Participants

Wayne Wasechek; Vice President and Chief Financial Officer; Potlatchdeltic Corp

Eric Cremers; President, Chief Executive Officer, Director; Potlatchdeltic Corp

George Staphos; Analyst; BofA Global Research (US)

Ketan Mamtora; Analyst; BMO Capital Markets (US)

Niccolo Piccini; Analyst; Truist Securities

Gregory Andreopoulos; Analyst; Citi Investment Research (US)

Mark Weintraub; Analyst; Seaport Global Securities LLC

Matthew McKellar; Analyst; RBC Capital Markets (Canada)

Kurt Yinger; Analyst; D.A. Davidson & Co. (Research)

Presentation

Operator

Good morning. My name is Rob, and I will be your conference operator today. At this time, I would like to welcome everyone to the PotlatchDeltic Fourth Quarter 2024 Conference Call. (Operator Instructions)
I'd now like to turn the call over to Mr. Wayne Wasechek, Vice President and Chief Financial Officer, for opening remarks. Sir, you may proceed.

Wayne Wasechek

Good morning and welcome to PotlatchDeltic's Fourth Quarter 2024 Earnings Conference Call. Joining me on the call is Eric Cremers, PotlatchDeltic's President and Chief Executive Officer.
This call will contain forward-looking statements. Please review cautionary statements in our press release, on the presentation slides and in our filings with the SEC regarding the risks associated with these forward-looking statements. Also, please note that a reconciliation of non-GAAP measures can be found in the appendix to the presentation slides and in our website at www.potlatchdeltic.com.
I'll turn the call over to Eric for some comments, and then I will review our fourth quarter results and our 2025 outlook.

