seeing a business that made a bold strategic decision late last year and is now delivering on it. We moved away from oxy-combustion as our main near-term commercial path, and that choice was intentional. Oxy-combustion is an extraordinary technology, and we're safeguarding that effort with care. At the same time, a route exists to the same endpoint. Natural gas power with carbon capture exceeding 90% that can be built using equipment available right now on a schedule that fits how urgent the market is. That route is a combined cycle gas turbine combined with post-combustion carbon capture, GT plus PCC. Established turbines, established solvent-based capture technology, and alongside the right partner, Entropy, combining these two established systems into one bankable project is finally achievable. This isn't a pulling back from what we set out to do. Net Power's mission has always been to turn natural gas into the cheapest form of clean, firm power. That mission hasn't shifted. What shifted is that we identified a more direct path to reach it and the intellectual honesty on our part to pursue it; now I'll move to slide four, which addresses the macro backdrop, since I believe this context is critical to grasping why we think the timing of this choice is precisely right; we're in the early stages of what could be the largest build-out of power generation infrastructure in America's history. AI data centers are the immediate driver, but the story goes beyond that. There's AI-driven hyperscale compute demand. There's industrial re-onshoring. There's electrification of transportation and industry. We've got a bunch of forces all landing at the same time on a grid that hasn't had real baseload capacity in decades, and ERCOT — the Texas grid — is where that collision is most severe. Just the load growth that's expected in West Texas over the next five to 10 years is mind-blowing. This isn't some theoretical forecast. You can see it in the permits being filed, in the interconnection queues, and in the conversations we're having. Every one of those conversations lands on the same two things: speed and reliability. Power buyers aren't sitting around waiting for the perfect clean answer. They're rushing to secure whatever electrons they can depend on being there 24/7/365. What we're witnessing is a practical reshuffling of priorities. Environmental idealism hasn't disappeared, but it's being pushed below an immediate physical reality. Intermittent power simply won't work for a hyperscale data center. There's no way to build a $10 billion compute campus and just cross your fingers that the wind is blowing, or bet that new nuclear can get built at a price that's never been achieved before — especially not in this environment where new infrastructure costs are hyperinflationary. Natural gas is a different story. This country holds some of the cheapest natural gas reserves anywhere on Earth, with 50+ years of supply in proven basins stretching from Appalachia down to West Texas. The real question — the honest one — is whether we can push technology forward that lowers the environmental footprint of burning natural gas, since natural gas is what's available to us and what we require at this moment. That's the reality we operate in. If anyone still doubted how essential domestic oil and natural gas are to America's economic security and physical safety, the past three months have delivered about as clear a reminder as anyone could ask for. We just made it through one of the harshest winters ever recorded, and the U.S. We maintained power continuously without any interruption — and that wasn't because of solar or wind. It happened because we possess plentiful, dependable natural gas along with the generating capacity needed to send it out whenever required. At the same time, we are working hard on military and diplomatic efforts to guarantee that worldwide petroleum supply networks remain in trustworthy control, since oil genuinely fuels the planet, and America recognizes the consequences if that flow ends up governed by hostile parties; these are not theoretical matters of geopolitics. These figures make plain just how essential fuels extracted at home remain for keeping our country safe and our economy strong. In the bluntest way imaginable, they show that solving our energy problem cannot mean pretending oil and natural gas will disappear. Instead, we have to find ways to pull more of both out of the ground here at home, while handling them with greater care and producing fewer emissions. That's precisely the path we're on. Encouragingly, Washington's approach is starting to line up with that thinking. Under the 45Q tax credit, capturing CO2 and putting it to work in enhanced oil recovery now receive equal treatment — a change that carries real weight for our company. Enhanced oil recovery, which we call EOR, works by putting captured CO2 down into oil formations so that more oil can be brought up. On top of the extra output, that CO2 remains stored beneath the surface for good, which means the carbon capture earns you a straightforward economic credit. It backs oil produced here at home along with U.S. energy security, and it allows for a substantial cut in the expense of clean power; out in West Texas, where the Permian Basin's enormous oil formations sit alongside plentiful cheap gas, EOR is precisely what makes the economics of our first project truly attractive. This isn't some kind of workaround — it's a core piece of the value chain. Here's the bottom line on the macro. Demand for dependable, low-emission power around the clock has reached an all-time high. Government backing for carbon capture and storage is at its strongest point ever. The part of West Texas where we've centered our buildout happens to be exactly where rising electricity needs and new generation capacity are converging fastest. We believe Net Power brings the right solution, in the right place, at the right time. With that said, I'll pass it to Marc, who can walk you through everything we've been assembling.

