Our first quarter results put us on track to achieve our 2021 guidance and 7% to 9% average annual growth through 2025.
Two, launched the first 24/7 product for carbon-free energy on an hourly basis; three, further unlock the value of our technology platforms; four, continue to improve our ESG positioning through the transformation of our portfolio; and five, monetize excess LNG capacity in Central America and Caribbean.
This year, we are increasing that goal by 60% to a target of four gigawatts.
Today, I am pleased to report that year-to-date, we've already signed 1.1 gigawatts including a landmark deal with Google.
As you can see on Slide six, we have a backlog of 6.9 gigawatts of renewables, consisting of projects already under construction or under signed power purchase agreements, or PPAs.
This equates to 20% growth in our total installed capacity and a 60% increase in our renewables capacity.
We continue to increase our pipeline of projects to support our growth and now have a global pipeline of more than 30 gigawatts of renewable projects, roughly half of which is in the United States.
Our second key goal for this year is to launch the first 24/7 energy product that matches a customer's load with carbon-free energy on an hourly basis.
To that end, earlier this week, we announced a landmark, first of its kind agreement to supply Google's Virginia-based data centers with 24/7 carbon-free energy sourced from a portfolio of 500 megawatts of renewables.
Under this innovative structure, AES will become the sole supplier of the data center's energy needs, ensuring that the energy supplied will meet carbon-free targets when measured on an hourly basis for the next 10 years.
This agreement sets a new standard in carbon-free energy for commercial and industrial customers who signed 23 gigawatts of PPAs in 2020.
As we discussed at our Investor Day, the almost 300 companies that make up the RE100 will need more than 100 gigawatts of new renewables by 2030.
This transaction with Google demonstrates that a higher sustainability standard is possible, and we expect a substantial portion of customers to pursue 24/7 carbon-free objectives.
One of these platforms is Uplight, an energy efficiency software company that works directly with the utility and has access to more than 100 million households and businesses in the U.S. Uplight is at the forefront of the shift to low-carbon and digital solutions on the cloud.
In March, we announced a capital raise with a consortium led by Schneider Electric, valuing Uplight at $1.5 billion.
This dynamic industry is expected to grow 40% annually, and Fluence is well positioned to capitalize on this immense opportunity through its distinctive competitive advantages, including its AI-enabled bidding engine.
This technology doubled the energy density and cuts construction time by 2/3.
Over the past five years, we have announced the retirement or sale of 10.7 gigawatts of coal, or 70% of our coal capacity, one of the largest reductions in our spectrum.
We recognize that we have more work to do and have set a goal of reducing our generation from coal to less than 10% of total generation by 2025.
Furthermore, we expect to achieve net-zero emissions from electricity by 2040, one of the most ambitious goals of any power company.
Last month, we reached an agreement to provide terminal services for an additional 34 tera BTUs of LNG throughput under a 20-year take-or-pay contract.
This will bring our total contracted terminal capacity in Panama and the Dominican Republic to almost 80%.
There are 45 tera BTUs of available capacity remaining, which we expect to sign in the next couple of years.
As you can see on Slide 16, adjusted pre-tax contribution, or PTC, was $247 million for the quarter, which was very much in line with our expectations and similar to last year's performance.
Adjusted earnings per share for the quarter was $0.28 versus $0.29 last year.
With adjusted PTC essentially flat, the $0.01 decrease in adjusted earnings per share was the result of a slightly higher effective tax rate this quarter.
In the U.S., in utilities, strategic business unit, or SBU, PTC was down $27 million, driven primarily by a lower contribution from our legacy units at Southland and higher spend in our clean energy business as we accelerate our development pipeline given the growing market opportunities.
At our South America SBU, PTC was down $31 million, mostly driven by lower contributions from AES and is formerly known as AES Gener, due to higher interest expense and lower equity earnings from the Guacolda plant in Chile.
With our first quarter results, we are on track to achieve our full year 2021 adjusted earnings per share guidance range of $1.50 to $1.58.
Our typical quarterly earnings is more back-end weighted with roughly 40% of the earnings occurring in the first half of the year and the remaining in the second half.
Growth in the year to go will be primarily driven by contributions from new businesses, including a full year of operations of the Southland repowering project, 2.3 gigawatts of projects in our backlog coming online during the next nine months, reduced interest expense, the benefit from cost savings and demand normalization to pre-COVID levels.
We are also reaffirming our expected 7% to 9% average annual growth target through 2025.
Consistent with the discussion at our Investor Day, sources reflect approximately $2 billion of total discretionary cash, including $800 million of parent free cash flow and $100 million of proceeds from the sale of Itabo in the Dominican Republic, which just closed in April.
Sources also include the successful issuance of the $1 billion of equity units in March, eliminating the need for any additional equity raise to fund our current growth plan through 2025.
We'll be returning $450 million to shareholders this year.
This consists of our common share dividend, including the 5% increase we announced in December and the coupon of the equity units.
And we plan to invest approximately $1.4 billion to $1.5 billion in our subsidiaries as we capitalize on attractive growth opportunities.
Approximately 60% of the investments are in global renewals, reflecting our success in renewables origination during 2020 and our expectations for 2021.
About 25% of these investments are in our U.S. utilities to fund rate base growth with a continued focus on grid and fleet modernization.
In the first quarter, we invested approximately $450 million in renewables, which is roughly 1/3 of our expected investment for the year.
In summary, 85% of our investments are going to the U.S. utilities and global renewables, helping us to achieve our goal of increasing the proportion of earnings from the U.S. to more than half and from carbon-free businesses to about 2/3 by 2025.
The remaining 15% of our investment will go toward green LNG and other innovative opportunities that support and accelerate the energy transition.

Summary:
Our first quarter results put us on track to achieve our 2021 guidance and 7% to 9% average annual growth through 2025.
Adjusted earnings per share for the quarter was $0.28 versus $0.29 last year.
We are also reaffirming our expected 7% to 9% average annual growth target through 2025.