Eric Cremers

Well, thank you, Wayne. Good morning, everyone. Thanks for joining us. Yesterday, after the market closed, we reported total adjusted EBITDA of $232 million for 2024. These results reflect the strong performance of our real estate business and the stability provided by our timberlands operations.
Our wood products results for the year were challenged by a relatively weak lumber pricing environment, which began to improve towards the latter part of the year. Despite market conditions, we remained focused on effectively managing our trollable operational metrics across all business segments. Additionally, we successfully achieved several strategic initiatives for the year highlighted by the modernization and expansion of our Waldo sawmill.
Our timberlands division generated adjusted EBITDA of $139 million for 2024. We harvested a total of 7.6 million tons across our northern and southern regions, which was in line with our plan at the beginning of the year.
Despite overall softness in lumber markets, log markets in both Idaho and the Southern regions showed resilience. In Idaho, stronger cedar prices driven by regional demand bolstered our aggregate sawlog prices. As we move into the new year, we are seeing improvement in Idaho sawlog prices due to improved lumber prices particularly under our index sawlog arrangements. Meanwhile, Southern sawlog prices remained relatively stable throughout the year despite challenges stemming from measured mill consumption and abundant log supply.
In our wood products segment, adjusted EBITDA was a loss of $8 million in 2024. However, the division's financial performance shifted positively in the fourth quarter with $9 million in adjusted EBITDA on improved lumber prices.
Our 2024 financial performance faced several market dynamics, including cautious buyer sentiment, ample lumber supply, and soft demand in end markets. These factors exerted downward pressure on lumber markets.
Later in the year, lumber markets became more balanced due to capacity curtailments, which we believe have contributed to the recent upward trajectory in the prices, with the Random Lengths lumber composite spot price increasing $37 or 9% per thousand board feet in the fourth quarter alone. And in what is generally a seasonally weak period for lumber prices, the composite has held steady since the beginning of the year. With a more balanced supply/demand dynamic, our 2025 outlook on lumber markets is cautiously optimistic, especially as we approach the spring building season.
We shipped just over 1.1 billion board feet of log during the year, setting a new record for the company in annual shipment volume. This achievement came even while we incurred a brief period of downtime during the year at our Waldo sawmill to integrate new equipment for modernization and expansion project.
Regarding the Waldo, Arkansas, sawmill modernization and expansion ramp up, we are making excellent progress and are firmly on track to achieve the mill's targeted production level by mid-year. The successful completion of construction and the positive trajectory of the mill's ramp up is a testament to the team's performance. I would like to take this opportunity to thank the Waldo team for their dedication and effective execution of this project.
As a reminder, we anticipate that the project will increase the mill's annual capacity by 85 million board feet. Additionally, we expect recovery rates to improve by approximately 6% and cash processing costs to decrease by about 30%. Once we complete the ramp-up phase, we project that the mill will generate approximately $25 million in incremental EBITDA annually, assuming a mid-cycle sales environment. With the construction phase now behind us and major capital expenditures completed, our focus is on managing returns and generating strong cash flow from this strategic investment.
Shifting to our real estate segment. This business had a very strong year, contributing $147 million in adjusted EBITDA. In our rural real estate division, we sold over 57,000 acres at $2,300 an acre. Our real estate team is focused on pursuing opportunities that drive shareholder value beyond our regular recurring sales of real estate. This was exemplified by the sale of 34,000 acres of very young average aged four-year-old timberland for $57 million or $1,700 per acre in the second quarter of 2024. While we don't anticipate a similar sale of this nature and magnitude in 2025, demand for our typical world properties remains strong. We expect to continue capitalizing on opportunities to sell world land at significant premiums to timberland value.
On the development side of our real estate business in 2024, we successfully closed on a $6 million sale of commercial land for $500,000 per acre and sold 135 residential lots at an average price of $146,000 per lot in our Chenal Valley master-planned community in Little Rock. Despite a challenging interest rate environment, the number of residential lot sales we achieved this year aligns with our historical average. This year's sales volume highlights the desirability of living in the Chenal Valley community, along with the premium lot offerings we brought to the market.
In 2024, we made meaningful progress on our Natural Climate Solutions initiatives and are excited about the potential value these opportunities will create in the future. Over the course of 2024, we doubled our solar options under contract and the associated net present value of these contracts. By year-end, we had solar option contracts covering over 35,000 acres with an estimated net present value exceeding $400 million. We continue to see strong demand for solar projects and do not anticipate this opportunity to subside under the new US administration. Solar energy can play a crucial role in addressing America's growing energy needs in its pursuit of energy independence.
On lithium development, we continue to pursue opportunities to lease subservice right on our land in Southwestern Arkansas where the Smackover formation is partially located. We are currently negotiating a brine lease agreement, which we expect to execute in the coming weeks. The ultimate potential of this and other emerging opportunities in the region will depend on several factors, including the determination of royalty rates and future pricing and demand for lithium.
Regarding forest carbon offsets, we are engaged with a couple of well-respected project developers to pursue high-quality projects under either a, quote, [build-distant] scenario for an identified buyer or a broader market opportunity. Given the complexity and care necessary in developing a high-quality, high train or carbon project, we don't expect to bring this project to market this year. In addition to these projects, we are actively exploring other long-term natural climate solutions opportunities such as carbon capture and storage. We believe these initiatives will ultimately increase demand for our rural land, likely driving timberland values higher.
Moving on to our capital allocation strategy. In 2024, we deployed a balanced and disciplined approach while netting the challenging lumber markets and macroeconomic uncertainty. Our priorities were centered around returning capital to our shareholders through our quarterly cash dividend and value-enhancing share repurchases, investing in high-return capital projects, such as Waldo modernization project, and making an accretive timberland acquisition.
For the year, we paid $142 million in cash dividends. With our stock trading at levels we believe are well below our estimated net asset value, share repurchases were an attractive option for capital allocation. In the fourth quarter, we purchased $8 million of our common stock, bringing our full year repurchases to $35 million, averaging $41 per share. This leaves us with $90 million remaining under our repurchase program. Our solid financial position, coupled with our liquidity profile allows us to continue being opportunistic with deployment as we move into 2025.
Turning our attention to the US housing market. Although the Federal Reserve issued three interest rate cuts totaling 100 basis points in September, the rate on the 30-year fixed mortgage actually increased over this period. As a result, the home buying market is still somewhat depressed as elevated mortgage rates continue to influence near-term demand and hold back construction activity supply, although existing home inventory has written, it is still below historical levels as existing homeowners wanting to move are continuing to choose to stay in their current homes due to the lock-in effect of their low mortgage rates.
Despite this market landscape, the single-family homebuilding segment has remained relatively resilient as single-family starts have held near 1 million units on a seasonally adjusted basis throughout 2024, bolstered by large homebuilders providing incentives such as interest rate buydowns. On the other hand, the multifamily homebuilding segment remains anemic as an oversupply of multifamily units, combined with the restrictive construction financing environment continues to limit multifamily starts.
While these trends highlight the current state of the housing market, the long-term housing fundamentals continue to remain strong. These fundamentals are supported by an undersupply of homes favorable demographics and growth in household formations. We believe that improved housing affordability once low mortgage rates take hold, coupled with these strong fundamentals will create significant positive momentum for lumber market demand fueling growth.
Looking at the repair and remodel segment, which is the largest demand driver for lumber, activity has remained subdued, particularly in the do-it-yourself sector. Several factors have weighed on this segment, including a cautious hire sentiment under an uncertain economic backdrop, suppressed housing turnover and higher financing costs for discretionary home and projects.
Despite these challenges, the leading indicator of remodeling activity published by the Joint Center for Housing Studies at Harvard University, predicts modest gains in 2025 for home remodeling as a solid labor market and rising home values are anticipated to support greater activity. Looking at our own business, we are seeing strong takeaway from our big box retail customers such as Home Depot, Lowe's and Menards.
Additionally, medium to long-term fundamentals for R&R remained favorable as a number of structural drivers expected to support the sector, including an aging housing stock with a median age over 40 years home equity levels at historic highs and people continuing to work from home.
As we look ahead in '25, we are optimistic about the prospects of improving lumber markets driven by capacity reductions, supportive consumer sentiment and a solid employment backdrop. Regardless market fluctuations, we remain committed to executing our strategy and maximizing operational and financial performance across all of our business segments.
Additionally, we continue to focus on our core corporate responsibility initiatives around Forest, Planet, people performance. With a strong balance sheet, ample liquidity and a disciplined approach to capital allocation, we are well positioned to deliver long-term value for our shareholders.
I will now turn it over to Wayne to discuss our fourth quarter results and our 2025 outlook.

