Hello. My name is Shelby, and I'll be your conference facilitator. At this time, I would like to welcome everyone to the MDU Resources Group 2017 Year-End Results and 2018 Guidance Conference Call. All lines have been placed on mute to prevent any background noise. After the speakers' remarks, there will be a question-and-answer period. This call will be available for replay beginning at 5:00 PM Eastern Time today through 11:59 PM Eastern Time on February 21. The conference ID number for the replay is 3158659. Again, the conference ID number for the replay is 3158659. The number to dial in for the replay is 1-855-859-2056 or 404-537-3406. I would now like to turn the call over Jason Vollmer, Vice President, Chief Financial Officer and Treasurer of MDU Resources Group. Thank you, Mr. Vollmer. You may begin your conference.

Thank you, Shelby. Welcome to our 2017 year-end earnings and 2018 guidance conference call. This conference call is being broadcast live to the public over the Internet and slides will accompany our remarks. If you would like to view the slides, please go to our website at www.mdu.com and follow the link to the conference call. Our earnings release is also available on our website. During the course of this presentation, we will make certain forward-looking statements within the meaning of Section 21E of the Securities Exchange Act of 1934. Although the company believes that its expectations and beliefs are based on reasonable assumptions, actual results may differ materially. For a discussion of factors that may cause actual results to differ, refer to item 1A, Risk Factors in our most recent Form 10-K. Through our call today, I will discuss key financial highlights and then turn the presentation over to Dave Goodin, President and CEO of MDU Resources, for his formal remarks. After Dave's remarks, we will open the line for questions. In addition to Dave and myself, members of our management team who are available to answer questions today are Dave Barney, President and CEO of Knife River Corporation; Jeff Thiede, President and CEO of MDU Construction Services Group; Nicole Kivisto, President and CEO of Cascade Natural Gas, Great Plains Natural Gas, Intermountain Gas, and Montana Dakota Utilities; Trevor Hastings, President and CEO of WBI Energy; and Stephanie Barth, Vice President, Chief Accounting Officer and Controller of MDU Resources. Yesterday afternoon, we announced 2017 earnings from continuing operations of $284.2 million or $1.45 per share compared to 2016 earnings from continuing operations of $232.4 million or $1.19 per share. In the fourth quarter, earnings from continuing operations were $115.4 million or $0.59 per share compared to $66.3 million or…

Thank you, Jason and good afternoon everyone. Thank you for your interest in MDU Resources and for taking time to join us today to discuss our results. 2017 really exemplified why we have our tag line of building a strong America. The products and services we provide, whether it's the infrastructure that supports our nation's transportation network or the electrical services that support our nation's grid, down to our commercial customers, or it's the heat and electricity we provide to more than 1 million homes and businesses or the natural gas that we move to market, everything we do helps to build a strong America. I couldn't be more proud of our management teams' and employees' ability to effectively and safely execute their jobs and our 2017 results reflect this success. Our utility companies reported record earnings from implemented rate relief and higher electric and natural gas sales volumes. We continue to experience good customer growth, up about 2% this year to nearly 1.1 million customers, and we expect our utility customer base to continue to grow at a rate between 1% and 2% annually. Our utility segment is focused on a number of organic growth opportunities which are expected to lead to substantial rate base growth. The Thunder Spirit Wind expansion is one of those opportunities. Construction is well underway, and after receiving advanced determination and prudence from the North Dakota Public Service Commission, we expect to have a purchase agreement in place very soon. This previously announced expansion will grow the company's electric generation portfolio to approximately 27% renewables, and should be on line later this year. Another growth opportunity, our Big Stone South to Ellendale, joint venture transmission line, has secured all easements required for construction and is expected to be complete in 2019. Our share of…

Your first question comes from Paul Ridzon of KeyBanc.

Good afternoon.

Hello. Hi, Paul. Good afternoon.

Congratulations on a solid quarter.

Hey, thank you very much.

Question on the construction materials backlog being down. Do you get the sense that maybe some projects, people are kind of sitting on their hands waiting to see if there's any federal action?

Paul, I'm going to ask Dave Barney to weigh in on that. I know – I'll reinforce. It's the third highest level we've ever had from a record perspective. But Dave can give you more color as to what constitutes the entire backlog.

I will. On our construction backlog, it's down right now, but we're heading into the main part of the season for us. So, we're not too concerned with the construction backlog. We got a good backlog schedule ahead of us. Our only concern is not having a federal DOT budget passed right now and how that's going to affect DOTs in cities and counties. But, I expect our backlog to pick back up later in through the year.

And then, secondly, of the backlogs you've announced, what percent of those do you think was booked before tax reform? In other words, kind of pricing in a 35% tax rate.

If I had to guess, I would say probably 75% to 80% was booked before tax reform.

Paul, ...

(00:17:47). Sorry. Go ahead.

Sorry, Paul. I should – would you like, Jeff Thiede, to weigh in so far CSG's backlog of $708 million as well?

That was my next question. Thank you.

Okay.

Hi, Paul. This is Jeff. Yes, most of our $708 million of backlog was booked before implementation of tax reform.

Do you have a – lastly, do you have a sense of when you expect to sign the purchase agreement with Thunder Spirit?

Paul, I'll ask Nicole to weigh in on that, I would say, shortly, but she can give you more definition on that.

Yeah. As we noted in the news release, we expect that to be soon, so in February, sometime this month.

Okay. Thank you very much.

Thank you, Paul.

Your next question from Sarah Akers of Wells Fargo.

Hey. Good afternoon.

Hi, Sarah. Good afternoon to you as well.

Thank you. Dave, when you mentioned challenges at materials early in the year, was that referring to 2017 with the weather or were you referring to 2018?

This is Dave Goodin. I'll start and Dave Barney can add in. I was referring to 2017, the challenges we had with near-record precipitation in many of our markets and the late start that we got to 2017. Really, a reversal of that here in the fourth quarter where, again, we actually picked up $10 million in earnings in the fourth quarter quarter-over-quarter between 2017 and 2016, our ability to complete projects really with weather helpful in that quarter.

Okay. And then, are you seeing any pickup in bidding opportunities whether that's related to the Federal FAST Act that's been on the books for a while, or any pick up related to the various state transportation funding bills?

Sarah, is your question specific to materials or...

Yes.

Okay. So, Dave Barney.

Yeah. We've seen a pickup, Sarah, definitely in the FAST Act in itself (00:20:11). We – and especially in the states like California and Oregon has put in special funding in their states for DOT. And so, we're definitely seeing that come out just starting in 2018 and a little bit at the end of 2017. So, we definitely expect it to be up over 2017.

Got it. Thanks a lot.

Thank you, Sarah.

This marks the last call for questions. This call will be available for replay beginning at 5:00 PM Eastern Time today through 11:59 PM Eastern Time on February 21. The conference ID number for the replay is 3158659. Again, the conference ID number for the replay is 3158659. At this time, there are no further questions. I would now like to turn the conference back over to management for closing remarks.

Thank you. As I mentioned earlier, we'll continue to update you on our progress as we better understand how our businesses are impacted by the Tax Cuts and Jobs Act as it relates particularly to our guidance. We are committed to building a strong America along with being optimistic about our opportunities for the rest of the year as well as beyond. And we do appreciate your participation on the call today. And so, with that, I'll turn this back to the operator.

This concludes today's MDU Resources Group conference call. Thank you for your participation. You may now disconnect.