Thanks, Danny. Morning, everyone. I'll walk you through how the business is progressing in three areas: where product development stands, the current position on Project Permian, and how the commercial pipeline is taking shape. Let's begin on slide five. At the base of everything we're building sits the integrated clean power product. It uses two Siemens SGT-A35 gas turbines, prepackaged by Relevant Power Solutions, combined with Entropy's post-combustion capture system, and it's designed to capture more than 90% of CO2. What we have with this integrated clean power product is something the market hasn't seen before. It's a fully pre-engineered power plant that brings together a natural gas combined cycle and post-combustion carbon capture in one standardized design. Working hand in hand with Entropy, WSP, and the partners who supply our OEM equipment, we're providing modular components that come pre-engineered. That approach methodically reduces the execution risk that has traditionally plagued projects that are the first of their kind. Ours is a fully air-cooled plant, so it has no need for water at all, and that widens the geography we can target considerably while easing a long-standing restriction on where such facilities can go. Our offering rests on technology already proven in commercial settings and assembled to a consistent specification, so we head into Project Permian feeling very sure about how it will perform, how reliable it will be, and how available it will stay. Every time we deploy, the design gets more refined, our buying power increases, and our costs keep coming down. What we're creating isn't a single plant — it's a product, and that product is what will be installed at our inaugural project, known as Project Permian, located in West Texas. Our conceptual design review, or CDR, has been completed successfully. At this point, we're collaborating with WSP Engineering to move the detailed design forward. There's also good momentum on the major equipment packages. Both modular gas turbine packages have been placed on order, with delivery expected in early 2028, and we're currently resolving the commercial selection and structure for our EPC. Reaching the product design CDR milestone represents a significant reduction in risk, since it verifies that the integrated system is capable of being engineered to specification and that the cost assumptions we've made rest on actual engineering rather than mere estimates. Turning to the Entropy partnership, that effort is a vital workstream. In solvent-based post-combustion carbon capture, Entropy ranks as a worldwide leader. They've already brought this technology into commercial operation up in Canada, at their Glacier site. We anticipate that once Glacier phase II finishes commissioning this summer, it'll give us actual field data to test the performance assumptions our clean power product is built on. Right now we're wrapping up the last steps on our joint development agreement alongside Entropy. Definitive agreements should be locked in during Q2. Once those are signed, Net Power is going to put strategic equity into Entropy, and for Project Permian we'll set up a joint venture in which Entropy holds a co-investment stake. Getting Entropy in as an equity partner rather than merely a licensor of technology matters a great deal to the structure we've chosen for this partnership, since it ties their incentives and their performance straight to our own. One more thing I'd like to touch on is the economics of our product, since I believe the market still may not fully recognize what we've built. When you compare our combined GT and PCC offering in West Texas against every other clean firm power alternative available — nuclear, geothermal, or solar paired with storage — what we provide is cost competitive over a wide range of scenarios for both capital cost and gas prices. That isn't a sales pitch on my part. It comes directly from thorough independent benchmarking that we had commissioned. Given West Texas gas prices and using the 45Q EOR credit pathway, this plant's LCOE falls within a range that works for power buyers and produces returns that work for equity investors. Honestly, when we began this process, we weren't certain we could show that kind of combination; our confidence in it is much greater today; with that said, I'd like to highlight a significant upgrade to the plant design that happened during the fourth quarter. Back in November, the last time we spoke with you, the plant was set up for about 60 MW of net electrical output. Working with Entropy on design and product engineering, we changed the configuration, and now we have roughly 80 MW of net electrical output. That's an increase of