Wayne Wasechek

Thank you, Eric. Beginning on page 4 of the slides, total adjusted EBITDA for the fourth quarter was $53 million, an increase of $46 million in the third quarter. This quarter-over-quarter increase was driven by higher lumber prices and improved cost recovery in our wood products segment. I will now review each of our operating segments to provide more details on our fourth quarter results.
Information regarding our timberland segment can be found on slides 5 through 7. This segment contributed $34 million in EBITDA to our fourth quarter results, which was moderately lower compared to the third quarter. In Idaho, our harvest volume for the fourth quarter was 345,000 tons. This volume is seasonally lower than the 427,000 tons we harvested in the third quarter. Idaho sawlog prices were 4% higher per ton in the fourth quarter compared to the third quarter, reflecting increased prices for index sawlogs, which reached their highest price point this year in the fourth quarter.
In the South, we harvested 1.5 million tons in the fourth quarter, consistent with our harvest volume in the third quarter. Our Southern sawlog prices moderated slightly lower in the fourth quarter as compared to the third quarter. This price decline was primarily driven by mix with a higher volume of smaller diameter sawlogs and a lower volume of hardwood sawlogs in the fourth quarter.
Moving to the wood products segment shown on slides 8 and 9. Adjusted EBITDA for the fourth quarter was $9 million, an increase of $18 million from the third quarter. The increase was driven by higher average lumber prices and improved cost recovery. In the third quarter, we incurred the planned downtime and the restart of the Waldo, Arkansas, sawmill for the expansion and modernization project. By the fourth quarter, the mill was operational. And as we have progressed through the ramp-up curve, per unit manufacturing costs and log recovery is significantly improved. We expect to complete the ramp base by mid-year.
Our average lumber price realizations increased $43 or 11% from $402 per thousand board feet in the third quarter, $445 per thousand board feet in the fourth quarter. In comparison, random like framing lumber composite average price was a 12% higher in the fourth quarter compared to the third quarter. It's important to note on a regional mix, the product mix differs from the composite and there's also a timing difference in our sales and the composite.
Lumber shipments increased by 16 million board feet, rising from 267 million board feet in the third quarter to 283 million board feet in the fourth quarter. This increase in shipment volume was due to higher production from the Waldo sawmill following an outage in the third quarter.
Next, let's look at the real estate segment on slides 10 and 11. The segment generated adjusted EBITDA of $19 million in the fourth quarter compared to $32 million in the third quarter. In our real estate business -- in our rural real estate business in the fourth quarter, we sold 5,900 acres at an average of $2,900 per acre. Notably, our fourth quarter results included the conservation land sale in Alabama for nearly $10 million and $2,500 an acre. We continue to capitalize on a healthy demand for rural real estate, particularly for recreational purposes and conservation outcomes.
In the development side of our real estate business, we sold 45 residential lots at an average price of $100,000 per lot in the fourth quarter. Demand for a lot offerings has remained steady across each of our price points. The fourth quarter included a higher mix of smaller lots compared to the third quarter, which featured a significant number of premium lots.
Turning to our capital structure, summarized on slide 12. At year-end, our total liquidity was $451 million, which includes $152 million of cash on our balance sheet as well as availability on our undrawn revolver. We repurchased 180,000 shares at $42 per share for a total of $8 million in the fourth quarter. We have $90 million remaining on our $200 million repurchase authorization.
Additionally, we refinanced $176 million of debt that matured in the fourth quarter, by utilizing $125 million of notional forward starting interest rate swaps within our portfolio, we achieved a weighted average interest cost of 3.2%, which is net of estimated patronage. This strategy enabled us to reduce our annual interest costs by $150,000 and maintain our total weighted average cost of debt at approximately 2.3%.
Under the refinance, we also spread the term loan maturities over three outer years, smoothing out our debt maturity ladder. We have $75 million of notional forward starting interest rate swaps available for future debt refinancing, which will allow us to maintain a lower cost of borrowing.
Capital expenditures were $20 million in the fourth quarter. This amount includes real estate development expenditures, which are included in cash from operations in our cash flow statement.
I will now provide some high-level outlook comments. The details are presented on slide 13. We plan to harvest approximately 7.4 million tons in our timberland segment in 2025 with about 80% of the volume coming from the South. The modest decline in our planned annual harvest volume compared to the 7.6 million tons harvested in 2024 is attributed to normal variability in our harvest plan and due to our land sales activities. Harvest volumes in the North are expected to be seasonally lower in the first quarter at levels comparable to those in the first quarter of 2024. We anticipate New Orleans sawlog prices to increase by approximately 5% in the first quarter due to higher cedar index sawlog prices.
In the South, we plan to harvest 1.4 million tons in the first quarter, and we expect our Southern sawlog pricing remain relatively stable. We plan to ship 1.2 billion board feet of lumber in 2025. This projected shipment volume includes ramping up to the expanded nameplate capacity at our sawmill by midyear. In the first quarter, we expect to ship between 270 million to 280 million board feet of lumber.
Our average lumber price thus far in the first quarter is $448 per thousand board feet which is roughly 1% higher compared to our average lumber price in the fourth quarter. This is based on approximately 90 million board feet of lumber.
Shifting to real estate. We expect to sell approximately 26,000 acres of rural land and 130 residential lots in Chenal Valley during 2025. For the first quarter, we plan to sell approximately 7,000 acres at an average price of $3,100 per acre and approximately 10 residential lots at an average price of $100,000 per watt. Additional details regarding real estate can be found on the slide. We estimate that net interest expense will be approximately $2 million in the first quarter of about $10 million per quarter for the remaining quarters in 2025. Interest expense is lower in the first quarter as this is when we receive our annual payments from the Farm Credit banks. These amounts also include noncash interest charges and our net of estimated interest income, which we expect to be lower in 2025.
Regarding capital expenditures, we are planning to spend between $60 million to $65 million in 2025. This range excludes the final closeout payment of $6 million for the Waldo sawmill project and any potential timberland acquisitions. With the construction of the Waldo modernization expansion project completed, our planned level of capital expenditures for 2025 returns us to a more normalized spending level. Overall, we estimate our first quarter 2025 total adjusted EBITDA will be in line with our fourth quarter results. This forecast anticipates slightly higher average lumber and index sawlog prices and an increased level of rural land sales activity, balanced out by a seasonal decline in timberland harvest volumes.
That concludes our prepared remarks. Rob, I'd now like to open the call to questions.

