Peter Kilmartin said he will seek to end the state Supreme Court appeal undertaken by current attorney general Patrick Lynch last August, the Providence Journal said.
The appeal sought to overturn Deepwater Wind’s PPA with National Grid for the eight-turbine, 20MW demonstration project.
Kilmartin was the only one of five candidates for attorney general to disagree with Lynch’s appeal, describing himself as "a full supporter of Deepwater Wind", the Journal said.
He voted for the bill authorising the developer and utility to file the PPA – their second – after their initial PPA was voted down in March.
Rhode Island’s Public Utilities Commission (PUC) had said the original PPA was not commercially viable.
But even if Kilmartin cancels the state’s appeal, other appeals by the Conservation Law Foundation and ratepayers Toray Plastics and Polytop Corp would be unaffected, the Journal said.
Deepwater Wind is planning Block Island to demonstrate the viability of a larger project off the Rhode Island shore, with a capacity of at least 350MW.
The developer and state signed a legally binding joint development agreement for the larger wind project in 2009.
