Mountain Valley, a 303 mile natural gas pipeline that stretches across West Virginia into Virginia, started operations on Friday.

Equitrans Midstream (the lead partner), a U.S.-based gas pipeline company, announced that the pipeline was now available to provide short-term or interruptible firm transportation services until July 1, 2024 when long-term firm capacities obligations begin.

Equitrans stated that the pipeline will be able to transport up to 2 Bcf per day of natural gas from the Marcellus and Utica production regions, to local distribution companies and power generation facilities as well as industrial users in demand markets throughout the mid-Atlantic region and Southeast U.S.

The $7.85 billion pipeline, which has faced multiple legal and regulatory challenges since its construction in 2018, was approved by the U.S. Federal Energy Regulatory Commission this week.

Equitrans, when Mountain Valley began construction, estimated that the project would be about $3.5 billion in cost and will enter service by 2018. Equitrans, NextEra Energy, Consolidated Edison, AltaGas, and RGC Resources are all part of the 303-mile (488 km) project. Equitrans will be operating the pipeline. Reporting by Kavya Baliaraman in Bengaluru and Rahul Pawan; editing by Chizu Nomiyama