Question and Answer Session

Operator

(Operator Instructions) George Staphos, Bank of America.

George Staphos

Congratulations on the year. I guess the first question I had, I know you attributed it to normal variability in the harvest profile, and that is pretty much all encompassing. But if you step back and say, where you were six months ago, would you been expecting to harvest only about 7.4 million tons for '25? On the margin, things look like they're getting better. You said you're cautiously optimistic pricing is up in lumber. Is there anything else beyond normal seasonality -- excuse me, normal variability in terms of why we weren't seeing a little bit more in terms of timber harvest?
A related question, just in general on harvesting. We've seen in the cellulose markets, a bit more of a premium than normal on softwood versus hardwood, again, in the pulp markets. Are you seeing any of that filter into demand for softwood pulpwood and in turn, demand in the next couple of quarters?

Wayne Wasechek

Yes, George, this is Wayne. So taking your first question on the harvest volumes for 2025, it really comes down to a couple of things. So as we discussed in our prepared remarks, first, it's normal variability of our harvest volumes. Every year, we have fluctuations. It can fluctuate either way a couple of hundred thousand tons.
Second thing is land sales activities. Now our land management practices always aim to maintain a sustainable harvest profile, but that's impacted by forest growth rates, how we maximize NPV generated by our timberland harvest. But now on the land sales activity, we're portfolio managers. We're always looking at options to generate attractive returns. For example, in Q4, we sold a larger track for conservation purposes. This was at a premium to timberland value at almost 3 times TMV. And we had that initially in our 2025 harvest plan, now which we had to adjust our '25 outlook because of that land sale. So it really comes into play those two pieces.

George Staphos

Understood. And just on softwood and in particular, pulpwood, if you can talk a little bit about what you're seeing there just with the sort of perspective of what's going on in the pulp markets?

