14th Feb 2014 08:34
LONDON (Alliance News) - Environmental utility infrastructure company Pennon Group PLC Friday said is struggling waste business Viridor has made "excellent" progress establishing its energy-from-waste business, which it hopes will transform it into a leading player in the UK renewable energy sector.
The company, which also owns South West Water, said Viridor's operational performance since September 30, 2013 was broadly in line expectations and expects pretax profit for the business to be similar to that of last year.
However, Pennon did highlight that Viridor's profit has been impacted by increased pension costs as a result of auto-enrolment, which requires employers to automatically enrol workers into a workplace pension scheme if they earn more than GBP9,440 a year and aged between 22 and state pension age.
Pennon said its water arm, South West Water, has performed well despite the exceptional weather and resultant flooding in the region.
"The company continues to deliver effective operational performance and high standards of customer service, underpinned by strong financial performance," it said.
Overall, the group renewed and increased a GBP60 million term loan to GBP100 million and drew down a GBP30 million revolving credit facility.
In addition, the GBP60 million was drawn down from the European Investment Bank.
The company intends to announce its results for the year ending March 31 on June 3.
Pennon shares were down 0.2% at 686.50 pence early Friday.
By Anthony Tshibangu; [email protected]; @AnthonyAllNews
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