A solid business strategy and continued focus on competitive electricity and natural gas offers to customers sees ENMAX making significant gains in the first part of 2007.

“Sales are up 45% as increasing numbers of Albertans choose our competitively priced offers,” said Gary Holden, President & CEO of ENMAX Corporation. “Customers are beginning to reap the benefits of a deregulated market in Alberta.  Our long-term contracts deliver value to customers, while our overall net earnings growth of almost 30% shows that we continue to deliver real value to our shareholder.”

“Our recently announced 1,200 MW power station will provide the capacity that we need to offer competitively priced certainty to our rapidly growing number of customers,” concluded Holden.

Net income for the first quarter 2007 was $32.6 million compared with $25.3 million for the same period last year, an increase of 28.9%. Increases in consolidated net earnings were the result of several factors including higher sales volumes in electricity and natural gas. Net earnings were also impacted by inflationary pressure on operating costs and increased costs to manage growth of the Calgary infrastructure.

Both electricity and natural gas sales made substantial gains over 2006 quarterly results. ENMAX electricity customers purchased 3,975 GWh in the first three months of 2007 compared to 2,995 GWh over the same period last year.  Sales volumes of natural gas in the first quarter grew to 9,192 TJ’s up from 5,877 TJ’s for the first quarter of 2006.  

Capital spending for the three months ended March 31, 2007 totaled $99.8 million, due primarily to the purchase of an additional 10% interest in the Battle River PPA (Power Purchase Agreement), continued construction of the Taber Wind Farm and  expansion and upgrades to the transmission and distribution networks in the Calgary and surrounding area.

ENMAX paid $12.5 million in the first quarter of 2007 toward the $50 million total dividend the Company declared to its shareholder earlier in the year. 

ENMAX Corporation and its predecessors have provided Albertans with safe and reliable electricity for 100 years. ENMAX provides electricity, natural gas, renewable energy and value-added services to more than 500,000 residential, commercial and industrial customer accounts in Alberta through its subsidiary companies. ENMAX Energy contracts low-cost reliable electricity from the Keephills and Battle River coal-fired plants and meets peak demand through a long term agreement with the natural gas fired Calgary Energy Centre. Through a subsidiary, it is one of Alberta’s largest investors in renewable energy with 50 per cent ownership of the McBride Lake Wind Farm and 100 per cent ownership of the Taber Wind Farm. ENMAX Energy has the largest green power marketing program of its kind in Canada and in 2006, received the Consumer Champion Award for its ground-breaking EasyMax® program. For more information, visit our website at enmax.com.