Wayne Wasechek

Yes. On the pulp side, certainly that hardwood volume has an impact on our pricing, our average pricing from period to period given the level of how much hardwood is in the mix. Certainly, I think right now, what we saw in the fourth quarter on the pulpwood side, it depends. Each market is unique. I think some of our markets, we saw a little bit elevated mill inventories on the hardwood side, which pricing may have come down maybe 1 or 2 percentage points.
On the flip side, we also saw other markets that were more tensioned and pricing was actually up several basis points. So it really depends on the unique market where we're at overall. So -- and I think that will hold true as we continue to move forward on the hardwood side.

George Staphos

So what you're saying, Wayne, is you're not really seeing any sort of greater than normal versus recent period demand for softwood pulpwood given what we're seeing in terms of the cellulose markets themselves kind of steady as she goes at this juncture, that would be fair?

Wayne Wasechek

Yes. Yes, that's right.

George Staphos

All right. So based on all that dialogue, I would imagine you're not seeing much in the way of log cost inflation over the next couple of quarters in the wood products business, but how would you have us think about that across the geographies?
And then kind of my last question, it's one you get periodically, and we all appreciate how thoughtful you are about capital allocation at Potlatch. But you talk about buying stock back opportunistically. You talk about being portfolio managers. You talk about the fact that the NAV is much higher than the current value. Why do you have to be necessarily opportunistic with your buybacks? Why not just -- if with things getting better and the NAV being where it is relative to the price as you see it, why not be a little bit more aggressive there?

Eric Cremers

Yes. So thanks, George. I'll answer those questions. So on the log cost side, as it relates to wood products, we did have a little bit of a favorable P&L effect here in the fourth quarter. I think our benefit was about $2 million. Going out into 2025, we expect log costs to be relatively flat across the whole company. There will be a little bit of benefit in Q1. We're estimating it to be about $1 million. But generally, across the whole business, we expect things to be relatively flat for the year in terms of log costs for wood products.
Now regarding capital allocation, I think we've said in the past that we're never going to move fast on any one capital allocation opportunity. We move slow and steady, and we do that intentionally. And the reason is, as we sit here today, we could look at it and say, yes, wow, with a $41, $42 stock price, we're trading well below NAV. And certainly, by virtually every analyst, we are trading well below NAV. But that doesn't mean it can't trade even lower.
And we're in this period of time where who knows what Trump is going to do with these tariffs and what's going to happen to the world economy and what's going to happen to interest rates and housing. And so we always want to remain open to having options down the road.
And if we spend our cash now buying back stock, that means we can't take advantage of an even bigger opportunity down the road. So while I find today's prices is attractive, they could get even more attractive, and they could also get less attractive if markets play out the way we planned. But I think you can look at our $200 million repurchase authorization and see that we put our money where our mouth is, and we bought back $110 million of stock now. So slow and steady wins the race in our mind as it relates to capital allocation.

Operator

Ketan Mamtora, BMO.

Ketan Mamtora

Perhaps to start with, pretty good progress on getting those unit costs down with the start-up of Waldo, certainly more than what we were expecting. I'm just curious, as we move into Q1 and into the first half of '25, how much more do you think are coming at you in terms of --

Eric Cremers

Yes. So quarter-over-quarter, I do think there's more room for us to push unit costs down. And certainly, you'll see that as we move into Q1. We expect costs to come down, not as much as we saw Q3 to Q4, but there's probably another couple of million dollars of cost to come down. And then when we get to Q2, we expect to have Waldo fully operational. So we won't see further benefit as we get to Q2, but there's a little bit more room here in Q1.

Ketan Mamtora

Understood. Okay. That's helpful. And then switching to timberland deal activity. Eric, I'm curious kind of what you are seeing out there in the market right now. And as you think about your portfolio, curious kind of what is your appetite for larger deals?

Eric Cremers

Yes, Ketan, it's a good question. The timberland M&A market, it's pretty quiet right now. Over the past several years, generally, $3 billion to $4 billion of timberland changes hands each year. And I think last year, only something like $1 billion traded hands. I continue to think sellers are -- they're holding off on marketing their properties, maybe waiting for housing to improve, lumber prices to improve, interest rates to come down or for maybe carbon deals to become more mainstream.
And to your second question about would we do more large deals? I think we would certainly be open to deals. The one caveat is it has to be at a price that creates shareholder value. And we're not going to chase the timberland deal if it comes in with an IRR that's less than our cost of capital. And our cost of capital today at the low end sits at around 6% real. So while our competitors may make timberland acquisitions and do it at prices that drive IRRs below cost of capital, that's not something we're going to do.
And I do think there will come a point in time where things will get back into balance, either prices will come down in the M&A market or returns are going to come up to justify a higher price, one of the two. But we've been on the sidelines for the past couple of years, and I think we'll continue to be on the sidelines until something changes.

Ketan Mamtora

That's helpful. And then just one final question for me. We've seen a number of sort of pulp and paper mill closures here in the US South over the last few years. Curious from a timberland perspective, kind of impact for you guys? And also, as we think about sawmills and finding a home for those chips, how do you think about that as you think about next two, three, five years?

