Block Island forms part of Deepwater Wind’s application to the federal government to build a 1GW project off Rhode Island and Massachusetts. The company hopes Block Island will be online by 2013 and can provide a commercial case for the larger project.
The survey will include mapping out the sea floor for cabling and turbine siting. Once this is complete, Deepwater said it would survey the route for onshore cables.
Deepwater has also proposed to build a $500 million to $1 billion undersea transmission network from Massachusetts to New York, allowing the company to sell its power into multiple states.
Deepwater’s survey comes as it faces a challenge from a second company looking to build a large-scale offshore project off Rhode Island.
Neptune Wind has said it would apply to build a 500MW wind farm about 20 nautical miles south of the border between Rhode Island and Massachusetts.
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