about 33% in generation capacity from an identical site footprint and about the same capital envelope. Just as significant, the redesign brought down performance risk on the carbon capture side. Our confidence is now greater in the capture rate assumptions that underpin the project economics. That represents real progress on both the revenue side and the project's risk profile. Moving to slide six and our path toward a financial investment decision. We're targeting FID in the second half of 2026, with commercial operations targeted for early 2029. Should we achieve that date, Project Permian would become the first commercial natural gas plus CCUS project in the United States. That's a milestone the industry and our customers will take note of. Reaching that FID requires four major work streams, all running in parallel at present. First, product and project engineering. We have to move the detailed design far enough along that we can execute our EPC contract and give lenders an independent engineer report they can rely on. Second, long lead equipment commitments. Some line items need commitments well ahead of FID to protect the COD timeline. Looking ahead to the middle of this year, our target is roughly $50 million in pre-FID long lead commitments, and we'll come back with an update on that as the year progresses. Moving to the third item, project financing: right now we're in the process of selecting a financial advisor to oversee the project finance effort, and we've already had discussions with potential lenders as well as co-equity investors. The economics of this project are solid, and our view is that Project Permian can be financed. This project has been structured so that it meets the return hurdles institutional infrastructure investors demand. Fourth is offtake, and I'll get into that on the following slide. One thing worth pointing out — site control has been locked down. We have an executed ground lease in place with Oxy. As for grid interconnection, that work is progressing with Oncor, with a target interconnection date of 4Q 2028. The core project infrastructure is in place. Moving on to slide 7, the commercial landscape. Getting offtake locked in stands as our top priority for this year. Let me walk you through where things currently sit. The furthest along talks we have are with Oxy — both our landlord at the site and a logical commercial ally. Oxy purchases the CO2 offtake for enhanced oil recovery — that forms the heart of the EOR economics Danny walked through — and we're also deep in negotiations regarding the power purchase structure. Past Oxy, our pipeline of potential offtake partners keeps expanding, spanning industrial, utility, and data center segments. Talks are advancing with a hyperscale data center builder in West Texas around a possible behind the meter setup that might wind up substantially bigger than phase I — roughly 300 MW. The scope of this pipeline confirms the thesis that demand for our clean, firm dispatchable power is genuine and expanding. The discussions happening now are fundamentally unlike those taking place just 12 months ago. Clients no longer question whether they require clean baseload power; instead they ask how quickly we can get it to them. For this year, what we're aiming for is an offtake agreement that's signed, or an MOU, with a price of $100 per MWh or higher — that's the level that allows a project to be bankable and produces the kind of returns we see as appropriate for the risk involved in a first-of-a-kind undertaking. We're working intensely to get there, and we're hoping to share additional details on that in upcoming quarters. Before I turn it over to Dan, there's one further point I want to make, since I think it's important background for the way we've thought about the site's value over the long term. Permian phase I comes in at 80 MW, but the site itself is not 80 MW. Take this site. You've got the land, you've got gas access, you've got CO2 offtake infrastructure working alongside Oxy, and you've got interconnection. All of that together could support a much larger power complex. Our view is that this single site has room to reach about 800 MW as we copy and scale up the plant's configuration. So what that tells you is the infrastructure now being built, the relationships we're building, and the operating expertise we're picking up during Permian phase I — none of that is just groundwork for one project. It's groundwork for something that might become one of the largest clean, firm power campuses in the entire country. How scalable it is matters a great deal when potential customers and co-investors look at this opportunity. Danny is going to walk through that in more detail. Danny, over to you.

