FERC approves Southgate pipeline amendment to change route, gas capacity

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE 
December 18, 2025

CONTACT
Dan Radmacher, Media Specialist, (276) 289-1018, dan@appvoices.org

WASHINGTON, D.C. — Today, the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission announced its approval of an amendment to change the route, pipe diameter and gas-carrying capacity for the methane-gas pipeline Mountain Valley Pipeline Southgate, proposed for Virginia and North Carolina. The approval comes despite strong opposition to the project by thousands of members of the public, including elected state and federal officials. 

Southgate would extend the controversial Mountain Valley Pipeline from Pittsylvania County, Virginia, into Rockingham, North Carolina, and has faced significant opposition since it was originally proposed in 2018. The project was previously unable to obtain state-level water and air permits. The Virginia Department of Environmental Quality will issue its decision on a Clean Water Act Section 401 permit within the next two months, followed by the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers.

Project opponents long contended a new application should be required, instead of an amendment, because the route, size and impact of this version of the project are far different than the project for which FERC issued the original 2020 Certificate of Public Convenience and Necessity. MVP has not provided evidence that Southgate is needed to meet demand for gas, as reflected in the recent London Economics International report commissioned by the Southern Environmental Law Center.

Adding to the significant concern about Southgate, the Williams Companies’ expansion of their Transco pipelines, called the Southeast Supply Enhancement Project, is undergoing a simultaneous permitting process, with FERC expected to decide on a Certificate of Public Convenience and Necessity in early February. The pipeline companies have bickered publicly about their access to the area and the need for both pipelines. FERC’s Environmental Analysis for the Southgate project concluded that the Southeast Supply Enhancement Project could eliminate any need for Southgate. The co-location of two high-pressure, large-diameter pipelines is of significant concern for local residents.

“FERC got it wrong, and Southgate will harm Virginia and North Carolina waterways and communities,“ said Jessica Sims, Virginia Field Coordinator at Appalachian Voices. “The project necessitated, at the very least, an environmental impact statement. Ideally, this totally revamped project should require a new application to fully consider its impacts. FERC required neither and has failed impacted communities in its Southgate decision.”

“For years, MVP Southgate has not moved forward and has been denied multiple permits, resulting in developers abandoning their original plans and proposing what can only be considered a totally new project,” said Dr. Crystal Cavalier-Keck, Co-Founder of 7 Directions of Service. “Our regulators are responsible for ensuring that proposals for new interstate gas pipelines follow procedures where community concerns can be fully heard. With their misguided approval of this amendment, FERC did not fulfill that responsibility. We deserve to be heard, and we will not rest until MVP is kept out of our communities for good.”

“Mountain Valley Pipeline Southgate will threaten the health and well-being of thousands of people,” said Caroline Hansley, Campaign Organizing Strategist with the Sierra Club. “Through the years, we have seen how MVP has a history of putting its own profits over the health of the environment and neighboring communities. While FERC’s decision is disappointing, we know we are most powerful when we stand together. From Virginia to North Carolina, we will not stop until this project is defeated.”

“Dragging communities through multiple permit proceedings only to tilt the scales once again in favor of the gas corporations adds injustice on top of injustice,” said Russell Chisholm, Managing Director of the POWHR Coalition. “This must change, and we will stand with the people in harm’s way until we replace this system with a fair process that serves the people and not the polluters.”

“This expensive pipeline project isn’t needed, plain and simple,” said Shelley Robbins, Senior Decarbonization Manager with the Southern Alliance for Clean Energy. “Duke and PSNC will pass hundreds of millions of dollars in costs straight onto the backs of North Carolina’s over-burdened ratepayers for a project that only benefits MVP’s shareholders.” 

“Right now, people want to see lower electric bills and know their drinking water is safe,” said Steph Gans, Assistant Director at Clean Water for North Carolina. “This decision does the opposite; it will raise bills and pollute water, period.” 

“With all the new energy sources becoming available almost daily, from Boom’s supersonic engines producing electricity, China’s hydrogen systems, new American-produced solar panels, Toyota’s new battery plant and more wind turbines coming online, it’s hard to see the need for these pipelines,” said Buck Purgason with Good Stewards of Rockingham.

“FERC has allowed communities to be plagued by pollution and destruction by the mainline Mountain Valley Pipeline, without effective oversight or enforcement,” said David Sligh, Water Quality Program Director at Wild Virginia. “Unfortunately, the commission seems willing to do the same on MVP Southgate, but the people of Virginia and North Carolina will continue to fight back.”

“FERC just rubber-stamped a massive expansion of fracked gas that our communities neither need nor want,” said Victoria Higgins, Virginia Director at Chesapeake Climate Action Network. “Southgate is an unsafe, unnecessary extension of the troubled MVP mainline that threatens our water, our farms and our climate so that a handful of fossil fuel executives can keep cashing in.”