IDACORP, Inc. (NYSE:IDA) Q1 2024 Earnings Call Transcript

Alex Mortimer: Understood. And just one more quickly. Can you provide any detail on what motivated the decision to file a limited scope case versus a full case this time around? Could we potentially see this type of approach utilized sort of more frequently in the coming years with maybe some bigger, I’ll call them [“full cases”] (ph) every few years? Or just sort of any additional detail on what the regulatory strategy might look like going forward?

Lisa Grow: We certainly take each year and then look at what our needs are. But in this case, since we had just finished the 2023 rate case and used a 13-month average on the capital investments, we felt like we had to come back and to shore that up. And then, of course, like all utilities, we’re seeing some upward pressure on labor. So we felt like it was more sort of a true-up and then, of course, given the capital plan that we have, we’ll evaluate what’s needed in the next one. That, of course, depends on really what’s going on in our jurisdictions at the time. So I don’t know that we have a particular cadence on one than the other. It’s really situational. But we’re feeling good about the approach we’re taking, and of course, affordability is something that we’re really thinking carefully about.

Brian Buckham: Alex, what I would add to that is one thing that you’ve seen our track record of managing O&M, pretty good that we had a 1% CAGR for quite a while. And part of that is when we look at our case going forward, there’s certainly incremental L&M, but our mantra is to control that going forward. So if you look at what the building blocks of the rate case would be, so long as we continue to be really prudent on our own in spending, that helps with the design of the case. Also in terms of just regulatory life, we’re seeing it mostly in depreciation and interest expense, as I mentioned a while ago, and so a rate base related case to focus on the assets that are in service while they’re serving customers, getting recovery on those is one of our focuses for this particular case.

If you remember the outcome of our prior case, we did shore up cash quite a bit in terms of amortizing off some of the regulatory assets we have, notably pension and the wildfire mitigation plan. So since we’ve shored up that cash component of the case, really, it becomes a rate base that we’re particularly focused on, given the high CapEx that we have and that we’re going to see for a long time going forward.

Alex Mortimer: That makes sense. Thank you for the update and congrats on a great quarter.

Brian Buckham: Great, thank you, Alex.

Operator: [Operator Instructions] There are no further questions at this time. That concludes the question-and-answer session for today. Ms. Grow, I will turn the conference back to you.

Lisa Grow: Thank you all for joining us this afternoon and for your continued interest in IDACORP. I hope you all have a great evening. Thank you.

Operator: That concludes today’s conference. Thank you for your participation.