Company: ATO
Filing Date: 2025-11-14
Form Type: 10-K
Source: 0000731802-25-000056
Chunk: 25

Company: ATMOS ENERGY CORP
Filing Date: 2025-11-14
Form: 10-K
Item: Item 1A
Chunk 25
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 to assess, investigate, and remediate any critical infrastructure security vulnerabilities. Any failure to comply with such government regulations or failure in our cybersecurity protective measures may result in enforcement actions that may have a material adverse effect on our business, results of operations, and financial condition. In addition, there is no certainty that costs incurred related to securing against threats will be recovered through rates.

Climate Risks

Adverse weather conditions could affect our operations or financial results.

We have weather-normalized rates for approximately 97 percent of our residential and commercial revenues in our distribution operations, which substantially mitigates the adverse effects of warmer-than-normal weather for meters in those service areas. However, there is no assurance that we will continue to receive such regulatory protection from adverse weather in our rates in the future. The loss of such weather-normalized rates could have an adverse effect on our operations and financial results. In addition, our operating results may continue to vary somewhat with the actual temperatures during the winter heating season. Additionally, sustained cold weather could challenge our ability to adequately meet customer demand in our operations.

Legislation to reduce or eliminate greenhouse gas emissions or fossil fuels could increase our operating costs, adversely affecting our financial results, growth, cash flows, and results of operations.

Six of the eight states in which we operate have passed legislation to prevent local governments from limiting the types of energy available to customers. However, federal, regional, and/or state legislative and/or regulatory initiatives may attempt to control or limit greenhouse gas emissions, such as carbon dioxide and methane, by requiring the adoption of new infrastructure or technology to limit greenhouse gas emissions, limiting our ability to serve new or existing customers, imposing costs or restrictions on end users of natural gas, or assessing additional charges to fund energy efficiency activities. Such laws or regulations could adversely affect our business, results of operations, and cash flows if the costs we incur to comply with these laws or regulations are not recovered or if the cost of providing natural gas services becomes prohibitively expensive, leading to a reduction in the demand for natural gas or fuel-switching to alternate sources of energy.

The operations and financial results of the Company could be adversely impacted as a result of climate change.

Climate change may result in a reduction in the demand for natural gas or cause shifts in the population of our service territories which could adversely impact the economic outlook for our service territories.  These occurrences could adversely impact our financial results, growth, cash flows, and results of operations.

It could also result in more frequent and more severe weather events, such as hurricanes and tornadoes,