Wayne Wasechek

Yes. I think we -- when we look at it, it's -- each market, timberland market is very unique. Each individual one is unique. So we look at it market by market. When we look at M&A deals for timberlands, we're certainly looking at what's the current market look like, how tensioned is it? Where do we think it's going to go? And that certainly plays into how we put together our long-term harvest profile, either our current one or when we're doing M&A deals. So I think we certainly factor that in on our viewpoint of what markets look like, but it's definitely market by market and very -- each one is unique.
But I think overall, we have an outlook. We think generally, the markets will become more attentioned just with all the opportunities out there from biofuels to emerging technologies for uses of timberlands and timberland byproducts. So I think we're still very optimistic and positive about the outlook.

Eric Cremers

And on the residual, I would just say our -- we've got a great team that handles the residuals that come out of a sawmill. We've got supply arrangements into consuming pulp mills in the various areas that we operate in. It's challenging. I feel like every year, I see lower and lower residual cost, both markets continue to dry up.
But there are -- like Wayne said, there are a number of new technologies coming, whether it's bioplastics or sustainable aviation fuel or pellets or Drax has got this carbon capture and storage project they're working on to, spend $12.5 billion in the South. I do think people see an opportunity to utilize low-cost pulpwood in a variety of applications. And it's just going to take time for all those facilities to get built.

Operator

Michael Roxland, Truist Securities.

Niccolo Piccini

This is Nico Piccini on from Mike Roxland. I guess starting at the new US administration has suspended fund from the inflation reduction and infrastructure investment and Jobs Act, but also suspending in offshore and onshore wind power leasings and caused some of the approvals, permits and loans. Do you have any early read on the impact of Natural Climate Solutions, mainly around CCS and wind because as I understand, I think has been left out from a lot of those positives and temporary holds?

Eric Cremers

Yes. So we're following this, needless to say, very, very closely. I do think that some areas of NCS are more vulnerable than other areas of NCS from government cutbacks. And my sense, our sense is that solar is going to be unscathed. I think lithium is going to be just fine.
I think carbon credits gets a little bit dicier. You're at the back on call of what do companies want to do to pursue their net-zero initiatives that they have, and there may be less government pressure on them to pursue net-zero. So that could change the outlook for carbon offsets.
And then I think CCS is the most vulnerable of all the different NCS opportunities. And that one to me is going to be highly dependent on government subsidies. So I do think it does vary from category to category. And thankfully, most of the near-term opportunity for us is in solar and lithium and those two are continuing to move on down the track.

Niccolo Piccini

And maybe just -- sorry, some further clarification. What for solar specifically gives you confidence that, that won't be dragged into the --

Eric Cremers

Yes. I think something like -- I've heard that like 80% of the money is getting spent in red states at the end of the day. And I read that 18 House members sent speaker Johnson a letter saying don't touch this money. So I have Trump say anything negative about solar. I'm sure he's not happy about solar panels being manufactured in China by and large. But he's really come out pretty publicly against offshore wind, as well as lithium EV mandates. But those two areas are -- get the most of the attention from him and not the other areas. Nobody really knows what happens in the end, but it's just -- it's a bit of a guess right now, reading between the lines. But he seems to be after the EV mandate, and so we'll see how that plays out.

Wayne Wasechek

Yes. And I would add that on the solar side, even post election, we continue to see strong interest from solar developers. We'll continue to pursue additional option contracts with these developers. And yes, we just continue to see that strong activity after the election.

Eric Cremers

Yes. And just to give you a -- I mean, we're at 35,000 acres. As we said in our prepared remarks now, our plan has us by the end of the year to be at something like 45,000, 46,000 acres under solar options. So like Wayne said, we see no slowdown in that part of our business.

Niccolo Piccini

Understood. So it sounds like solar is may be safer and then forest carbon and CCS on the other end of spectrum.

Eric Cremers

Yes, correct.

Operator

Gregory Andreopoulos, Citi.

Gregory Andreopoulos

Just a quote on Southern log prices for 2025. We've seen some wood products capacity come out of more coastal southern markets this year. Would you say you're more positive on those coastal markets or more of the inland markets in 2025 in terms of year-over-year lot price growth? And then based on your view there, does that inform your decision on 2025 plans for inland legacy PCH lands versus the coastal lands you acquired in the CatchMark deal?

