Tidal / Storage / valuation28 Jun 2024 16:08
Nice to have the gang around without the spammers. Thought I'd put down a few thoughts ahead of the weekend and in response to what a few people are saying.
Tidal
Given the tidal beginnings of SAE and how excited most of us are for the technology it seems there's a bit of disappointment at a perceived relegation of the technology. I would say that I don't feel this quite the right way to look at it, it's more a case that the storage side of the business has clearly surged in value, in a way that took SAE by surprise (or wasn't apparent at outset) as well as all of us. Noticeable to me in reading the report was how many times the words "Scottish Government" appeared alongside Meygen, which I find very reassuring. I think the tone about Meygen is one of realism, everyone is aware of the scale of the task but I don't think anyone believes that SAE isn't up to it after so many years work. Just because there is now a very strong supportive side of the business now in storage, I think it would be an error to see this as anything but an asset to a tidal side of the business that is firstly linked to storage anyway, and secondly will be very lucrative in its own time.
Well done to Munin with the eagle eyes on the reduction in the Proteus holding - that is indeed a little disappointing, but again and as mentioned there is work in-kind (Proteus do the work at Nigg and the buyout also included their covering certain operations at Meygen) so I would be surprised if there wasn't some arrangement where the return of equity wasn't covered by something that saved SAE on some opex costs. At root and though we started out as turbine manufacturers, I think we probably just need to adjust our horizon to being the Orsted and not the Vestas of tidal, and that's fine by me.
Storage
It's clear the potential of the grid-ready storage prospects is huge, and these projects are also fantastically deliverable. The determination evident in the recent interviews and report to have SAE operating rather than only building and selling these projects is for me the crucial factor in realising this value. With financial stability now seemingly secure, it doesn't seem impossible to start getting in shape for this.
Value
This in turn for now is I feel the main determinant of the SP and overall value. In the past I considered the UK's main energy storage supplier, Gresham, as the obvious comparator, although then the scale of Gresham compared to a single 200MW at Usk, that we weren't operating ourselves, seemed ridiculous. Now I'm less sure. Gresham have around 700MW in operation and more being built, but a 1GW storage target for SAE hardly seems unrealistic, so again the key is that we operate and profit ourselves.
Value
This brings me to value, and of course for now it is to an extent anybody's guess, though higher valuations and multiples don't right now seem crazy. Gresham were valued at £1/share before Tories destroyed the economy and Labour binned th