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FERC Grants Permission to Mountain Valley Pipeline to Start Flowing
Wonder of wonders. Yesterday, the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC) granted its permission for the 303-mile Mountain Valley Pipeline (MVP) to begin flowing natural gas. YES!!!! We are elated! Finally, nine years after MVP filed for permission to build, the pipeline is now (or soon will be) flowing Marcellus/Utica gas to the Southern U.S. This is a great day for all of the Marcellus/Utica.
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Is today the day we’ve been waiting and writing about for the past nine years? Possibly! Yesterday, Mountain Valley Pipeline (MVP), the 303-mile, 2 Bcf/d pipeline from Wetzel County, WV, to Pittsylvania County, VA, filed a request with the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC) to say the pipeline is now mechanically complete, meaning the pipeline is in the ground, covered up, fully tested, and ready to begin operations. MVP asked FERC to allow it to begin flowing gas TODAY, June 11. At best, it’s a 50/50 shot that FERC will allow it to begin operations today. No matter. Whether today, tomorrow, or next week, MVP is done and will begin. WE WON!
Williams’ Regional Energy Access Expansion (REAE) project involves expanding the mighty Transco pipeline in Pennsylvania and New Jersey to deliver an extra 829 MMcf/d of Marcellus gas to PA, NJ, and Maryland. Part of the project was completed and went online last year (see 
For all of the griping and complaining and moaning from the radical left (and uppity Virginia horse farmers) about the Mountain Valley Pipeline (MVP) being unnecessary and a blight against humanity, wonder of wonders, customers are WAITING for the gas that will flow through MVP! In fact, the CEO of Roanoke Gas Co. says “We were out of gas literally.” Roanoke Gas desperately needs the new supplies that will flow through MVP. In addition, Summit View Business Park in Franklin County will receive gas from MVP, which will boost the park’s efforts to market its 13 available sites.
The merger of EQT Corporation and Equitrans Midstream into a single company took one giant leap forward in May when the Hart-Scott-Rodino (HSR) Antitrust Act waiting period expired and the federal government (by not objecting) blessed the re-union (see 
In 2021, as he was running for Governor in Virginia, Glenn Youngkin pledged that if he won, he would remove the state from the onerous carbon tax on coal- and gas-fired power plants called the Regional Greenhouse Gas Initiative (RGGI). Youngkin kept his promise, although it took longer than he had hoped (and is still being challenged in court). In addition to not paying as much for electricity post-RGGI, ratepayers just got another gift: Dominion Energy, the primary utility company servicing Virginia, is dropping an average fee of $4.50 per month from the utility bills of Virginia residents.
Four out-of-state pipeline protesters (two from New Jersey, one each from Vermont and Maryland), all senior citizens who thought it was cutesy to block access to work sites for the almost-done Mountain Valley Pipeline (MVP), are about to learn a hard lesson. They have been sued by MVP for BIG BUCKS — for the costs to compensate for lost time AND for punitive damages. We’ll see if the protesters’ Big Green benefactors will pony up the lawyers and money they need to fight the lawsuits. It’s about time our side begins to play hardball. You play hardball by suing these crazies and making them pay. Kudos to MVP.
NiSource Inc. is one of the largest fully-regulated utility companies in the United States, serving approximately 3.3 million natural gas customers and 500,000 electric customers across six states through its local Columbia Gas and NIPSCO brands. Earlier this year, NiSource hosted representatives from LRQA, a global engineering, technical, and business services organization based in the U.K. (owned by the Lloyd’s Register Foundation). NiSource hosted the LRQA reps at its Columbia Gas of Pennsylvania service territory. The LRQA reps were there to review safety practices. NiSource and its Columbia Gas of PA subsidiary passed the review with flying colors, resulting in NiSource receiving the International Organization for Standardization (ISO) 55001 and American Petroleum Institute’s Recommended Practice (API RP) 1173 certifications.
Newly released information gathered from a Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) request shows that as Mountain Valley Pipeline (MVP) tested its 303-mile pipeline from Wetzel County, WV, to Pittsylvania County, VA, some 130 potential problem areas were located. Running a PIG (pipeline inspection gauge) device through the pipeline to check for dents and other weaknesses found 50 “anomalies” that required further excavation work to check. Another 80 excavations were needed after tests using an electric current to probe for weaknesses in the pipeline’s special anti-corrosion coating.
Dominion Energy plans to build four small “peaker” electric generating plants in Chesterfield County, VA, a Richmond suburb (see 
Two weeks ago, the bottom pretty much fell out of the U.S. rig count, both nationally and for the Marcellus/Utica region. We hit new lows for both counts (see 
Anti-fossil fuelers and some residents with portions of the 303-mile Mountain Valley Pipeline (MVP) traversing their land are flooding the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC) with comments asking the agency to delay permission for MVP to be placed into service. The latest in-service date MVP outlined to FERC in a recent request for startup permission is “early June” (see 
Yet another out-of-state protester temporarily blocked workers’ access to one of the few Mountain Valley Pipeline (MVP) construction sites remaining in Montgomery County, VA, yesterday morning. She was swiftly removed and arrested. According to Virginia State Police, 25-year-old Elsa Schlensker of Cleveland, Ohio, was taken into custody “without incident” and transported to the Montgomery County Jail, where she was charged with obstructing the free passage of another.
Earlier this month, MDN brought you the great news that New Fortress Energy’s (NFE) proposed Wyalusing LNG export plant (in Bradford County, PA) and a docking facility in Gibbstown (in New Jersey, along the Delaware River) to load ships with PA-produced LNG, are not dead yet (see 
The Tennessee Valley Authority (TVA) is a federally-owned electric utility corporation in the U.S. TVA’s service area covers all of Tennessee, portions of Alabama, Mississippi, and Kentucky, and small areas of Georgia, North Carolina, and Virginia. TVA is the sixth-largest power supplier and the largest public utility company in the country. Last May, TVA announced that it would convert the Kingston Fossil Plant (coal-fired plant) in East Tennessee to a natural gas-fired plant capable of generating 1,500 megawatts of electricity (see