PITTSBURGH — A Pennsylvania company plans to invest $380 million to expand natural gas pipelines in the state, and ultimately link to markets in New Jersey and New York.

Penn Virginia Resource Partners, L.P., of Radnor, said Monday that some of the expansions to its Lycoming County pipeline in central Pennsylvania will begin in the next two weeks and be finished later this year. Other parts of the project will continue through 2018.

CEO William H. Shea, Jr. said in a statement that the expansions are part of a long-term plan to help bring the bountiful gas production from Pennsylvania's

to markets in the northeast and New England, where heating oil is used extensively.

Shea said the company has signed a 20-year distribution agreement with a subsidiary of Royal Dutch Shell PLC, as well as agreements with Southwestern Energy Co. and Range Resources Co. to extend an existing pipeline an additional 19 miles into Tioga County.

The new project will also eventually connect PVR's existing pipeline to Shell's system in Bradford County.

The company said it ultimately plans to connect its pipelines to the Tennessee Gas Pipeline, an El Paso Co. project that stretches from the Gulf of Mexico to Canada.