Tidewater operates renewable diesel unit at 96% of design capacity, announces leadership changes

Tidewater Renewables Ltd. announced April 22 that the corporation continues to strengthen its corporate governance and make progress optimizing the business and operating costs, as announced in its fourth quarter 2023 results news release.

The company said its renewable diesel and renewable hydrogen complex at its Prince George Refinery in British Columbia, Canada, “continues to operate well in the first quarter, exceeding previous guidance for the corporation’s first quarter.”

So far in the second quarter, the renewable diesel and hydrogen facility has run at 96 percent utilization of design capacity, according to Tidewater Renewables, and has recently been able to exceed nameplate capacity, operating at approximately 3,100 barrels (130,200 gallons) per day.

The unit, scaled at approximately 45 million gallons per year (mgy), produced its first renewable diesel volumes Oct. 22.

The complex progressed to commercial operations Nov. 7.

Through the remainder of this year, Tidewater Renewables said it will continue to focus on generating free cash flow and is on track to reduce debt and strengthen its balance sheet.

Tidewater Renewables also announced that John Adams has resigned as a director of the corporation due to potential future conflicts of interest identified by Adams with respect to his position.

In addition, as of May 16, Raymond Kwan will no longer be the chief financial officer (CFO) of the corporation.

Effective May 16, Ian Quartly will be appointed as the new CFO.

Quartly is a chartered accountant and has 19 years of finance and accounting experience, with the past 10 years of experience at publicly listed midstream and infrastructure entities.

He is currently vice president of accounting and finance at Tidewater Midstream and Infrastructure Ltd. and will continue to also serve in that role.  

Jeffrey Hamilton, an independent director and the chair of the audit committee, has been appointed the lead independent director of the corporation and Jeremy Baines, the chairman and CEO of the corporation, has been appointed as a member of the audit committee.

Baines’ appointment to the audit committee will be in reliance on the exemption permitting a nonindependent board member to be a member of a public company’s audit committee following the resignation of an independent audit-committee member set forth in Section 3.5 of National Instrument 52-110.

Tidewater said it will begin a search to find an additional independent director.