FCC Improves EBITDA by 9.3% for First Half of 2019

FCC Environment presented its Zero Waste masterplan in the U.K. FCC Environment presented a new masterplan linked to its Greengairs Landfill in direct response to the Scottish Government's Zero Waste strategy. Under the strategy, the disposal of biodegradable waste in landfills will be prohibited beginning January 2021, creating a significant shortage of treatment facilities. The construction of the Drumgray complex will cost approximately €400 million and will include an energy-from-waste plant for biodegradable waste that would otherwise be disposed of in the landfill. The facility will be able to process up to 300,000 tons of waste per year, and its 25.5-megawatt electricity generator will supply power and heat to local homes and businesses.

FCC Aqualia entered France and expanded its footprint in the UAE with two new contracts worth €100 million. In June, FCC Aqualia acquired Services Publics et Industries Environnement, a French end-to-end water management company. Additionally, in Spain, it acquired Agua y Gestión and a stake in Codeur. These acquisitions amounted to a total of €38 million. This area also obtained a €40 million contract for operation and maintenance of the wastewater system in the city of Abu Dhabi and in the adjacent islands of Al Reem, Al Maryah and Al Saadiyat. Additionally, the client administration has renewed the sanitation contract for the city of Al Ain, in the east of the Emirates, for seven years, representing more than €60 million in revenues.

As a result, Aqualia's contracts in the Arabian Peninsula (Saudi Arabia, UAE, Qatar and Oman) amount to more than €600 million. The projects, which are mostly medium- and long-term concessions, reflect the growing success and acceptance of the public-private partnership model for developing and operating essential infrastructure in the region, where the company serves a total of 6 million people.

In the first quarter of 2019, FCC Environment signed a deal to develop and operate a new energy-from-waste (EfW) plant in Lostock, England, in partnership with Copenhagen Infrastructure Partners fund, owning 60 percent and 40 percent, respectively. The project represents a total investment of £480 million. Once operational, it will one of the largest EfW facilities in Europe, with an initial capacity to process 600,000 tons per year.

Also, in the U.K., the company obtained a contract worth more than £26 million to operate 11 recycling centers in Suffolk. It already operates close to 100 household recycling centers in the U.K., recycling and recovering 1.6 million tons of waste each year.

Palm Beach County, Fla., awarded FCC Environmental Services, the parent company of the environment division in the United States, a municipal solid waste collection contract worth $215 million, which runs for seven years beginning October 1. FCC will deliver the service using a fleet of 108 vehicles, including 90 garbage trucks and a range of light vehicles.

This fourth contract in Florida, alongside the existing contracts in Orlando (Orange County) and Lakeland (Polk County), enhances FCC's position in the U.S. FCC's backlog in municipal services in the U.S., which also includes 10 contracts in Texas, amounts to $1.1 million and serves a total population of 8 million.

At FCC's shareholders' meeting in May, shareholders approved all the items on the agenda, including a flexible (scrip) dividend. As a result, FCC paid €0.4 per share to the shareholders who opted for cash and the equivalent amount in shares to the remainder. More than 99 percent of the shareholders opted for shares. This is the first time that the FCC Group has used a flexible dividend formula of this type.