Welcome to the Aemetis First Quarter 2023 Earnings Review Conference Call. At this time, all participants are in a listen-only mode. A brief question-and-answer session will follow the formal presentation. As a reminder, this conference is being recorded. It is now my pleasure to introduce your host, Mr. Todd Waltz, Executive Vice President and Chief Financial Officer of Aemetis Inc. Mr. Waltz, you may begin.

Thank you, Matt. Welcome to the Aemetis’s First Quarter 2023 Earnings Review Conference Call. Joining us for the call today is Eric McAfee, Founder, Chairman and CEO of Aemetis; and Andy Foster, President of Aemetis Advanced Fuels and Aemetis Biogas. We suggest visiting our website at aemetis.com to review today’s earnings press release, the Aemetis Corporate and Investor Presentations, filings with the Securities and Exchange Commission, recent press releases and previous earnings conference calls. The presentation for today’s call is available for review or download on the Investors section of aemetis.com website. Before we begin our discussion today, I’d like to read the following disclaimer statement. During today’s call, we will be making forward-looking statements, including, without limitation, statements with respect to our future stock performance, plans, opportunities and expectations with respect to financing activities and the execution of our business plan. These statements must be considered in conjunction with the disclosures and cautionary warnings that appear in our SEC filings. Investors are cautioned that all forward-looking statements made on this call involve risks and uncertainties and that future events may differ materially from the statements made. For additional information, please refer to the company’s Securities and Exchange Commission filings, which are posted on our website and available from the company without charge. Our discussion on this call will include a review of non-GAAP measures as a supplement to financial results based on GAAP because we believe these non-GAAP measures serve as a proxy for the company’s source or use of cash during the periods presented. A reconciliation of the non-GAAP measures to the most directly comparable GAAP measures is included in our earnings release for the 3 months ended on March 31, 2023, which is available on our website. Adjusted EBITDA is defined as net income or loss plus…

Thank you, Todd. Thank you very much. Aemetis is focused on producing below-zero carbon intensity products and is executing the 5-year plan that is available to investors on the Aemetis homepage. Core activities to achieve the 5-year plan include extensive energy efficiency upgrades to the Keyes ethanol plant, the build-out of our dairy renewable natural gas project and the ramp-up of production at the India Biodiesel plant. Each of these core activities were achieved during Q1 while minimizing the negative impact of temporary extraordinarily high natural gas prices during Q1 2023. During Q1, we completed an extended maintenance and upgrade cycle for our Keyes ethanol plant that avoided significant losses during the quarter, but importantly, avoids future plant shutdowns that would have been required to install the upgrades. The result is an acceleration of our reduction of energy costs and driving the lower carbon intensity of our biofuel through a number of plant electrification projects. We also accelerated the installation of an entirely new Allen Bradley decision control system with artificial intelligence capabilities, along with several other important process upgrades. While a top priority for Aemetis is to maintain our decade-long track record of continuously operating the Keyes plant to supply feed and fuel to local markets. Doing so under the extremely negative conditions that developed late last year and continued into the first quarter of this year in California natural gas markets would have been irresponsible and unsustainable. We chose to use that short time period to instead conduct a significant plant maintenance program and pull forward many of the critical components of our energy efficiency projects. In the long run, this decision to focus on fundamental improvements in our energy efficiency will save us millions of dollars in project costs through avoided down days and lost production and…

