Mountain Valley LLC (Mountain Valley) has secured new water permit from the West Virginia environmental regulators for its $6.6bn Mountain Valley natural gas pipeline, reported Reuters, citing the firm as saying in court papers.

Equitrans is the operator of Mountain Valley, which owns the pipeline project. Other partners in the project are NextEra Capital, Con Edison Transmission, WGL Midstream, and RGC Midstream.

Mountain Valley told the US Court of Appeals for the Fourth Circuit, that its West Virginia-to-Virginia pipeline secured renewed Section 401 water quality certification from West Virginia.

The project is expected to unlock additional gas supplies from the US’ biggest shale gas basin Appalachia.

Mountain Valley expects to secure a Section 404 water permit from the US Army Corps of Engineers as mandated by the Fiscal Responsibility Act, the company said in the court filing.

Mountain Valley said in the filing: "Once (the Army Corps) does [that], Mountain Valley expects to resume construction.”

Construction of the planned underground, interstate natural gas pipeline has been delayed due to regulatory and legal fights with environmental and local groups. Work on the project started in 2018.

The pipeline will span about 303 miles from northwestern West Virginia to southern Virginia.

The project is designed to transport up to two billion cubic feet per day of natural gas drawn from the Marcellus and Utica shale.

In May 2023, Reuters reported that Equitrans expects to secure required authorisations from the federal agencies for the pipeline by the early summer and complete the construction by the end of 2023.