PORTLAND — Developers who want to build a natural gas pipeline from Nova Scotia to Massachusetts said Thursday that the project’s first phase has received preliminary federal approval.

The Federal Energy Regulatory Commission approval covers nonenvironmental issues for a 64-mile stretch of 24-inch diameter pipeline between Wells, Maine, and Dracut, Mass., Maritimes & Northeast Pipeline said.

“The commission’s action reaffirms our proposal and moves us significantly closer to providing increased gas service to New Hampshire and southern Maine beginning next year,” said George Mazanec, vice chairman of PanEnergy Corp. and chairman of Maritimes & Northeast Pipeline’s management committee.

The company is still trying to get environmental approval for the project.

Maritimes & Northeast, partially owned by PanEnergy Corp. of Houston, hopes to complete the entire 630-mile pipeline by late 1999. The pipeline, with a capacity of 400 million cubic feet per day of natural gas, would run from the Sable Island gas fields off Nova Scotia, across areas of New Brunswick, Maine and New Hampshire to Dracut, Mass.