Ben Naccarato: Well, there was, it’s higher on the service side because of the improved productivity, it was lower on the treatment side. And that was a — that’s a revenue or a waste mix issue, a little higher this time around than usual because we had a good-sized number of what we call direct ship waste streams that we don’t even touch at the plants and they go and we just broke room. So to speak, and that brought the margin down, but we expect it to normalize going forward.
Brian Russo: Okay, great. And then just on the on the RD&D permit delays from the DOD permit delays from the Washington State of Ecology. Any insight there? Is it just more procedural or are there any read-throughs? Are they taking an extended period of time to review, which I thought might have been more of a formality. Just wanted to get any insight there?
Mark Duff: Yes, we have no idea, Brian. The bottom line is that this is not a big permit. They ask some questions several months ago of DOD, we answered them before I heard and they weren’t big questions. So it’s really difficult to understand, why this would take so long, but it certainly has taken a lot longer than everyone anticipated for the state to turn this thing around for 2000 gallons, it certainly would not appear to be that big of an effort, but we have no insight whatsoever as to why.
Brian Russo: Okay. And then just any update on the ITTC contract and the options that the DOE has either rebidding the procurement again or any other scenarios?
Mark Duff: Sure.
Brian Russo: A contract and the options that the DOE has either rebidding the procurement again or any other scenarios?
Mark Duff: Yes, that’s extremely complicated procurement, unprecedented in nature in regards to what has happened, if there’s not a lot more information than what’s publicly available and regards status of it, other than to say that the deal we did come out with a final proposal revision request, each of the teams provided a response, the Atkins team did a file a protest in regard to that final proposal revision requests. That’s at the — I believe it’s a [JO now and JOS], I believe they’re going to make a decision. But before February, what those options would be are very difficult to speculate on other than to say that, one could still assume that the options are to award two, the Adkins team or to go out for rebid and I’m sure that with the submittal of that proposal, now there’s a revision there’s probably an alternative to award again to [BBXT].
So, in other words, anybody can win, so nobody lost anything yet. [Now] one’s one any and it’s really wrapped around the axle and protest space. So, I wish I could give you some speculation, Brian, but we’ve got no idea on this one. And there’s a lot that the public, including us is, does not know about the legal situation and what they know, what the data is or what the evidence is. So, it’s just the you sit back and wait, there’s really not much else we can do at this point, right?
Brian Russo: Yes. know that, that’s helpful. And then just to clarify on the DFLAW, how to start and ramp up. If hypothetically, if there’s a hot startup in late 2024, you won’t be at full production or DFLAW won’t be at full production for all of 2025. There’s it’s more like full year, 12 months of production, would be more like 2026? Correct?
Mark Duff: That’s probably a good thing. And I don’t know, when both melters are operating, but one could assume your statement is correct that any plant, the stress of like that it’s not going to be 100% productive initially. So, one would assume your statement is correct, that they will start up with one melter [this will] melter at a time and it’ll be a while before the all three shifts or hit on all cylinders and that they’re maximizing their design basis [for 100 for a million] gallons a year. So, I would assume it would be 26 before you start to see that effluent come out at that rate.
Brian Russo: Okay, great. And one last question, if you don’t mind, just I’m sorry if I missed this, but what was it? What was the services backlog as of September?
Ben Naccarato: It’s in the $22 million range.
Brian Russo: Okay, great. Thank you very much.
Mark Duff: Thanks, Brian.
Operator: Next question is coming from Ross Taylor with ARS Investment Partners.
Ross Taylor: Yes. Gentlemen, I kind of want to dig into, what I think is the real important issue here, which is we spend a lot of time on minutia about contracts, but let’s talk about revenues and where we’re going just a bit ago, you indicated that you should be able to do $90 million to $100 million kind of a base load. You did ’21 or so this last quarter, you’re talking about this next quarter being roughly the same. My math tells me that you’re operating 80%, 90% of base load on those two numbers, why don’t we are what’s going to take to get to the fourth quarter get to that 23 million, 25 million, you need to have to kind of keep your baseload where you want it to be?
Mark Duff: Yes, I was really speaking more annually, Ross, on that. So, we had a rough Q1 that pulled us down a good bit, but our goal is to [hover] a minimum around the [20, 23, 25] range every quarter. And that’s where our sweet spot is. And profitability being below that gets very difficult based on our fixed costs. So that’s typically where we need to be to maximize our EBITDA is a $23 million to $25 million minimum each quarter.
Ross Taylor: Okay. So, and do you can you get there? Do you see you talked about stuff being pushed to the right and the like, do you, can you get there in this current quarter end? Or is that something we’re going to need to wait?
Mark Duff: As, I think we’re looking at our forecast the next quarters, I said we should be equally as good as this quarter, but a little better. We do have several projects starting up and it’s difficult to predict, what the revenues and margins will look like as you roll through the quarter on new projects. But right now, it looks very promising to see a quarter at least as good as this quarter. And particularly in regards to revenue. So, we’re optimistic that we will continue to see that come back. The trajectory we had last couple of quarters as well and finish up in the $90 million or close to $90 million range for the year. But we were like, when I mentioned that, like goal of $90 million fully annualized on a quarterly basis, so beginning in about 22, 23 is that we got to be to really be healthy as, we dipped a little bit below that this quarter because of those delays?
Ross Taylor: Yes, yes. Now in looking at it, it’s been a while since we’ve seen you guys announce a win, you had started the year around talking about what we could be getting out at Hanford and the vit. And that obviously caused a lot of excitement in the name. And since then, we’ve kind of been stuck waiting for the Italy operation for some other Hanford stuff for things happening, how you’ve talked about the ability to get you think you can get some new wins or get some this decided in this current quarter, how comfortable are you that your ability to kind of push next year towards the extra business to be able to produce $20, million, $30 million or more kind of out of this non-core load that we just were talking about.
Mark Duff: We are also what’s really asking about is our growth strategy. And I was mentioning the list of opportunities that we’re bidding on these next two quarters this quarter and next quarter are a significant chunk that, we haven’t seen this many big opportunities that we’re really well positioned for with high win probabilities that would that could be literally be awarded by next summer. So with that in mind, I feel very good about where we’re heading and we’re very optimistic about it. The way we’ve retooled our ability to bid these things, gives us additional confidence. The JRC, we’re very confident on — we’re very confident that we’ll know in the next week or two, I have been saying it since last December, very aware of that.
