DC Circuit Hears Arguments on FERC's MVP Southgate Pipeline Approval

Today, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit heard oral argument challenging the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission’s (FERC) decision to extend the construction deadline for the Mountain Valley Pipeline (MVP) Southgate project through Virginia and North Carolina. Environmental petitioners contend that FERC’s decision disregarded the pipeline developer’s admission that it actually intends to construct a significantly different “redesigned” project in lieu of the FERC-approved project, and that FERC failed to uphold its legal obligation to conduct a thorough environmental and public interest review. As a result of the extension order, MVP maintains the power to take private property through eminent domain even though its new project has not been found to serve the public interest.

Appalachian Mountain Advocates argued the case on behalf of the environmental petitioners Appalachian Voices, Blue Ridge Environmental Defense League (BREDL), Center for Biological Diversity, Chesapeake Climate Action Network, Haw River Assembly, NRDC (Natural Resources Defense Council), Sierra Club and Wild Virginia. Mere days after FERC granted an extension for the original project’s certificate in December 2023, MVP Southgate developers announced a major project overhaul, including increasing the pipeline’s gas capacity by nearly 50 percent and altering the pipeline route. Despite these drastic changes, FERC extended the project’s certificate without an updated environmental or public interest review. Since then, MVP has applied for an amendment for the Southgate project, continuing its attempts to circumvent a meaningful approval process. Conservation groups are calling for FERC to abrogate the extended certificate that authorizes MVP to exercise the power of eminent domain, and to require MVP to conduct a new review and approval process to fully evaluate the new project’s impacts.

The Southgate project has faced overwhelming opposition from local communities, environmental organizations, and state officials. More than 39,000 public comments were submitted urging FERC to deny the extension, citing environmental risks, lack of need, and concerns over eminent domain, including from then-North Carolina Gov. Roy Cooper and dozens of state and federal lawmakers. North Carolina’s Department of Environmental Quality has twice denied MVP critical water quality permits, and concerns over the project’s impact on environmental justice communities remain unresolved.

Critics point out that the project would lock power company customers into decades of paying for fossil fuels while endangering sensitive ecosystems and vulnerable communities along its route.

“FERC’s approval of the MVP Southgate project is an example of another dangerous and unnecessary fossil fuel project getting a pass,” said Caroline Reiser, Senior Staff Attorney, Climate & Energy at NRDC. “The further expansion of fossil fuel infrastructure threatens public health, clean water, and the climate.”

“The damage to our waters and our communities caused by the Mountain Valley Pipeline are an ugly predictor of the destruction the Southgate project will cause,” said David Sligh, Wild Virginia’s Conservation Director. “It is inexcusable for FERC to ignore that evidence and allow the same kind of costs and pain to be imposed on the people and environments along Southgate’s proposed path.”

"Although this project shares many of the same impacts to critical, high-quality watersheds like the Dan River that are vital to tourism, drinking water and industry in the region, the significant shift of Southgate to supply gas to Duke Energy's new, proposed gas plants is a major departure from the impacts studied by FERC in the original approval,” said Ridge Graham, North Carolina Program Manager for Appalachian Voices. “Retaining the same outdated and inadequate certificate without reevaluation is not acceptable."

"FERC cannot allow the burden of Mountain Valley Pipeline’s unneeded and dangerous Southgate extension to be pushed onto residents already bearing the brunt of the climate crisis,” said Caroline Hansley, Campaign Organizing Strategist with Sierra Club. “MVP should not be allowed to use a FERC certificate granted years ago for a dramatically different project to take private property for its new project, which would carry nearly 50 percent more methane gas. Virginia and North Carolina communities have made it clear for seven years – they don’t need or want Southgate. It’s time for FERC to listen.”

“We suspect that Southgate is another link in a chain of pipelines designed to allow for the large-scale exploitation of American fracked gas for overseas export, and that’s why we plan to use every lawful tool at our disposal to fight it to the finish.” said Perrin de Jong, senior attorney for the Center for Biological Diversity. “The cost to both Americans and American wildlife would be heavy, while the profits of this diabolical scheme would flow to elite corporate executives in their plush penthouses.”