The Trans Mountain Expansion entered service on 1 May 2024 at a final capital cost of ~CAD 34.2 billion for 980 km of new pipe — a 6.3-fold overrun against the 2013 Kinder Morgan estimate of CAD 5.4 billion, and roughly $35 million per kilometre. While Canada was spending eight years and CAD 34 B to twin a single existing right-of-way through Burnaby Mountain, the UAE's new West-East Pipeline went from EPC contract award to ~50% completion in roughly 27 months at an estimated $5–8 million per kilometre.
The cleanest international TMX analogue is the United States' Mountain Valley Pipeline — also a ~10-year saga of court-driven delay, finished in June 2024 at US$7.85 B (CAD ~$22 M/km), that needed an Act of Congress to clear its final permits. Three of Canada's largest proposed pipelines — Northern Gateway, Energy East, and Keystone XL — sat in regulatory and political processes for 4 to 14 years before being killed without a single barrel moving; the United States cancelled four of its own (Atlantic Coast, PennEast, Constitution, Jordan Cove) over the same period, for similar reasons. All figures on this page are capital construction cost, converted to 2026 CAD where required.
Recent built or under-construction pipelines, plotted four ways: capital cost per kilometre, calendar years per kilometre, cost overrun multiple against FID estimate, and capital cost against regulatory duration before construction. Toggle between the views below.
Recent built or under-construction pipelines, sorted ascending. Trans Mountain Expansion highlighted in red; UAE West-East in gold.
TMX's ~$35 M/km is between 4× and 7× the per-kilometre cost of comparable replacement and expansion work elsewhere in Canada, and roughly 5× the UAE West-East Pipeline's estimated $5–8 M/km. The honest peer for TMX is Coastal GasLink at $21.6 M/km — also a recent Canadian greenfield, also through difficult terrain, also subject to material overrun.
All built or under-construction comparators sorted with TMX first, then by ascending capital cost per kilometre.
| Project | Country | Tier | Length (km) | Capacity | Build period | Final cost | Capital/km (CAD M) | Yrs/km |
|---|
Build period uses calendar years from the start of major civil works to in-service / mechanical completion. Pre-FID regulatory processing time is shown separately in the next section. UAE West-East Pipeline figures are estimated from disclosed EPC tranche values and trade-press reporting — ADNOC has not published a single project-level CAPEX number; flagged accordingly.
The bar below shows years from the date a project was first formally proposed or filed for regulatory review to either (a) the start of major civil works for built projects, or (b) the date of cancellation/rejection for killed projects. It is the cleanest single number for "time in the Canadian regulatory machine."
Green = built. Red = killed before a barrel moved. Gold = UAE comparator.
Three of the four longest-running Canadian pipeline proposals never moved a barrel. Mackenzie Valley was in regulatory process for 36 years measured from the Berger Inquiry (1974); Northern Gateway 14; Keystone XL 13. TMX, the one heavy-oil pipeline that did get built, spent ~6.5 years between NEB approval and meaningful construction. The UAE West-East Pipeline went from EPC contract award to ground-breaking in ~13 months.
Eight major pipelines killed by process in the last decade, plus three currently in limbo or just announced. Sorted by years in process, longest first.
| Project | Country | Length (km) | Capacity | First proposed | Killed / status | Yrs in process | Cause of death (single sentence) |
|---|
"Yrs in process" measures the interval from initial formal proposal or regulatory filing to the date the project was abandoned, vetoed, or quashed by a court. For projects still alive in 2026 (Eagle Spirit, the Carney–Smith MOU pipeline), the interval is measured to today.
The 2013 Kinder Morgan filing estimated TMX at CAD 5.4 B. The final figure disclosed by Trans Mountain Corporation and confirmed by the Parliamentary Budget Officer in November 2024 is approximately CAD 34.2 B, a 6.3× nominal overrun. The PBO's audit attributes the overrun to COVID labour disruption, the November 2021 BC atmospheric river floods, the Burnaby Mountain tunnel and Fraser River horizontal directional drill scope additions, route changes to accommodate Indigenous consultation, regulatory variance applications, and approximately CAD 4 B of financing carry costs accumulated during the schedule extension.
The US Mountain Valley Pipeline (Equitrans, 487 km, West Virginia to Virginia) finished June 2024 at US$7.85 B against a 2014 FID estimate of US$3.5 B — a 2.2× overrun and roughly CAD $22 M/km. MVP and TMX share an almost identical pathology: ~10 years from filing to in-service, serial court-driven vacaturs of federal environmental permits (Fourth Circuit for MVP; Federal Court of Appeal for Northern Gateway and TMX), and rescue by extraordinary state action. MVP was saved by §324 of the Fiscal Responsibility Act of 2023 (an Act of Congress ratifying its permits and stripping the Fourth Circuit's jurisdiction); TMX was saved by the federal Crown purchase in 2018. Western democracies appear to have one mechanism for finishing contested oil/gas pipelines: extraordinary intervention.
Coastal GasLink, the gas line from Dawson Creek to Kitimat that fed LNG Canada's first cargo in 2025, came in at CAD 14.5 B against a 2018 FID budget of CAD 6.2 B — a 2.3× overrun, comparable to MVP's. CGL is the closest cost-and-terrain analogue Canada has produced recently: greenfield, mountainous, contested, completed. Its $21.6 M/km matches MVP almost exactly and is roughly 60% of TMX. That gap — TMX 6.3× overrun versus CGL/MVP 2.2–2.3× — is the policy-relevant residual that points to TMX-specific drivers (Burnaby tunnel, federal-Crown ownership transition, financing carry on a forcibly extended schedule).
