Nov 3 (Reuters) - Equitrans Midstream Corp ETRN.N said on Tuesday it pushed back the expected completion of its long-delayed Mountain Valley natural gas pipe from West Virginia to Virginia to the second half of 2021 and boosted the project cost to $5.8 billion to $6.0 billion.
Previously, the company targeted an early 2021 full in-service date and a cost of around $5.4 billion to $5.7 billion.
When Equitrans started construction in February 2018, it estimated Mountain Valley would cost about $3.5 billion and be completed by the end of 2018. Valley is one of several U.S. oil and gas pipelines delayed by regulatory and legal fights with environmental and local groups that found problems with federal permits issued by the Trump administration. said the latest change was due to "unanticipated delays during the prime 2020 construction season resulting from the current inability to complete certain construction work."
Those delays included a U.S. Fourth Circuit Court of Appeals decision in October to issue a temporary administrative stay of the project's Nationwide Permit 12, which prevents waterbody crossings under the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers' permit program.
The company also said the U.S. Federal Energy Regulatory Commission's stop work order covering about 25 miles (40 kilometers) of the project, and a challenge to the its Biological Opinion, which allows construction in areas inhabited by endangered and threatened species, held up progress.
The 303-mile (487.6 km) pipeline was designed to deliver 2 billion cubic feet per day of gas from the Marcellus and Utica shale in Pennsylvania, Ohio and West Virginia to consumers in the Mid Atlantic and Southeast. One billion cubic feet is enough to supply about 5 million U.S. homes for a day.
Mountain Valley is owned by units of Equitrans, NextEra Energy Inc (NYSE:NEE) NEE.N , Consolidated Edison Inc (NYSE:ED) ED.N , AltaGas Ltd ALA.TO and RGC Resources Inc RGCO.O .
Equitrans shares fell 4% earlier on Tuesday to their lowest level since May.
<^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^ UPDATE 1-EQM stops some work on WV-VA Mountain Valley natgas pipe
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