CEO Alan Armstrong said Williams is prepared to meet the accelerating demand for natural gas transmission capacity in the United States, particularly in the high-growth regions where the company operates.
“We’ve been delivering consecutive year-over-year growth for more than a decade at Williams, and all signals indicate that the future will be even stronger as demand for natural gas accelerates due to increasing electrification and LNG exports,” he told analysts during a call about third quarter 2024 earnings.
Armstrong said utilities across the Mid-Atlantic and Southeast markets have reported missing growth targets for power generation. Williams is well positioned to serve these customers with projects like the Southside Supply Enhancement expansion of Williams’ Transco system, designed to provide reliable power where much of this data center growth is expected.
He noted that Williams also recently signed a precedent agreement for expansion of the existing Dalton lateral that serves northern Georgia. This expansion will be an opportunity to support load growth from electric power generation demand driven by industrial reshoring and data center growth.
Data centers will drive strong regional growth in both baseload and peak power demand as they tend to operate around the clock, a tailwind for natural gas.
In interview with CNBC Money Movers, Armstong said a significant amount of capital is going to be required to build out the nation’s energy infrastructure and keep up with growing demand from AI and data centers.
“A tremendous amount of demand has been building up,” he said, adding large utilities are contracting now for future capacity. Additionally, data center developers are seeking on-site power generation.
“We’re seeing people contacting us directly, wanting to get natural gas off of our big systems to fuel new power generation in what they call behind the meter,” he said. “So rather than going through the utilities, they’re actually wanting to install their own power generation and not have to deal with the long queues that exist in a lot of places right now to get connected to the grid.”
In another interview with Fox Business Network, Armstrong said building out energy infrastructure in the United States will not only lower costs for consumers but help our global allies through exports of LNG.
“We used to play defense as it relates to our national security on energy,” he said. “Today we’re in a position to play strong offense. The U.S. has plenty of low-cost natural gas reserves. The challenge is the infrastructure. Anything we are trying to build today is very difficult.”
“Really the biggest beneficiary (of permitting reform) will be the consumer,” he continued. “If we can get the low-price gas to them and not have the cost of building out the very constrained infrastructure, that’s really where the opportunity is right now.”
Read the press release about Williams third-quarter 2024 results here.