Texas intrastate gas (Gulf Coast Express, Permian Highway) delivered ~2,000 km of large-diameter pipe in under two years each, at CAD 3–4 M/km, with no FERC certificate required. Australia's Northern Gas Pipeline (Jemena, 622 km) was finished in 18 months at CAD 1.16 M/km. Europe's Baltic Pipe (Norway–Denmark–Poland) and Trans Adriatic Pipeline (Greece–Albania–Italy) crossed multiple sovereign borders and finished at CAD 3.4 M/km and CAD 7.6 M/km respectively. These are not autocratic outliers — they are NATO and EU democracies with environmental review regimes — but they share a clean federalism: clear primacy of one regulator, no parallel judicial review at the state/provincial level, and statutory deadlines that bind.
The four Canadian deaths (Northern Gateway, Energy East, GNL Québec, Eagle Spirit) and the four US deaths (Atlantic Coast, PennEast, Constitution, Pacific Connector/Jordan Cove) share a single mechanism: state- or provincial-level environmental certifications (US Clean Water Act §401, Canadian Indigenous-consultation jurisprudence, and provincial GHG screens) used as veto points after federal regulators had already approved. Three further deaths (Pacific NorthWest LNG, Mackenzie Valley, Keystone XL) had different proximate causes — market collapse, US shale revolution, and a US Presidential Permit revocation. The structural pattern is consistent: in both federations, finished pipelines now require either pre-existing right-of-way (Line 3, DAPL) or exceptional intervention from the federal sovereign (TMX Crown purchase; MVP Act of Congress).
Cost basis. All cost figures are capital construction cost in 2026 CAD. TMX uses the CAD 34.2 B figure reported by the Parliamentary Budget Officer's November 2024 audit, which incorporates the 2018 federal purchase price, all subsequent Trans Mountain Corp estimate revisions, and financing carry. Coastal GasLink uses TC Energy's February 2023 final disclosure of ~CAD 14.5 B. Line 3 Canadian segment uses Enbridge's disclosed ~CAD 5.3 B for the Canadian portion only (the US segment is reported separately and faced different cost drivers). NGTL system expansion costs are CER filing values, not audited final figures (these are toll-recovered investments where final cost data is not always published outside the regulator's regulatory account).
UAE West-East Pipeline. ADNOC has not disclosed a single project-level CAPEX number. The USD 2–3 B estimate triangulates from the CPECC contract tranche values reported by Yicai Global (USD ~480 M for one section) and "multibillion-dollar" official language used in MEED and Upstream coverage. The 520 km length and ~50% completion figure as of 15–20 May 2026 are from CNBC, Al Jazeera, The National, and MEED. Treat the per-km figure as inferred — it is the right order of magnitude but not audited.
US comparators. Mountain Valley Pipeline uses Equitrans' April 2024 8-K disclosure of US$7.85 B and Cardinal News reporting of the same figure; the FID baseline of US$3.5 B is from the 2014 FERC pre-file. The Mountain Valley Pipeline Act (§324 of the Fiscal Responsibility Act of 2023, P.L. 118-5, 3 Jun 2023) is the operative statute that ratified federal permits and stripped Fourth Circuit jurisdiction. Dakota Access uses USACE Omaha district disclosures of US$3.78 B for 1,886 km. Permian Highway and Gulf Coast Express use Kinder Morgan investor disclosures (US$2.0 B and US$1.75 B respectively); both are Texas intrastate lines requiring no FERC certificate, which is a material part of why they delivered in under two years. Cancelled US projects (ACP, PennEast, Constitution, Pacific Connector / Jordan Cove) report sunk-cost figures from sponsor 10-K filings and press releases; per-km values are not computed because no pipe was completed.
European and Australian comparators. Trans Adriatic Pipeline (TAP) cost from EIB project finance disclosures of €4.5 B for 878 km across Greece, Albania, and Italy; build period from TAP-AG's own timeline. Baltic Pipe (Norway–Denmark–Poland) cost from Gaz-System's FID disclosure (~€1.7 B) revised to ~€2.1 B at completion per European Commission launch reporting. Northern Gas Pipeline (Australia, Jemena) at AUD 800 M for 622 km from Tennant Creek to Mt Isa, per Jemena project page and AEMC register. Nord Stream 2 included as a context point for large-diameter offshore strategic pipelines — €9.5 B nominal, mechanically completed September 2021, never commissioned, sabotaged September 2022.
Years in regulatory process. For built projects: from formal regulatory filing (NEB application or equivalent) to the start of major civil works. For killed projects: from formal regulatory filing or first public proposal (whichever is earlier and verifiable) to the date of cancellation. Mackenzie Valley is shown at 36 years using the 1974 Berger Inquiry as the start date; a narrower measure using the 2004 refiling is 13 years and is noted in the table.
Cost overrun multiples. Computed as final disclosed capital cost divided by the cost estimate at FID (or earliest binding cost estimate). TMX uses the 2013 Kinder Morgan filing as the FID baseline (CAD 5.4 B → CAD 34.2 B = 6.3×). CGL uses the 2018 FID budget (CAD 6.2 B → CAD 14.5 B = 2.3×). Line 3 uses the 2014 application figure (~CAD 4.9 B → CAD 5.3 B = 1.1×).
What is not on this page. Lifecycle operating cost, tolls and rate of return to the federal Crown shareholder of Trans Mountain Corp, downstream refining capacity at tidewater, displacement effects on Canadian crude price differentials (the so-called "Western Canadian Select" discount), and GHG impact accounting are all material to a full pipeline policy review but are out of scope for this construction-cost benchmarking page.