Good day, and welcome, ladies and gentlemen, to the Alliant Energy’s Second Quarter 2014 Earnings Conference Call. [Operator Instructions] Today’s conference is being recorded. I would now like to turn the conference over to your host, Susan Gille, Manager of Investor Relations at Alliant Energy.

Good morning. I would like to thank you on the call and the web cast for joining us today. We appreciate your participation. With me here today are Pat Kampling, Chairman, President and Chief Executive Officer; Tom Hanson, Senior Vice President and CFO; and Robert Durian, Controller and Chief Accounting Officer; as well as other members of the senior management team. Following prepared remarks by Pat and Tom, we will have time to take questions from the investment community. We issued a news release yesterday, announcing Alliant Energy’s second quarter 2014 earnings and reaffirming 2014 earnings guidance. This release, as well as supplemental slides that will be referenced during today’s call, are available on the Investor Page of our website at www.alliantenergy.com. Before we begin, I need to remind you that the remarks we make on this call and our answers to your questions include forward-looking statements. These forward-looking statements are subject to risks that could cause actual results to be materially different. Those risks include, among others, matters discussed in Alliant Energy’s press release issued yesterday and in our filings with the Securities and Exchange Commission. We disclaim any obligation to update these forward-looking statements. At this point, I'll turn the call over to Pat.

Good morning, and thank you for joining us today. I am pleased to report that we had another solid quarter. Consolidated earnings were $0.56 per share, bringing our year-to-date earnings in at $1.53 per share, which is $0.28 higher than year-to-date earnings last year. Included in our year-to-date earnings is a positive weather benefit of $0.14 per share. However, we expect that the mild July weather will negatively impact earnings by approximately $0.09 per share. Therefore, our year-end earnings are now trending back towards the midpoint of our earnings guidance issued in November 2013, which was based on normal weather. The economy continues to improve in our service territories. Unemployment rates in both Iowa and Wisconsin are below the national average and we continue to see higher electric usage from our industrial customers, with increases of 2.5% in the second quarter, and 3.6% year-to-date, compared to the same periods last year. It is great to see our communities experiencing economic expansion across many industrial sectors throughout our service territory. Tom will provide more detail on these sales trends later. 2014 is a critical year as we transform our generation fleet and I'm happy to report that all the projects are progressing very well. We recently celebrated the completion of Columbia's baghouses and scrubbers. The project was placed in-service on time, and we estimate that the total cost will be approximately 5% below the $630 million original budget. The installation of the baghouse and scrubber at Ottumwa is on-time and on budget and expected to be placed in-service in December. In addition, MidAmerican has completed construction of baghouses and scrubbers at Neal Units 3 and 4. Also, the construction of Lansing's scrubber will begin this month, and the construction of Edgewater unit 5 baghouse and scrubber recently started. In addition to…

Good morning, everyone. We announced second quarter 2014 earnings last evening with our GAAP earnings from continuing operations of $0.56 per share. These earnings are a $0.03 share decrease when compared to 2013 second quarter earnings of $0.59 per share. Comparisons between 2014 and 2013 second quarter earnings per share are detailed on Slides 2 and 3. Second quarter 2014 earnings were lower than second quarter 2013, primarily due to retail electric consumer billing credits at IPL, higher energy efficiency cost amortizations at WPL, higher generation, O&M and interest expenses at IPL and higher depreciation expense at both IPL and WPL, resulting from placing environmental projects in service. These negative drivers were partially offset by lower capacity payments related to the renegotiation of the Duane Arnold Energy Center purchased power contract and the expiration of the Kewaunee Nuclear Power Plant PPA. The reduction of the capacity payments allows us to earn a return on and of rate base increases at both utilities while keeping retail consumer base rate stable. Our current forecast for weather normalized sales, and a comparison to 2013 weather normalized sales is illustrated Slide 4. Based on our sales-to-date and our forecasted sales for the rest of the year, we have increased our projected industrial and commercial sales at WPL and have left the projected IPL increase unchanged when compared to our 2014 sales forecast for first quarter call. Several industrial customers have expanded their operations or have increased their production to meet demand. Industrial segments experiencing electric sales growth due to plant or production expansions include chemicals, health services and manufacturing. For our residential sales at both IPL and WPL, we are now forecasting weather normalized sales growth of approximately 1% to 1.5% when compared to last year. IPL's tax benefit riders resulted in a $0.01…

[Operator Instructions] We'll have our first question from Andrew Weisel, Macquarie.

My first question is on the usage trend, you sound incrementally more positive. Can you talk about the weather adjusted load growth in the quarter? Typically, you include that in the EPS bridge, but I didn't see anything about either weather or the weather-normalized trends.

If you take a look at our earnings release, on the last page, we show some of the operating statistics for the quarter. Really, weather was basically comparable to the second quarter of 2013. So quarter-over-quarter, there's really no difference. The benefit that Pat referred to, really, was predominantly in the first quarter. And in terms of the sales forecast, as I did say, we are seeing some improvement in our industrial and commercial, and for all intents and purposes, residential is kind of still hovering at that 1% to 1.5% level.

