Peabody planning board to study data centers; subcommittee formed to review zoning and infrastructure impacts

The Peabody Planning Board agreed on Thursday to convene a subcommittee to study AI/data centers and to prepare initial guidance the City Council requested on where such facilities should be allowed, restricted or prohibited.

Andrew Levin, senior planner, told the board the City Council (via a referral from Councilor Anne Manning Martin) wanted to know whether data centers were on the planning board's radar and, if so, what the board recommends. Levin said the Community Development Department would draft a letter and proposed forming a working group to look at zoning definitions, energy and water impacts, buffering and potential performance standards.

Several speakers urged a cautious approach. One board member/public commenter argued that a hypothetical 100,000-square-foot data center could require substantial electrical capacity and water for cooling — figures he presented as roughly 125 megawatts and 1,425,000 gallons per day in his example — and warned about generator noise and community impacts observed in other municipalities. "You don't want them anywhere near this city," he said, citing Lowell, Mansfield and Holyoke as examples where municipalities have either excluded data centers or imposed moratoria.

Other participants urged the board not to assume every data center would have the same footprint or environmental profile. A planner who read a prepared memo recommended treating data centers as a distinct use category with strict performance standards and conditions: require project sponsors to fund necessary electrical or substation upgrades (not taxpayers), direct such uses to commercial/industrial districts with major utility access (Centennial Park and Rousselah were mentioned), and tie incentives to enforceable community benefits such as prevailing wage and local hiring goals.

Board members asked practical zoning questions — whether a data center is essentially a warehouse or whether it should be defined separately — and staff replied that they expect to add a definition and regulate the use through special provisions. The board discussed job impacts and noted that operational data centers typically create few permanent jobs beyond construction, so the board should weigh infrastructure demands and public benefits when considering incentives.

The chair invited volunteers and said the subcommittee would likely meet an hour before regular meetings (about 6 p.m.) while following open-meeting posting requirements. Several members volunteered and staff committed to drafting a memo to the City Council stating that the planning board will research the issue and convene a subcommittee. The board also discussed inviting neighbors of the Lowell facility and industry experts to future meetings.

The subcommittee is intended as an exploratory body to gather technical evidence on local electrical capacity, water usage, noise mitigation, and potential zoning controls; no formal regulatory action was taken at Thursday's meeting. Staff will coordinate volunteers and provide the City Council with a memo summarizing the planning board's next steps.