The company building a controversial 31-mile natural gas pipeline extension through Virginia and North Carolina started construction last week.

On March 30, Mountain Valley Pipeline announced it had begun construction in Virginia on its Southgate project, originally conceived as a 75-mile extension to transport 375 million cubic feet of gas per day from the main pipeline to Dominion Energy’s distribution facilities in North Carolina.

After being denied permits from both the North Carolina Department of Environmental Quality and the Virginia Department of Environmental Quality, the company pared its project down to 31 miles of pipeline that could deliver even more gas – 550 million cubic feet per day.

The extension grew out of the 303-mile Mountain Valley Pipeline that crosses Pennsylvania, West Virginia, and Virginia. The project led to years of battles that pitted landowners and environmental groups against the company, with Congress clearing a way for it to proceed as part of a June 2023 budget compromise.

The Southgate extension drew its own legal challenges, including from the Southern Environmental Law Center on behalf of multiple local groups and landowners. In late March, seven conservation and community groups challenged the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission’s approval of the project in the D.C. Circuit Court of Appeals.

“This project is redundant, dangerous, and a clear transfer of ratepayers’ hard-earned dollars straight up to Mountain Valley Pipeline’s shareholders,” said Shelley Robbins, senior decarbonization manager at the Southern Alliance for Clean Energy.