Thanks, Eric. With the closing late last year of our first $25 million financing that utilized the USDA Renewable Energy for America program, the Aemetis Biogas renewable natural gas project in California delivered in-service dates in Q1 2023 for several key components. We completed the installation and final commissioning of the 40 miles of biogas pipeline. We completed commissioning of the biogas to RNG upgrading facility. We completed commissioning of the RNG interconnection unit with the PG&E pipeline. We also completed 4 new digesters and now have 6 fully operating with the seventh digester being completed right now. With the expected funding of our second $25 million USDA guaranteed loan this quarter and a third funding plan for later this year, we are scheduled to begin construction of up to 10 more digesters by the end of 2023, depending on the timing of the permitting and USDA financing. We also signed up a number of new additional dairies and now have approximately 40 dairies in the Aemetis RNG network. After receiving CARB LCFS carbon intensity pathways for RNG, these 7 dairy digesters are expected to generate approximately 200,000 MMBtu per year of RNG. We have already submitted our RNG production data to obtain LCFS pathway approvals to begin generating LCFS credits. While we await the approval of LCFS pathways for credit generation, we are storing the RNG underground and carrying it as inventory. Operationally, we are focused on executing the construction of dairy digesters to fill the Aemetis Biogas pipeline, the centralized biogas to RNG production facility and the PG&E interconnection unit, all of which are operating now. Let’s briefly discuss progress at our California ethanol plant. As Eric already discussed, we are working on the restart of the Keyes ethanol plant to take advantage of strong demand for ethanol…

Thank you, Andy. Let’s review our growing biodiesel tallow feedstock refining and glycerin refining business in India. The national biofuels policy in India was updated in 2022 and is now being implemented to achieve a 5% blend of biodiesel that is equal to about 1.25 billion gallons per year. During the first quarter of 2023, the 3 government oil marketing companies issued tender offers to purchase more than 10x the entire production capacity of the Aemetis biodiesel plant under a feedstock plus pricing formula that was used very successfully last fall to bring biodiesel plants into full production in India. The tender offers were for delivery during the second quarter of 2023. Aemetis selected specific delivery locations and amounts, then received supply contracts for $34 million of biodiesel to be delivered during April, May and June of this year. The pricing formula and timing of the tender offered by oil marketing companies is expected to be the ongoing format for sales to the oil marketing companies. We expect the formula to be a successful mechanism for the rapid growth of biodiesel production in India due to the predictability of the pricing formula. Our plant in India is uniquely situated to benefit from the successful feedstock plus pricing mechanism since importing biodiesel or renewable diesel is not allowed under India law and Aemetis owns and operates the largest production facility biodiesel plant in India. We are negotiating the sale of tallow feedstock that is refined by our tallow pretreatment unit in India for export to the U.S. for the production of renewable diesel and sustainable aviation fuel. We recently made breakthroughs in tankage locations at 2 delivery points in California and have 2 renewable diesel customers in late-stage contract discussions. Since our India subsidiary has no debt and the 50 million…

Thank you, Mr. McAfee. We will now be conducting a question-and-answer session. [Operator Instructions] Our first question is coming from Amit Dayal from H.C. Wainwright.

Eric, just on the RNG side, how many MMBtus by the end of June do you think you’ll have in storage? And could you maybe share your internal thinking on how much you may get for this once you have the guidance on the ITC?

We reported on the Q1 report how many we had in storage. At the end of Q1, the…

I was talking more about by June, how much you think you might have, sorry.

Yes, I don’t have that in mind, but it would be -- it’s linear. So the 6 operating digesters would actually be increasing slightly as we get out of the winter, which is colder in California. These are solar dairy biogas digesters so as they warm up during the summer, we get more production, much like you would get out of a solar farm. So we can get that data, and we’ll include it in future communications. Regarding the value per MMBtu, California low carbon fuel standard value, as we know, they went from $65 to today over $86 just in the last few weeks and probably 6 weeks of trading, but CARB itself on Slide 51 of their webinar cited that out of the next 22 years, they expect more than 20 years to exceed the price cap, which is over $250 per credit. We think as traders realize that, that’s CARB’s not only intention, but what they’re going to actually do very quickly the price of the credits will exceed $200. So we generate a negative 427 permanent intensity over 500 LCFS credits, about 10x as much as a landfill project would for an equivalent volume of MMBtu. So we will be providing more clarity on this, especially as we start pulling out of the ground and shipping it. But our focus is on not selling this product at low LCFS prices. And just in the last month or so, you’ve seen a 25% increase in the value of that inventory in the ground. It’s because we’ve been going long. We have projected ever since a couple of years ago that this recovery would happen. It’s now happening. And so we are taking a long view, not the short view. And by inventorying the product as we get carbon approval, the value should end up easily above $100 potentially above $150 as we get CARB pathway approvals and start moving product. So we also have the federal D3 RIN currently at roughly $2 next month, the EPA announces its first government-issued mandate, let’s call it, the first 15 years of the program since 2007, it was set out in legislation. This is the EPA’s first opportunity to show that the President is actually committed to decarbonization. And we should see a recovery in D3 RIN prices if that comes to pass. So we think bedding, again, long on D3 RINs. So under the previous administration, they were $3.40 per RIN. They are $2 a day under a president who would like to support decarbonization. So we would be looking for recovery of those prices, again, putting the inventory on the ground allows us to preserve that future opportunity to participate in the price increase.

