Impacts on landowners The threat of “eminent domain”, where the company benefits from the government’s right to acquire property for “public use”, has been widely employed in this project. MVP, LLC has sued landowners to force them to provide access to their land for construction surveying. Opponents suffer intense criminalisation, including peaceful blockaders facing terrorism charges.
Landowners impacted by the MVP Southgate project also complained of being repeatedly harassed and verbally bullied by MVP land brokers. Landowners are pressured to allow construction on their private lands, which would require a permanent easement of 50 feet (about 15 metres) and a temporary easement of 100 feet. The expansion project could also further impact landowners who already lost land to the construction of another major pipeline, Transco. The MVP will feed the gas fracked from the Marcellus and Utica shales to the Transco pipeline.

Impacts on public health The pipeline crosses a region with steep slopes, with 225 miles of pipeline running through high landslide-risk terrain. These natural characteristics increase the risk of damage and explosions once the pipeline becomes operational. Numerous private houses are located within the so-called ‘blast zone’, that is the quarter-mile radius area where, in case of an explosion, death or serious injuries are most likely.
The MVP Southgate project would increase the chance of polluting gases (methane, CO2, and NOx gas among others) and aerosol particles (VOCs) leaking from the pipeline. This project also entails the construction of a new compressor station in a predominantly black community near Chatham, Virginia.  Compressor stations are generally responsible for higher rates of air pollution. Their engines often run on diesel or gas and the complex equipment is prone to leaks, polluting the air whenever they operate. The noise pollution caused by compressor stations, where multiple engines operate simultaneously,  can also pose health risks by causing stress, sleep deprivation, and elevated blood pressure.

Furthermore, the construction of a pipeline of this capacity incentivises the extraction of fracked gas, with terrible consequences for the population in the vicinity of the shale. A 2019 scientific paper published by the US National Health Institute estimates that the fracking operations in the Appalachian basin, from 2004 (when fracking began) to 2016, caused between 1200 to 4600 premature mortalities associated with air pollutant emissions caused by the fracking activity. 54% of these mortalities are concentrated in the counties where fracking operations take place, while the rest are mostly concentrated in the downwind populous coastal Northeast regions.

Impacts on access to water Several counties in the pipeline route are laden with karst formations, particularly prone to sinkholes, sinking streams, and caves. Throughout construction, several of these formations have been severely damaged, with permanent disruption of water access by homeowners, water pollution, and flooding caused by the obstruction of cave structures where the water used to flow. Private wells have been irremediably damaged by construction, resulting in the loss of clean drinking water for numerous homes and farms. 

Environmental injustice Communities of colour and economically challenged and rural communities are often targeted by pipeline companies, as they generally lack the financial and political power to oppose the projects and effectively fight back. The MVP crosses counties where low-income, elderly, and medically underserved populations live. Furthermore, the proposed MVP Southgate project would entail the construction of a compressor station in Lambert County, Virginia, in an area populated by a predominantly black community. 

Impacts on Indigenous rights The MVP pipeline is designed to run through the ancestral lands of the Occaneechi, the Saponi, and the Monacan Indian Nation. The MVP Southgate would run through Monacan and Saponi lands. The pipeline route crosses counties where hundreds of culturally significant native sites are recorded. According to Indigenous activists, construction has already damaged burial grounds and other sacred sites. MVP, LLC denies these claims. Indigenous communities, who are actively involved in the resistance against the pipeline, have specifically been the object of strong harassment during and in the aftermath of protests. Indigenous activists are also campaigning against the increase in cases of sexual violence and missing indigenous women often connected to “man camps”, temporary settlements of construction workers along the pipeline.

Emissions The pipeline is set to carry about two billion cubic feet of fracked natural gas daily. The gas is extracted from the Marcellus and Utica shales and would be transported through the MVP after which it will converge in the Transco pipeline to travel to the many LNG terminals in Louisiana and Texas. 
A 2020 report from Oil Change International has estimated that the annual emissions of greenhouse gases from the entire MVP supply chain throughout the pipeline’s full life cycle would be equivalent to over 32 coal plants or nearly 24 million passenger vehicles. In the case of construction of the Southgate addition, the total annual emissions of greenhouse gases would rise to an astronomical 128.7 million metric tons, the equivalent of over 37 coal plants or 27.3 million passenger vehicles. 