Okay, great. Next question is on O&Ms. Last call, we talked about potentially accelerating some of that given how strong the winter was and that you had some flexibility both for the planned expenses in '14 and '15. How should we think about that now given that it sounds like July was not particularly good for you guys? Should we think of O&Ms going back toward what the original budget was before the year started, or have you already pulled forward some of the spending that would help 2015 earnings?

Sure, Andrew. We did pull some of the O&Ms forward. However, we still have flexibility as the year unfolds. We still have August and September to get through, which are -- again, we're a third quarter company. But we still have flexibility to move the O&M around as warranted.

Okay. So again, should I think about the full-year budget as of now looking similar to how it was when we entered the year and similar for next year's budget?

Assume that the incremental O&M is in that probably about $7 million range of additional spending that was not originally intended in our forecast when we issued this last year.

Great, that's very helpful. And then lastly, there's the comment about the WPL earnings deferral. What was the earned ROE at WPL you needed to take the deferral? And can you just remind how the process works, is that a one-time charge or could that reverse if the ROE falls in future quarters?

Yes. It certainly is metrical. So as, certainly, sales and weather would move up and down, certainly, that would go commensurate with that. But we were above the 10.65% for the second quarter, and that's why we needed to then take the reserve for the fact that we're now in the first year where there's a sharing mechanism with customers at 50% for each of the 2 parties.

We will go next to Brian Russo, Ladenburg Thalmann. Brian J. Russo - Ladenburg Thalmann & Co. Inc., Research Division: Sorry if I missed this earlier, but I got on the call just before the Q&A started. I'm just curious, the $0.11 negative driver for the retail electric customer billing credits at IPL, is that just a first -- second quarter or is that something we're going to see throughout the year?

Yes, Brian, that has to do with the $70 million credit going back to customers this year, and IPL is part of the settlement. So you'll be seeing that each quarter this year. Brian J. Russo - Ladenburg Thalmann & Co. Inc., Research Division: Okay. So roughly $0.11 each quarter or just relative to the seasonality of sales?

Yes, seasonality because it's based on kilowatt hours.

We did start this in May, Brian, and assume it's $70 million, then, for calendar year '14. Brian J. Russo - Ladenburg Thalmann & Co. Inc., Research Division: Okay. And, I assume you reaffirmed your 5% to 7% EPS CAGR?

Yes we did. Brian J. Russo - Ladenburg Thalmann & Co. Inc., Research Division: Okay, great. And then, just can you remind me what the normalized sales growth assumption is?

We did talk about that, Brian. In terms of the commercial and industrial, we're continue to see an improvement in the economy. So we're looking at about a 2% increase at IPL in terms of industrial and commercial and at WPL, a little bit higher at 4%. And if you look at Slide 4, we typically share the comparison to last year, so hopefully, that's a slide that you're familiar with, Brian. Brian J. Russo - Ladenburg Thalmann & Co. Inc., Research Division: Yes, that's helpful. And what about the residential?

Residential, we're seeing about a 1% to 1.5% increase.

We'll go next to Andy Levi, Avon Capital.

Sorry if we kind of go over some stuff that maybe was said. We've got a lot of different calls going on today. So anyway, just weather wise, I don't know if you covered this already. I know you talked about, there was $0.09 anticipated, at least for the third quarter that -- versus normal right, that's what you said?

Yes. The impacts for the mild weather in July were estimating to be approximately a $0.09 drag. And that's just for July.

Just for July, okay. And...

The first half of the year, we had a positive $0.14.

Okay. So right now, we're at probably about positive $0.05 versus normal, absent August.

Yes.

Got it. And then, just on the comment on the $150 million of equity, which has obviously been in your forecast, how would you characterize that now? Because I know, I don't know, maybe there was some thinking that maybe you weren't going to need all of it, and obviously, you're still not on that phase of exactly whether you do or don't, I would still guess, or you're definitely going to do the $150 million?

Our plan does assume that we're moving forward with the $150 million, Andy.

Okay. So that's definite, there's no kind of flexibility there?

Well, our plan assumes that.

Could that plan change, or should we just assume that, that's kind of locked in?

We always reassess our needs. But what we're trying to do is at least, as a planning assumption, provide an indication that right now, we would anticipate issuing up to $150 million of equity.

So let me ask the question another way. I'm good at that. What would cause you not to need to issue that much equity if there is anything?

Certainly, changing cash flows would be a significant contributor. Recognizing the reason we're issuing the equity is to maintain our target equity ratios at the 2 equal utilities. So again, that's the primary driver. So to the extent that we would see incremental earnings at the 2 utilities, additional cash flows, certainly, that would suggest that $150 million could be potentially reduced.

Okay. Does bonus depreciation or the extension of that have any bearing on it?

Very little, because our NOL positions now would take us through 2016.

Got it, okay. So it sounds like it's pretty locked in.

It's a planning assumption, Andy.

Ms. Gille, there are no further questions at this time.

With no more questions, this concludes our call. A replay will available through August 14, 2014 at (888) 203-1112 for U.S. and Canada, or (719) 457-0820 for international. Callers should reference conference ID 8244179. In addition, an archive of the conference call and a script of the prepared remarks made on the call will be available on the Investor section of the company website later today. We thank you for your continued support of Alliant Energy, and feel free to contact me with any follow-up questions.