Understood. And then do you think you’ll get clearance to recognize revenues for all the 6 or 7 digesters or will this be staggered through the course of ‘23?

It’s going to be staggered because of the physicals coming out of the ground. The biggest uncertainty is a decision we have not announced yet. When we get an EPA approval, which we expect by the end of this quarter, do we just ship with what’s called a temporary pathway in California, it’s negative $150 million, and we generate revenue, but it’s going to be short what our revenue potential is when we get our final pathway. We’ll make that decision in June or so, but we certainly could start generating a significant amount of revenue, frankly, be positive cash flow from operations just by deciding to not wait for final CARB pathway approval. We are definitely intending to work with CARB and make sure that approval is expedited. And so that’s one of the reasons why we’re waiting until the end of June because if we can get an expedited pathway approval through CARB, which we’ve been successful doing in the past, then we’ll just wait until we have our full pathway approval. And there’s a significant amount of money. I mean, we’re taking millions of dollars of benefit for us to wait until we have our negative 427 pathway.

Understood. And then just for the India Biodiesel deliveries, what kind of cadence should we think about in terms of how revenues will potentially come in? Is it equal amounts spread through the course of 2023? Or will it be weighed more towards the near term versus maybe the fourth quarter?

The India governments and the 3 oil marketing companies have all stated their intention to do better at procurement so that we have a continuous operation of our plant with no breaks. We do believe that there will be delays basically at the beginning of each quarter as people are getting their papwork together. But with our ability to predict that and keep the plant operating in basically inventory of the product and then ship in the quarter, we do see an evening out of revenues. The $34 million of contracts which we have won for the second quarter, April, May and June, we started production in March. So our plant was actually operating in the first quarter. You just don’t see it in the revenues because we didn’t have the contract to sell or deliver, I should say, until April delivery, even though the contracts are put together in March. So the same as we expect to happen in July. We’ll be producing in June for delivery starting in July. We think the papwork will finally catch up in later July, but we’ll be delivering with the idea of what the quarterly looks like and this current quarter represents only about 70% of our total production capacity. We were fairly conservative about what commitments made. And as the procurement cycle improves, we’ll go from currently roughly $35 million a quarter to more than $50 million a quarter in India. So this is really only -- frankly, the only uncertainty is whether the paper or the LMC is slow. That’s it. They’ve got a stated commitment, a goal, it’s working. And if they just keep the process working, we’ll be scaling up revenues every quarter in India. With a slight winter issue in the hump months there at the end of the year. But with the fact we’re only running at 70%, you might not even notice that. So we are expecting a ramping up of our India business. And then I should note, we are not currently showing any revenues from our feedstock business, which is increasingly becoming understood as the core of profitability of renewable diesel and [sustainabilities] fuel plants, and we are the largest tallow-refining plant in India, currently showing zero revenue, but it’s no debt, fully operational capacity plant. And as we get our contracts in California, logistics finalized, that business could actually be at the same size as our biodiesel business. India is a very, very bright spot in what we’re doing.

Understood. And then with respect to the Keyes plant, now that you’ve had a chance to make some of the improvements that you are looking to make, how should we think about margins from this facility given that you can recognize some of these improvements in your selling price?

