Equitrans Midstream Corp on Monday said it would evaluate the budget and schedule to complete its Mountain Valley pipeline depending on upcoming federal approvals and ongoing litigation. The $5.4 billion-$5.7 billion natural gas pipeline was granted permission from The US Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC) on late Friday.
Last year, the US Fish and Wildlife Service (FWS) issued Biological Opinion allowing the project to be built in areas inhabited by threatened and endangered species. The opinion was legally challenged by environmental and other groups, prompting FERC to suspend the work. FWS released a new Biological Opinion in early September that is also legally challenged by the concerned groups.
Analysts said that the litigation over FWS’ Biological Opinion might prevent some stream crossing that could delay the project’s start-up to the third quarter of 2021 from the initial target of early-2021. Equitrans started the Mountain Valley project, which is now 92% complete, in 2018. At the time, the company expected to complete the construction by the end of 2018.