Wayne Wasechek

Yes. On the -- looking at pricing for '25, we would -- our view would be that the coastal area, timberlands have more of an opportunity to increase in pricing. Those are the more tension markets for us. So when -- with a little more pricing demand pick up, we would see pricing move there first on our inland side and Gulf South. We haven't seen prices even with a softer demand dynamic, those prices have remained a little more stable. So we wouldn't see those have as much price appreciation as the coastal areas.
From a harvesting profile perspective, look, we have solid demand across our portfolio in the South. And yes, that hasn't the pricing or where we see it going as an influence where a harvest plan is, we maintain a long-term sustainable harvest yield and plan, and we're focused on that.

Gregory Andreopoulos

Understood. And then just one quick follow-up on solar. So you mentioned doubling your option contracts from $200 million to $400 million NPV or above $400 million NPV. Is there any way to quantify your ambitions for 2025 in terms of options? And then kind of relatedly, when should we start expecting these option contracts to convert into full lease agreements? Is that 2025, '26 or further down the line?

Wayne Wasechek

Yes. So our plan this year anticipates us getting another 10,000 to 12,000 acres under option for the year, which would have an NPV of approximately $151 million. So by year-end, we expect to be somewhere 45,000, 47,000 acres or roughly $575 million of net present value. That's not the end of the opportunity for us in solar. There will be more beyond what we get done this year, we'll talk about that at a later date.
But in terms of when we see these options actually get exercised, we don't anticipate one getting exercised this year. I do think two to three could get exercised next year. That's about the earliest we can see one happening. And then in 2026, we might -- or 2027, we might see quite a few get exercised, but will really start happening next year, not this year.

Operator

Mark Weintraub, Seaport Research Partners.

Mark Weintraub

So a couple of follow-ups. One, is there any meaningful contribution you expect in 2025 from any of the natural climate solution profit pools? Or is that now likely '26, '27?

Wayne Wasechek

No. Mark, we're getting option payments as we sit here today. It's probably, I don't know, $4 million, more or less those option payments. So we're getting money today as we sit here for doing absolutely nothing and we manage that timberland at our own free well. So that's where we sit here today. We'll get a little bit more when we get this first lithium brine lease executed. But this is not big money. The big money will come at a later date, but we're getting a little bit as we sit here today.

Mark Weintraub

Got you. Second, in terms of mix, just remind us -- what was the sawlog mix in the US South in 2024? Is that similar to what you're expecting in 2025? Or is there a change? And if there's a change, why the change?

Wayne Wasechek

No. There's -- we don't expect a mix, I think, in the sawlog volume, we were roughly around 55%. We continue to -- our outlook is near that 55% or less. That's in the US South. And our mix -- our sawlog mix in Idaho is very heavily weighted towards solid, and we don't see that changing that thoratically.

Mark Weintraub

Okay. Good. And just one quick clarification. So stumpage in the US South, is that considered outlet? Or is that a mix?

Wayne Wasechek

That's a mix. So it's both -- it's both sawlogs and pulpwood. When I give our outlook guidance there, we're -- 55% of sawlog. Well, that includes stumpage as well.

Mark Weintraub

Okay. Got you. All right. And then lastly, you kind of raised a little bit about tariffs. And obviously, we also have the potential for likelihood of higher duties from Canada later this year as well. Can you maybe just provide a little bit more color on your thoughts on potential impacts from those variables, recognizing there's uncertainty?

Eric Cremers

Yes. So there's a lot of moving pieces right now, as you can imagine, in terms of the lumber price outlook, Mark, and stems from this possibility of tariffs. What we do know is that duties are going to go up. It was going to be August, and I think the government has pushed it back to November. But the lumber duties from Canada to the US are going to go up from 14% to somewhere between 25% and 30%, and I heard one firm estimated it could go 40%. So duties are going to go up no matter what.
There is a potential for tariff to go up any day depending upon what Trump decides to do. And I think what that's going to do is that it's going to raise the floor on pricing for the Canadians. And I heard a large Canadian producer one week or two ago, make a comment that if there's a duty put in place, they plan on raising their prices to their US customers to capture 100% of that duty. Now will they be able to get all that 100% of whatever the duty is or not? Who knows what will ultimately wind up happening, but their plan is to pass that along to consumers.
And I'm frankly a little bit surprised that lumber markets haven't moved on some of this talk because that -- we're not very far away from that. I think Tom's talked about a February 1 tariff date. Now he's known talk a lot and then to do other things. But we really haven't seen much lumber price movement as it relates to the potential for tariffs. But I think as we move through the year, the trend is going to be for prices to move higher even without that tariff given that the duty is going to be increasingly significantly come November.
And as you know, BC produces, I don't know, 6 billion board feet of lumber today. And Canada exports, I don't know, 25% of the US market needs Canadian lumber. Roughly 25% of US consumption comes from Canada. And I think after these duties get passed along, the BC mills, the median BC mill is going to need north of $5 lumber just to breakeven. And SPF today, Western is probably, I don't know, 450 or less. So when I think about the lumber price outlook, to me, the risk is clearly to the upside from here, not to the downside. And this Canadian producer that I referenced at the start of my comments, they talked about lumber prices fluctuating between $425 and $500 for the year, and that actually feels like a reasonable forecast to me.