The improvements are going to be recognized gradually over the next 6 quarters. Today, we’re just getting the benefit of E15 being approved for this summer. That means a lot of ethanol that otherwise we come to California that’s produced by Midwestern producers will not. It will go to East Coast, to go down to the Gulf or stay in their own states. This is a second summer that 15% ethanol blending has been allowed. And the EPA had already proposed that next year, it would be basically finalized. So we’ll see a rapid expansion in availability of less expensive, less polluting, domestic renewable E15, 15% ethanol. And what’s pretty remarkable is as an industry, the entire U.S. capacity is about 17 billion gallons. But if you take the U.S. gasoline market, multiply 10%, 15%, it’s over 20 billion gallons. So we don’t even have the physical capacity to produce E15 across all vehicles in the United States. This is a shift from too much ethanol to too little and a need to invest in additional facilities, primarily driven by low-carbon feedstocks. So this news was taken with a shrug by the market. I don’t think people understand the market dynamics of the commodity and which demand exceeds supply. But as they look at margins, certainly in our business, the margins in California are at high marks right now and with a lack of supply coming on California, we perceive that there will be some future margin expansion just because the E15 function and crude oil prices remain elevated. So ethanol continues to be a very low-cost and low-carbon solution for buyers of gasoline.

Just last one, Eric, on the cash needs and your balance sheet with respect to all these initiatives, how are we managing through what your requirements are right now? Are there any plans to tap the capital markets, et cetera, just to fill some of these gaps while maybe these RNG revenues come into play for you?

We structured the company so that each project is a project financing in and of itself. Biogas, we closed $25 million of 20-year financing last October. We have another $25 million, we’ve announced we’re scheduled to close this quarter. and another $25 million later this year. We’ve already put $53 million of equity and grants in that project. So there’s no additional equity required. And so when you look at our biogas business plan and investors should understand, there is no need for capital other than us just to use the renewable energy for America program, which we already qualified for, and we continue to actually improve the pace in which we’re completing those fundings. So you can just take biogas and set it aside, especially as we flip the switch and turn positive cash flow as early as next month, if we decide to go ahead and take the revenue early, it’s operationally positive cash flow, project fully funded. It’s just not needed. The ethanol plant with this restart is positive cash flow. There’s no capital required to expand that business. We have $16.7 million of grants we’re spending. So it’s primarily grant-funded expansion, we put in our equity already. So largely, our projects are largely grant-funded with maybe one little exception, but will be funded through internal cash generated there. So you can take the ethanol plant set it aside, I don’t have to worry about it. India is debt-free. So India Biodiesel, India glycerin and India tallow don’t have to worry about. They’ve got a large cash balance, and they’re just growing the cash balance. It can be set aside. I don’t have to think about that one. The jet and diesel plant, we have over $30 million already invested in it, and we’ll do one project…

Your next question is coming from Derrick Whitfield from Stifel.

Eric, so today, your stock is down quite meaningfully, while the market response seems a bit aggressive relative to what you announced, we sense that investors are increasingly focused on resolution to your preferred, which is scheduled to convert into a credit agreement in June. Could you offer any color on your latest action plan with regard to refinancing the preferred or if you plan to use your business to cash flow, some element of that?

There are two outcomes to the preferred outcome actually, I should say 3 because we really should recognize the third. One outcome is extension. And I say that because that’s exactly what happened in December. We faced the same kind of discussion last fall, and we just extended. That is probably the most probable outcome here. Number two would be partial or full refinance with the debt instrument because the biogas project is operational, all the infrastructure is built, the USD is funding the actual projects. We need no cash from anybody to actually build out the project. It’s purely a discounted cash flow calculation. And with LCFS credits jumping so aggressively and next month, very possibly RFS, I’m sorry, renewable fuel standard D3 RINs also jumping as the EPA announces its new mandates. We’re very well positioned for debt refinance as a part of all of it. And I should mention as an adjunct to that, is that we are projected to generate over $150 million of investment tax credits over the course of putting this $380 million project in the ground with a portion of that is already done. So sale of inflation reduction at tax credits act to offset the needs for redemption. And then the third category is just converting to the node. I mean when you think about it, is there any dilution effect to convert it from the preferred stock to a node? It just moves it up on the balance sheet. They’re both on the right side of the balance sheet. They’re both obligations of the company. We’re just moving it to a node. And I should note for everybody that our accountants already did us that favor. For the last 4 years, they’ve never recognized this as an equity investment. It’s always…

