Weyerhaeuser Company (NYSE:WY) Q4 2022 Earnings Call Transcript

Anthony Pettinari: Devin, in lumber, you talked about, I think, the very large number of curtailments that we’ve seen in BC. And I was wondering, in aggregate, do you have a sense if there are still kind of meaningful curtailments to go, or has that maybe sort of run its course and was more sort of a seasonal — the seasonal actions with lumber, maybe back above 400, could we see some of that capacity coming back? I was just wondering if you could kind of talk about how the dynamic in BC could play out this year, assuming we’re somewhere close to current lumber prices.

Devin Stockfish: Yes. Well, look, I’ll just say at the outset, it’s hard for me to comment specifically on the cost structure of my competitors. So, I’ll just offer some broad commentary because we obviously do have some operations in BC. And I think certainly, we’ve seen a fair amount of capacity curtailment. I don’t think that was unexpected, just given the higher cost structure that you see in British Columbia now. A variety of reasons for that, and we’ve discussed that in the past. I think the curtailment activity is just going to be dependent on where lumber prices go. I think for where we were for much of the fourth quarter, particularly at the end of the year, it would be very challenging for the economics to make sense in British Columbia.

Now, we’ve seen prices come up just a little bit. As you know, the log price adjustment mechanism does happen quarterly, so that will adjust down a little bit. But, it remains a very high-cost region to manufacture lumber. And so, lumber prices are going to have to stay well north of probably the historical averages for the economics to work in that geography. And I’d say too in the Pacific Northwest for that matter. The log cost to lumber ratio that we’ve seen recently has been pretty challenging for the Pacific Northwest. And so, I suspect there are a number of producers that have been challenged in this environment as well. So, until you see lumber prices go up or log prices go down, the economics are challenging, and you could see continued curtailment activity.

Anthony Pettinari: Okay. That’s very helpful. And then just following up on George’s question on Natural Climate Solutions. If you look at the kind of the work streams and the different activities there, whether it’s wind or solar or forest carbon or CCS, is there a sense that sort of partner interest and adoption is maybe progressing faster than expected or maybe slower than expected if you look at those different categories compared to when you kind of first unveiled those targets at your Analyst Day? And are there any sort of obstacles or pain points as you pursue some of these projects? Just curious if there’s any additional color there.

Devin Stockfish: Yes. I would say, on balance, the interest level has gone up since we first announced this target. And that’s really true across the board, whether you’re talking about conservation, mitigation with all the infrastructure activity that’s going to happen over the next several years, there’s going to be a lot of need for mitigation banking, carbon capture and storage, particularly with the 45Q tax credit going up to $85, solar wind, forest carbon. There’s really a very significant amount of interest across all of those categories. The challenge is the time line to get these things to come to fruition. And that’s true, particularly when you talk about the renewables, you think about solar. The demand for solar is off the chart.