The company planning a “transmission backbone” for wind farms off the Atlantic coast has broadened its sights slightly and asked the Interior Department to give it a right-of-way of hundreds of miles.

The Atlantic Wind Connection was originally supposed to run from Virginia to northern New Jersey and pick up about 6,000 megawatts of wind energy along the way from wind farms far enough from the shore to avoid complaints from neighbors and pick up strong ocean breezes.

But when the company applied to the Bureau of Ocean Energy Management on Tuesday, the proposal had grown to 7,000 megawatts and an option to connect with Manhattan or Brooklyn.

The engineers have chosen several alternate routes. Among the factors they are considering are the water depth, which determines the cost of building a foundation for a wind machine; the wind speeds at various sites; and other elements that are likely to influence Atlantic Wind’s probable customers, the wind farms. They have also identified seven potential connection points on land.
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