Appreciate that, Marc. There are a couple of items I'd like to address prior to taking your questions. The first concerns where we stand financially, and the second is our approach to funding Project Permian; after that, we'll wrap up with some wider observations. As we closed out Q4, we held roughly $379 million across cash equivalents and investments, landing ahead of the internal goals we'd set for that period. To my mind, that speaks to how carefully we've managed capital throughout the transition; we shut down work streams that no longer sat at the core. We adjusted our cost base to the right size, and we preserved our flexibility. That gives us the financial headroom to move through the Permian phase I FID process in a measured way. That counts for a lot when the investment decision you're facing is the first of its kind. Turning to project financing, I'd like to give investors a clear view of our thinking here, since it's a key dimension of the Project Permian story. Broadly, there are three routes to funding a project of this kind. Option one is all equity, meaning our co-investors and we write the entire check. Nothing borrowed externally. Straightforward, though extremely heavy on capital. Equipment financing is the second route. A significant share of this plant's components — notably the power island, the gas turbines, the HRSG, the steam turbine, the electrical equipment. Lenders know these well as proven, commercially marketable assets. Financing can be arranged against them, similar to how you'd fund a fleet of industrial equipment, and it doesn't call for the complete project finance structure. That brings the equity requirement to approximately $0.75-$0.80 . Improved, yet we believe further improvement is possible. Full project financing is the third route. Non-recourse debt backed by the project's long-term contracted cash flows. That's genuinely what we're after. Executed properly, project financing lowers the equity requirement to approximately $0.25-$0.35 . The gap in capital efficiency separating option one, 100% equity finance, from option three, the project finance, is massive. It's the gap between Project Permian phase I being a draw on our balance sheet versus being the launch of a capital efficient, scalable platform. Let me be candid about where things stand. Post-combustion carbon capture at this scale on a U.S. natural gas power project is uncharted. PCC is somewhat like the Loch Ness Monster. Everybody's heard of it, yet project finance lenders have never witnessed it running in the wild within the U.S. power sector. Entropy has deployed this commercially in Canada for years, so the technology itself isn't speculative. Bringing infrastructure lenders fully up to speed on PCC performance assumptions takes education, takes data, and takes a certain amount of handholding. That's among the tasks in front of us, and it's exactly why the Glacier 2, phase II commissioning Entropy is carrying out this summer carries such weight. Actual operating data from a live commercial plant speeds up that conversation considerably. The remaining ingredient that opens the door to project financing is robust offtake. Creditworthy long-term power purchase agreements are what provide lenders the cash flow certainty needed to underwrite the debt. That's the reason why, as Marc mentioned, getting offtake agreements signed ranks as our top objective for this year. What Marc noted regarding scale deserves emphasis, since it shapes our financing approach directly. If a potential lender or equity partner examines Project Permian phase I sitting at the center of a campus spanning 500 MW to 800 MW, what they see isn't merely a modest inaugural project of its kind. What they see is the opening chapter of a significant clean power platform located in America's quickest expanding electricity market. That perspective shifts the risk-reward discussion in a substantial way. Each prominent data center builder we talk with thinks in GW terms, not MW. The reality that we hold a site capable of expanding to meet that demand, backed by established infrastructure plus a demonstrated operating model, truly sets us apart. In conclusion, our mission is unambiguous, our strategy has been settled, and execution has begun; the milestones for this year — the Entropy JDA, commitments for long lead equipment, executed offtake, and project financing — are all that separate us from FID. We're pursuing each of those work streams with urgency. We're eager to share updates on our progress during the coming quarters. With that said, let's take questions. I'll hand things over to the operator.