Flawed carbon offsets plan In July 2021, Mountain Valley Pipeline, LLC announced its intent to purchase carbon offsets to make the first 10 years of MVP’s operational emissions (Scopes 1 and 2) carbon neutral. 90% of these emissions would be compensated for with the purchase of offset credits related to the construction of a methane abatement project for a coal mine in Virginia unrelated to the project. The other 10% would be covered by among others “addressing” abandoned gas wells in Virginia and West Virginia. The plan does not deal directly with MVP’s own emissions of methane. The plan also exclusively covers the first ten years of operations of the pipeline. Additionally, the only emissions that are supposed to be offset are standard operational emissions, not Scope 3 emissions or the emissions caused by construction of the pipeline, testing, and possible leakages and explosions. Finally, the methane abatement project would be developed by a subsidiary of NextEra, one of the companies involved in MVP, making it both the buyer and the seller of the carbon offset credits.
No other information related to the Virginia abatement project or to any other carbon offset projects can be found on the MVP website and it is not clear whether its development ever began. The plan also does not mention the proposed MVP Southgate extension.

Impacts on forests and land The pipeline has major local environmental implications. Erosion, mudslides and soil disturbances have been a major problem during construction; this has led to massive influxes of mud to waterways, threatening local animal and plant life, some of which are endangered species. One expert noted of an 8-acre landslide that “events like this are almost expected; MVP chose to route…this titanic 42-inch diameter, 303-mile pipeline across several hundred of miles of “high landslide potential” areas.
The construction of the pipeline also requires the destruction of 4.856 acres of forest across West Virginia and Virginia. It has already caused and will further aggravate major impacts on the Jefferson National Forest. The project has already downed trees to clear a 125-foot wide right of way that runs through 3.5 miles of the forest. Despite the strong opposition by activists and local communities, in July 2023 the U.S. Supreme Court finally allowed construction through the forest, after the Court of Appeals for the 4th Circuit had previously halted it.
34% of the proposed Southgate extension route is forested and the construction of this extension would permanently damage 615 acres of forest, among which there are 12 acres of riparian forest (a natural barrier against possible floods) in the Jordan Lake watershed. 

Impacts on waterways The pipeline is set to cross waterways 1.146 times along its 303-mile length. As of January 2023, 429 water crossings were still to be constructed. These crossings have posed strong concerns, including the risk of corrosion of the pipeline caused by the chemically-coated pipes degrading while sitting outside for long periods due to construction delays. Because of the static nature of the pipeline and the dynamic nature of a water stream, they are also the most fragile aspects of a pipeline, with high risks of exposure and rupture of the line while in operation. The consequences of such ruptures would be extreme pollution of waterbeds and flowing water, with severe damage to the local wildlife and the communities who rely on such water sources. Numerous endangered species that are native to the area impacted by the construction could be irremediably harmed. 
Since the beginning of construction, the construction companies have committed hundreds of violations of water quality regulations, laws, and permits. These violations include, among others, unpermitted discharges into waterways and failure to repair erosion and control sediments. MVP, LLC has already been fined numerous times, in both Virginia and West Virginia, for these violations.
The proposed Southgate extension would also have a dangerous impact on the waterways of Virginia and North Carolina, crossing 207 streams and 3 ponds. Among these there are the Dan River, home to several endangered species, and the Stony Creek Reservoir, the main source of drinking water for the city of Burlington, North Carolina.

Financial unsustainability MVP has obtained the permits to continue construction until October 2026. This further extension will probably entail new increases in the total cost of the pipeline. Indeed, as of October 2023, the total budget has been raised from USD 6.6 billion to USD 7.2 billion. These cost increases have already required substantial investments and de facto shown how the project is not only a threat to the climate, the environment, and local communities but also financially unsustainable. There are also serious doubts that there might not be a market for the gas transported by the pipeline, as the four corporate customers who have signed deals with MVP have only committed to buying 35.5% of the MVP’s capacity.