PITTSBURGH, Pa. — The developers of the Mountain Valley Pipeline don’t expect the project to be completed before the final few months of 2019, according to a recent statement.
MVP said under current circumstances, which include a modified stop work order, full in-service of the project isn’t expected until the fourth quarter of next year.
The company has also announced released as much as half of its construction workforce because of the stop work order that has come from the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission.
FERC entered the latest order last Wednesday after a federal court rejected several permits that had been granted for work in a 3.5 mile right-of-way in the Jefferson National Forest in Monroe County, West Virginia and Virginia.
FERC has said it believes the court will eventually approve the work in the forest.
“There is no reason to believe that the Forest Service or the Army Corps of Engineers, as the land managing agencies, or the BLM, as the federal rights of grantor, will not be able to comply with the Court’s instructions and to ultimately issue new right-of-way grants that satisfy the Court’s requirement,” FERC said.
The modified stop work order does allow for construction to restart on 77 miles of the project in West Virginia. The order currently prohibits work on more than 200 other miles of the project.
Mountain Valley Pipeline will extend 42-inch diameter natural gas pipeline over 303 miles to transport West Virginia natural gas into southern Virginia.