Terrific. And with regard to the ITC, could you comment on your expectations for timing and amount as you understand it today?

There are 2 kinds of tax credit, the investment tax credit, which results from us making investments in calculation. In our case, is about 40% of that investment then shows up as a tax credit. And then second one is production tax credit. So production tax rate that start in 2025 on what’s called the clean fuels provisions of the Inflation Reduction Act. So today, the things we talk about are investment tax credits. Over the course of the project, we expect about 40% of roughly $380 million. So coming in at the $150 million range, there is some argument that we’re low, it should be 50%, but we’re not pushing the envelope on this one. The IRS is supposed to announce by June of this year, so roughly a month from now, how to transfer the credit because what’s so unique about the IRA is that you don’t have to bring the investor and as a part owner in the project, which was required in solar and in wind and other tax credits. We can simply through a certificate process transfer to one taxpayer or one time. So there’s not a Nasdaq trading market tax credits. It’s going to be one relationship between us and one investor. We could have 50 of those investors in a given project. It’s just defining how much each investor buys. So the form for doing that has not been issued. We literally don’t have a form to file with the IRS to say, "I’ve sold my tax credit to this fire." And so this is being known as the IRS guidance that everybody is looking for. And when that is issued, it is going to be a market which any federal taxpayer will wonder why they haven’t paid a smaller amount to an…

And Eric, one last for me, if I could, just because I want to make sure to be clear on the topic today. I’m showing a very positive cash margin for generic ethanol facility at present to the tune of about $0.50 per gallon. Understanding that, that is a generic number, how does that square with your calculations inclusive of plant upgrades at Keyes?

California cash margins are in that range right now and actual operations in California that are currently going on to generate that kind of number.

Your next question is coming from Matthew Blair from TPH.

Hoping you could provide just a little bit more color and update on the overall debt picture. I think there was some debt that was scheduled to mature in April, the revolver, some term notes. What’s the status on that? Was that extended or refinanced? What’s the status there?

Todd, do you want to take that?

Yes, I’d be happy to. So those facilities included provisions that allowed us to extend the notes and we exercise those options and extended the notes.

And did that come at the same rates?

Yes. The rates were not changed as a part of the extension. There was an extension fee that was paid for that option, but the rates, they were stated and the original notes remained.

Okay. And then on the India Biodiesel sales for Q2, are you expecting a similar margin as we saw in Q3 and Q4? Or with lower oil prices to have an impact there? And then also, have any of the tenders gone through yet for Q3? And if not, when approximately would you expect those to go through?

We expect a lower margin than what we had last time. Not dramatically lower, but let’s call it the moderated margin than we have before. So if you take the numbers forward moderate and slightly, we’re in the range, but it’s not quite as robust. And we expect the next procurement cycle should start in June or July, August and September and October. So we expect a 4-month procurement cycle. And the reason why is because what’s called the winter blend starts in November. So we expect that the remaining part of the summer specifications will be all in one tender offer. As you can imagine, we’re being very proactive with the oil marketing companies and trying to move the paperwork quickly so that we don’t have a gap starting July 1. But from a production perspective, we continue producing the product, and we would ship more in the 3-month period or something that there was some delay in the paperwork. It’s that confidence that they have an underlying demand that has been created through the first tender offer last fall, the second one now, the third that’s in the process. They definitely want to buy the product and the volumes that they’re requesting are so significantly more than anything the industry could produce. We know where we’re going, which is they want us to expand production to meet the demand there.

