TransCanada said on Friday that the U.S. Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC) had approved the full in-service of the Mountaineer XPress natural gas pipeline project, which will help link the Appalachian basin’s natural gas supplies and growing markets in the U.S. and beyond. The Mountaineer XPress (MXP) project includes a 170-mile natural gas pipeline in West Virginia that will increase natural gas capacity by 2.7 billion cubic feet per day and together with related infrastructure—new compressor stations and modifications to existing compressor stations—represents a total investment of US$3.2 billion. The approval of the full in-service of Mountaineer XPress will allow TransCanada to start partial in-service of its Gulf XPress Project , a network of seven new compressor stations in Kentucky, Tennessee, and Mississippi, which will significantly increase the reach of low-cost, U.S.-produced natural gas from the Appalachian Basin. Investment in Gulf XPress is some US$600 million, according to TransCanada. […]