GFL Environmental Inc. (NYSE:GFL) (TSX:GFL) (“GFL”, “we”, “our” or the “Company”) today provided an update on its capital allocation strategy for 2024.
Patrick Dovigi, GFL’s Founder and Chief Executive Officer said, “We remain committed to making the disciplined capital allocation decisions that we expect will generate outsized returns while continuing on our trajectory of de-levering the business, with a focus on moving toward an investment grade credit rating. In order to align expectations for 2024, we are also providing detail on our planned growth capital expenditures for the coming year.”
Mr. Dovigi continued, “Our growth capital expenditures in 2024 will focus on sustainability investments and the continued execution of our M&A strategy. We believe that the sustainability-related investments we are making represent the best risk adjusted returns that we have seen in decades. On M&A, our investments in 2024 will be focused on densifying our existing footprint. Given our current pipeline, we are confident that we can deploy capital into these accretive opportunities at attractive valuation multiples consistent with our track record.”
The details of the incremental growth capital expected to be deployed by GFL in 2024 are as follows:
- $250 million to $300 million in investments related to renewable natural gas (“RNG”) projects, material recovery facilities and other infrastructure primarily related to opportunities arising under extended producer responsibility (“EPR”) legislation.
- $600 million to $650 million in M&A opportunities within its existing geographies.
The total amount to be deployed by GFL into these growth opportunities in 2024 will not exceed $900 million. This amount will be in addition to GFL’s normal course capital expenditures in the year which are expected to be between $850 million and $900 million.
The EPR-related investments are expected to generate an incremental $40 million to $50 million of Adjusted EBITDA1, resulting in an aggregate of $80 million to $100 million of incremental Adjusted EBITDA1 that GFL expects to realize starting in Q4 2024 and ramping up to the full run rate by 2026. GFL’s first RNG facility at Arbor Hills is now online and the Company continues to develop its portfolio of other RNG projects that it expects will come online starting in Q4 2024 through 2026.
Mr. Dovigi concluded, “As we said in our Q3 investor call, we expect to realize at least $2.2 billion of Adjusted EBITDA1 in our base business in 2024 and organically de-lever to the mid 3’s by the end of that year. These incremental growth investments will add approximately 20 basis points to our leverage, yielding Net Leverage1 at year end of between 3.65x and 3.85x. We are fully committed to these targets and we anticipate this balanced approach to capital allocation will further demonstrate our absolute commitment to de-levering. We look forward to updating you in February on our 2023 results, 2024 guidance and broader outlook.”