Okay. Great. And then last question. You mentioned that the dairy RNG was put in storage in Q1. So it looks like your inventory on the balance sheet rose by about $8 million from the end of 2022 to the end of the first quarter. I understand there’s probably a lot of things that go into inventory, but is that the starting point that your stored biogas would generate roughly $8 million of revenue?

Let me give you just a perspective on that. When we initially injected the carbon value, the low carbon fuel standard value was in the $65 range. It today is 86% when we actually pull it out in terms of revenue, it should be higher. CARB is saying it’s going to be $250 if we’re willing to wait for 3 quarters from now. So the value of that inventory is changing. I would focus on the number of MMBTUs and then multiply it times the current valuation in the marketplace or your own feeling of what the market is going to do, both D3 RINs and LCFS credits comprise over 90% of the value of that inventory. So the actual storage value is changing per day as LCFS prices go up and frankly, in a month as EPA sets up new D3 RIN obligations.

Your next question is coming from Jordan Levy from Truist.

This is Henry on for Jordan. In the past, you guys have mentioned a potential spin-off of the India Biodiesel segment. Just curious at this stage of something that you’re still thinking about or might come back to the table. Or if there are any other kind of strategic transactions you’re looking at in that space?

India Biodiesel is a very bullish part of our business right now. And since it’s illegal to import biodiesel into India, it is obviously a great opportunity for global companies to get exposure to the Indian market. And in India, there’s 4 domestically owned businesses, and there’s us. We’re the only foreign-owned biodiesel producer and we’re the largest in the country. We are not currently in discussions on a strategic arrangement with an oil company or a private equity firm. We did have a very extensive investment banker meetings, and they’re standing by waiting for a phone call from us to do an IPO in India. And the IPO market in India is very much structured to favor the offering company with a high valuation. And as a result, you can raise a lot of cash very quickly in India. We believe we need to put up a couple of quarters and have continued positive trends with our tallow business, and we have a very significant opportunity in India, but probably not this year. I think we’re talking next year. So I don’t want to leave anybody’s expectation that we’re hopping around looking for a Q3 or Q4 transaction. What we’re looking to do is to show our scale up and our scale-up is very significant in India, both revenues as well as margins and our strategic position is just fantastic. And so we believe we’ll be probably, if not the best beneficiary of the renewable fuels and biodiesel business in India. We’ll be certainly the top 2. And I don’t even know who the other one would be, out of the 5, who we know very, very well, the other 4, we are just excellently positioned to do a public transaction in India.

Awesome. And then just a quick follow-up. Going to the digester side, I know you mentioned that the plan is to bring online about 10 more digesters by year-end this year. Any headwinds or risk we should be looking at in terms of bringing that on? Or is that a pretty conservative number from year-end?

To be specific, we’ll be constructing 10 more. So I just want to make sure we get that phraseology right. So we’ll have additional wins that are online, but some will be filling some will be in the construction phase, et cetera. I do expect the pace to be faster because the hard part, which is the pipeline, the RNG facility and the interconnect, that’s done. All we’re doing right now is these rectangular piles of dirt with layers of rubber in a skid with some processing equipment. It’s a repeatable activity we’re doing now. And so as we move at the pace of USD funding, because that’s actually what is our pace. We are not putting in $25 million of new equity by diluting shareholders. We’re putting in $25 million of USDA funding this month with no dilution at all the shareholders. So as we move the USDA funding mechanism better and better and faster and faster, and I was on the phone with the USDA this morning on a very positive, we’re closing this month, discussion. Our job is to continue to be good and get better at getting that 20-year financing at low-interest rates guaranteed by the USDA. That’s what they need to make their program successful. That’s what we’re doing. I agree, have been slower at executing it because we’re committed to the idea that our business model needs to work and our business model is leveraging this business without dilution of shareholders and we’re proving it in the biogas business.