Morning. Appreciate you fielding these. Regarding the offtake pricing, I believe you brought up $100 per MWh. Could you provide some context for that region — what does the competitive environment there look like?

Hi Marty, Danny here. Great to hear your voice. Sure, and honestly, it's quite fascinating. When you consider simply what has happened across the past several years, prices have clearly begun climbing, and that's not only within ERCOT's merchant segment. I mean, if you rewind a couple of years, or actually, rewind 12 months, and examine what the forward curve indicates regarding where ERCOT power prices will land — if you had checked last year or the year prior and reviewed the strip for 2028, 2029, 2030, that forward curve stood at $40-$45 per MWh. Now, looking at that same curve today, we're discussing $65-$70. That's purely merchant, unabated. That's simply electricity from the grid. Wholesale power prices in West Texas have risen by nearly 80%, heading toward the latter part of this decade, which coincides with when this plant will begin operations. That's essentially the reality on the commercial merchant side. What I find truly compelling is when you examine contracted capacity pricing for new firm delivery — meaning possible co-location, setting aside the clean aspect. We're picking up talk of those discussions exceeding $100 per MWh when attempting to bring new capacity online prior to this decade's close. That genuinely captures how much reliability matters, how much speed matters, and equally, how much scale matters. What the market hasn't yet revealed is what buyers will pay when something is fast, scalable, reliable, and has lower carbon intensity. That market hasn't been established yet, and I believe we'll be the first solution to define what it is. The truly persuasive aspect for us is that, relative to our position on oxy-combustion — where you required a power price comfortably above $130-$150 per MWh for the math to work — that price point isn't necessary ahead of this clean gas solution with Entropy. I'd simply say I believe we'll land in that ZIP code where the price works well for the counterparty and works well for us, making project economics viable on the equity side as well as enabling project finance support on the debt side.

All right, that's useful. As a second question, I was hoping to ask about whether the government might step in on the financing side. Is there anything worth noting there when it comes to the DOE?

Yeah, so I'm not going to go into details, but I'd say when you consider what this administration is actively advocating and what it's actively promoting, it's essentially strengthening energy supply here at home. That applies broadly. It isn't limited to fossil fuels — it extends to things like rare earth metals. And when you think about oil and gas specifically and how critical both are for national energy security, those two sit right at the top. When you look at solutions that fit with what this administration wants, solutions that can draw on domestic energy supply, open up additional domestic energy supply, assist in stabilizing the grid, assist in lowering grid prices relative to where they've been heading, and can accomplish all of that in an environmentally responsible manner, that's something this administration ultimately backs very strongly. I believe everyone listening would share that view. What's fascinating about this approach — where we rely on domestic natural gas, extremely cheap natural gas, to stabilize the grid at a genuinely scalable level, which supports the AI expansion that represents an existential threat if we fail to win, while simultaneously increasing domestic oil output. There are very few such solutions. In fact, nobody anywhere in the world is attempting that at present; we are attempting it at present since we believe it's right for the country, right for consumers, and right for the shareholders; this approach genuinely fits with what this administration wants. That certainly becomes something I'd describe as not merely a possibility for verbal backing from the government, but I think possibly financial backing too — whether through grants, whether through loans, that's going to be a path we chase, because this is likely among the handful of solutions that lines up comprehensively across every energy solution this administration hopes to see work.

Excellent, I appreciate that — it was quite useful. I'll hand it back over.

Thank you, Marty.

Morning, all. Thanks for letting me ask a few things. Very briefly, I wanted to build a bit on what Marty brought up regarding Project Permian. Can you share a refreshed view of the costs — what the whole project runs to?

Sure, we're able to share certain approximate figures about what we're currently observing. Wade, I'll hand things to Marc so he can walk you through part of how he's handling this.

Okay. Wade, hello there. This is Marc Horstmann. A small amount of context first. Over the past several months, we've moved on from what you'd describe as the product's conceptual design stage. As we keep collaborating with Entropy, we've engaged an EPC as well as key OEM suppliers in order to truly define and grasp the plant design in its entirety. As you're aware, numerous elements come into the picture regarding the TIC as such, and likewise regarding what you'd term how competitive the LCOE is. At present we find ourselves in — and, as I just mentioned, we have recently completed the conceptual design stage — we find ourselves within a span of, let's say, the high $400s up to the high $500s. Put it as $475 to $575, that's the range we're targeting. That span clearly backs the economics discussed during today's presentation. I believe it's worth pointing out that as we progress through design prior to FID, this is going to let us reach that pre-engineered project, giving us, let's say, a more solid perspective on cost going forward. What I can share is that, as we examine our complete design along with our product solution, the risk tied to that product solution — at minimum the risks beyond our control — is, as Danny referenced concerning the AI race and regarding how quickly power is needed, those exposures related to OEM pricing and whatever impact that has or doesn't have are things we will be monitoring carefully. As we've said, our current position is fairly strong since we've locked in the gas turbines along with the gas turbine packages, and we intend to start securing certain other long lead equipment this summer, even before FID.