Operator

Matthew McKellar, RBC Capital Markets.

Matthew McKellar

You touched on it briefly in your prepared remarks, I was wondering if you could just provide a little bit more detail on your forest carbon initiatives, including how project redesign under the Core Carbon principles have gone? And what you're thinking in terms of time line to achieve the sale of credits given that you're not expecting any sales this year?

Wayne Wasechek

Yes. Like we said in the prepared remarks, we're certainly pursuing a carbon credit project. We're actively working with carbon credit buyers and top quality developers to design a project. Now this project -- buyers cloud be a targeted specific buyers. So a project that is built to suit just for them. So we're exploring that. But we're also looking to a project for the broader market. So we'll see where the best opportunity lies. We're still in the due diligence phase of identifying how to take this project. But nonetheless, we'll develop a high-quality project, and we feel that would command certainly higher pricing.
But from a timing perspective, keep in mind, these projects, they're very complex. They take time to develop anywhere almost probably 18 months to two years. And with that timeline, that puts us probably closer to the end of '26 to bring a project to market. So we're really -- there's much work to do there, but we're actively pursuing it.

Matthew McKellar

Okay. And just one last for me. Can you give us a sense of when you expect better clarity on what the lithium royalty rates in Arkansas will be? And what that -- the size of that opportunity looks for you?

Wayne Wasechek

Yes. So that's a tough one for us given that we're highly dependent upon -- well, two things. One is lithium pricing. And if you go look at what lithium prices, how volatile have been, you'll get a sense for it's really hard to forecast where lithium is going. But then the other big unknown is what does the Arkansas Oil and Gas Commission, what royalty rate do we set for mineral rights owners in Arkansas. The range is somewhere between 2% and 12%. And so the order of magnitude of profits that we get from our lithium deposit could vary dramatically.
So it just -- we're at the mercy of the AOGC, and we expect -- they were supposed to I believe, in the fourth quarter of last year, and then there was talk of the first quarter, and that seems to have slipped. And so who knows. We're at the mercy of AOGC, but I think it will get resolved by the end of the year.

Operator

Kurt Yinger, D.A. Davidson.

Kurt Yinger

I wanted to start off with the home center business. It sounded like that was point of strength in the order book. Are you seeing orders kind of up nicely year-over-year or just maybe tracking with what you would expect seasonally? And I guess as you talk to those customers, do you get the sense that that's advantageous buying just at what are still kind of relatively prices or actual kind of sell-through activity that they're seeing improving as well?

Wayne Wasechek

No. I think the home center business, it looks like it's starting to turn. It's always been very strong, very steady, very stable for us. And they'll take every one of our premium studs that we produce. What -- the thing that gives me the most confidence is saying the home center business is turning. And I think, in fact, the entire R&R market is starting to turn is if you look at the home center comp store sales forecast for 2025, now this is the analysts that cover Home Depot and Lowe's because they're publicly traded. And of course, those analysts spend their life studying what happens to Home Depot and Lowe's. The consensus is for both of those two companies to have positive comp store sales in 2025 in the order of 1% to 2%. That 1% to 2% may not sound like a lot, but over the past two years, comp store sales for those two companies have been running negative. And I think at the worst point, they were negative 5% more or less. So for them to be turning positive, gives me confidence that 2025 looks to be like a pretty good year, and it's consistent with what they're telling us that they're seeing in their business that they expect to have a strong year. So lots of things can happen. It's early in the year, but we think the outlook looks pretty good for R&R.

Kurt Yinger

Got it. Okay. And then second, I just wanted to follow up on the Southern harvest expectations for this year? And I appreciate the comments on variability in land sales. I guess as we look at the 5.9 million tons, how should we think about kind of level set range sustainably going forward from here? And does that 5.9 million kind of fall at the low end, the middle, -- how should we think about that?

Wayne Wasechek

Yes. Yes, I won't give specific guidance on future periods or years. But what I would say is we look at, we do maintain and analyze long-term harvest profile. And we look, say, over the next, for example, 25 years of our current land base, some years, it's higher, some years is slightly lower. But over that period of time, our total harvest volume range, I would say, between 7.1 million and 8.2 million tons. So as you can see, over time, we'll have some variability.

Operator

At this time, I'm showing there are no more questions. I'll now turn the call back over to Wayne Wasechek.

Wayne Wasechek

Thank you. Appreciate your interest in PotlatchDeltic, and have a great day.

Operator

This concludes today's conference call. Thank you for your participation. You may now disconnect.