Your next question is coming from Ed Woo from Ascendiant Capital.

Yes. Can you talk about the logistics involved with getting the case plant back up? And how long or how quickly can you get it back to full capacity?

Andy, do you want to respond to that?

Sure. The logistics are relatively straightforward. It’s corn supply, which currently railroad is showing some improvement over last year. As far as the physical plant start-up, it’s probably takes about, I’d say, a week for us to get back to full production, maybe 7 days, maybe 10 days, but it should be relatively quick. So as we’re finalizing our plans, we should be able to enter the market relatively quickly. I think it’s pretty straightforward.

Great. And I wish you guys good luck.

Your next question is coming from Dave Storms from Stonegate Capital Markets.

My question is regards to the Keyes plant. Can you just quantify how the economic viability of operating that plant has improved after implementing all the upgrades you talked about? And how that may even get better as you complete the upgrades through the end of this year?

Let me take that on initially, and then I’ll have Andy wrap it up. We have 2 factors. Number one is external commodity price factors. In the first quarter, the price of natural gas was tremendously high. It hit a high of $83 intra-day trading and it’s usually a $5 or $6. So that drove us to make decision to accelerate our upgrades and do basically a 10-year plant maintenance cycle, which just positions us tremendously for lower cost and more sustainable operation. So that external market has now moved to being very, very positive. E15 has created overall demand in the U.S. that’s much higher over the next 3 or 4 months because the retail stations are no longer going to be forced to have to only sell 10% ethanol during the 3-month summer driving season. Now they can sell 50% more than that. So the California market is going to not receive as much ethanol in the Midwest as we usually do. So the external market for that natural gas prices have recovered down to basically the same level it was roughly 6 months ago. So our commodity markets have moved in a positive direction, good price of ethanol, reasonable price of corn, good price of natural gas. Internally though, our upgrade projects then give us a fundamental lower cost of operation. We spent over, let’s call it $1 million a month on natural gas as we get rid of 80% of that, that’s a permanent $800,000 month or $10 million a year improvement in our economics. Andy, you want to talk about the phasing of adopting the Solar, MVR and ZEBREX process over the next year or so?

Sure. So to echo what Eric said, there’s 2 ways to look at it, the short term, which is really the current market. And as Eric mentioned, from the price of corn to the price of ethanol, the tight supply in California, the crush margins in California look pretty positive. I’d say, through the summer, we expect that to continue. South America is going to show a strong corn crop. Midwest farmers are planting too early to predict anything about this year’s corn crop. But the carry seems to be pretty significant. There were some activity in terms of corn purchasing by China and a couple of those were canceled. So I think people are pretty comfortable with the current supply and pricing seems to be calmed down from where it was over the last few years. So in the near term, at least through the summer, I think we see a pretty positive market from the ethanol perspective in terms of a crush margin. As far as the improvements that we’re making at the plant, we’re really -- if you take it as an extension of what California is working towards this zero carbon goal and removing fossil fuels, we are probably right at the leading edge if we’re not the leader on electrifying a large manufacturing facility. So if you just look at it as a manufacturing facility going from using natural gas to electricity is a pretty significant undertaking. And what we’re doing is we’ve already brought in the Mitsubishi ZEBREX dehydration system, which we run and we’re continuing to adjust as we go along because frankly, it’s the largest installation they’ve ever done. So it’s got some hiccups along the way, but when we run it, we’ve seen an over 20% reduction in our natural gas…

That concludes our Q&A session. I would like to turn the floor back over to management for closing comments.

Good. Thank you very much. We really want to thank all of you for spending time with us today, and we look forward to further discussions with you about our plans. We really would invite you to review the Aemetis company presentation that’s posted on the homepage of the Aemetis website. Todd?

Thank you for attending today’s Aemetis earnings conference call. Please visit the Investors section of the Aemetis website, where we’ll post a written version and an audio version of this earnings review and business update. Matt?

This concludes today’s teleconference. You may disconnect your lines at this time. Thank you for your participation.