Thanks for that.

Let me expand on that just a bit, regarding the CapEx side. Our CapEx is running somewhat above what we had previously forecast. Part of that, I believe, comes from inflationary pressure, which I think folks anticipated. Another portion stems from design modifications. As you know, Marc mentioned that we can increase the plant's capacity from 60 MW up to 80 MW. That brings additional CapEx with it. Ultimately, all of this is genuinely aimed at bringing the LCOE down. When we evaluate things on an LCOE basis, they remain roughly within that same band. What I think is truly useful to grasp is how a facility's CapEx converts into the equity requirements for the project. Because ultimately, that's the critical point — what will our equity portion of the capital outlay be? If you're in that roughly $550 million territory and we can get the whole thing fully contracted on the PPA side, on the offtake, then we're in a strong spot to obtain project financing, which would cover approximately 65% of the total capital spend. That comes to roughly $350 million in debt. That leaves an equity gap of $200 million, and that's a $200 million equity check that would be — assuming Entropy and Brookfield join in alongside us for their equity portion of the project — we would land at approximately $100 million, $105 million for our equity portion of that first project. We definitely have the capital on our balance sheet available to fund that, so we're in a fairly solid position. But once again, it depends on those two elements falling into place — the PPA and, without question, locking in the project financing as we move through this year.

Great, that's a big help. Thanks a lot. For my second question — I may have missed this during the presentation. As you're aware, I bring up the commercial pipeline every time. Perhaps I missed it, but has anything changed with the MISO project, or anything past MISO? Or is Project Permian the only thing on your radar at the moment?

Honestly, we've got the horse blinders on somewhat when it comes to West Texas. West Texas overall, and specifically the initial project, at that single site you're familiar with — if you look at the slide, the first phase there is the 80 MW project Marc walked through in quite a bit of detail. As that slide shows, this site has room for 800 MW; for clean firm power, that's a fairly substantial block. Right now, that region is where our attention is. When you consider the economics and where we're able to produce clean firm power at the lowest cost, that's ground zero for it. Definitely more than MISO. We do still have optionality regarding that MISO site. I believe everyone saw that we disclosed pulling out of the MISO queue late last year, purely because of the escalating costs of what the interconnect would be. Putting that capital into MISO simply didn't make sense for us when we keep seeing such strong chances to redirect that money toward West Texas. For the foreseeable future, the West Texas opportunity is really going to be the focus. A good portion of that, I'd say, is driven by economics, and the other portion, I'd say, is driven by opportunity. The opportunities we're going to see in West Texas — the ones we're seeing right now — justify us devoting as much of our time there as we possibly can.

Great. Thanks so much. I appreciate that.

Hello there. Good morning. So, one thing that caught my attention — obviously, you've had conversations with various prospective customers regarding offtake. I'd like to know whether you could describe the kinds of parties you're engaging with and explain why the Net Power solution appeals to them specifically, rather than the several other options for generation they could choose, which are frequently also tied to gas.

Yes. Hey there, Noel. This is Danny. I'll give it an initial shot, and Marc can definitely fill in any gaps. I believe, well, the truth of the circumstances facing us right now is — and perhaps it helps to pull back a bit and go over what has happened across the past 3 to 4 years. Three to 4 years back, I think the world, and definitely the wider tech sector, held the view that additional natural gas power generation wasn't necessary. Nuclear would be within reach. Renewables would be within reach. Battery storage was going to be available. Building more natural gas power generation wasn't needed. Eventually, a path to decarbonize without it would be found. I believe our — I believe Net Power's unique mission has consistently been that the optimal approach to decarbonize is simply to capture the CO2, rather than attempting to shift away from natural gas, but instead keep leaning into natural gas and, using new technologies, discover methods to capture it, given just how inexpensive natural gas power generation is. So that mission has remained constant. What's truly fascinating at present, I think, is when you jump ahead to today's situation, everyone has basically come to accept there's simply no path to satisfying this load growth absent additional natural gas power generation. There's a bit of a tension in a sense — there may be some hesitancy about being able to rely on natural gas, yet they must embrace it; otherwise they won't succeed; they won't manage to build the data centers; they won't come out ahead in the AI race; they won't stay relevant, since someone else is going to do it. I think everyone has completely embraced natural gas for what it is — the most dependable, most scalable, most cost-effective energy source for power generation ever. Natural gas is viewed by all as the basis for coming out ahead in the AI race and for satisfying the load growth we're witnessing throughout the whole electricity system. How do you accomplish that while not entirely abandoning your environmental objectives? You have to discover methods to bring in new technologies that decarbonize. I think that's pretty extraordinary. While I believe that this absolute emphasis on how quickly you can get power is completely critical, what I see as the opening is whether we can bring in natural gas solutions that decarbonize without sacrificing that rapid delivery, and to some degree without sacrificing how affordable the power is, yet still providing the dependability people have grown to expect from generating power with natural gas. Those roughly 3 main traits are what Marc and his team have been engineering toward. It's the speed component, the reliability component, and the certainty of capture. That's definitely among the reasons, you know, we've teamed up with the Entropy people, since they truly are the sole proven PCC solution that's been running commercially for the past few years, and they have excellent expertise in that area; they know how to get it done. Once you combine that with gas turbines being obtainable, which they are, and I think we've shown that given we've locked in a handful of them already for the first project. Suddenly, you're at a point where we can provide the same kind of speed you'd expect from anyone else who was going to construct an unabated gas power plant. I think the value proposition is pretty simple. You can get the speed to power, you can get the reliability of the power on the same timeline you would from an unabated gas power plant. Now you can achieve that with 90% carbon capture, which basically translates to 90% lower emissions compared with what the unabated version would produce. I think there will be locations where capture won't be possible, which is most of the United States. Gosh, when you're somewhere like West Texas, where we are, and we have a strategic partnership with Oxy, which has led in CO2 sequestration for the past couple of decades and needs all the CO2 they can possibly obtain for EOR, it makes for a pretty compelling setup where this isn't merely a route to do a single project, a one-off project; it genuinely is the project that turns into the cornerstone of many gigawatts of potential clean gas power we can install in West Texas, you know, across the next 5 to 7 years. The speed component, the scale component, the reliability component, all of it's there. You simply get the extra advantage of the clean component that I think everyone ultimately is trying to work out how are we going to accomplish that, knowing that we're going to need to build a lot of natural gas power generation over the next decade.

Thanks, that's helpful. What you just mentioned reminds me of a point I've picked up from a few other vendors of alternative generation technology — namely, when it comes to the terms of contracts with, say, hyperscaler data center clients, they report that questions around time constraints are obviously front and center, along with questions around cost. There's such a sense of urgency that it isn't as though that concern has been fully set aside, but the pressure of the moment does appear to be overwhelming pricing to a certain extent. One particular wrinkle I've heard one company raise is this: when it comes to how long an agreement lasts, they're noticing some attention being paid to the scenario where a behind the meter power project serving a data center sees an interconnection become available — let's say 5 years out — and in that case, customers are putting considerable thought into how that would work, the chance to hook up to the grid using whatever technology they have. Naturally, the reliability and interruptibility concerns that gas handles would remain a very high priority, but there may be something like a transition point on the horizon, looking out that far. I was curious whether that subject has surfaced in your conversations.

Yes. You mean the shift away from behind the meter, or being fully islanded, toward ultimately having a grid connection, correct?