County reviews battery-storage assessment, zoning and tax questions after presenter’s briefing

Commissioners on the Emmons County Board of Commissioners spent a substantial portion of the meeting reviewing a staff-packaged analysis of proposed battery-storage facilities and how the county should respond.

Christine Severson, who presented the county’s analysis, said the first question is ownership and assessment: whether the battery arrays will be centrally assessed by the state as utility property or assessed locally as land. “If we go by how the…are assessed, they’re essentially assessed by the state,” Severson said, arguing that batteries and the metal containers holding them tend to be treated as personal property and not taxed locally unless packaged with real estate or a power-generating function.

Commissioners pressed practical and safety questions. Several expressed alarm at the prospect of batteries being left on-site as they “degrade” and then stacked with replacement units rather than removed; Severson said her understanding from industry briefings is that operators may add containers to maintain nominal capacity and that full removal typically occurs later in the equipment life cycle. Commissioners also asked about fire risk, on-site storage, and whether local permits can require removal and detailed fire-safety plans.

The board discussed zoning and permitting options. One commissioner said the facility resembles industrial operations and recommended rezoning or at least conditioning a conditional-use permit to require industrial setbacks; others noted that a conditional-use permit does not change tax classification and that rezoning would require a public hearing and a longer process. Severson said she contacted other states with similar facilities and that Colorado provided the most substantive feedback, which suggested central assessment in some cases.

Members also asked for supporting documentation behind a company’s valuation estimate. A commissioner said the developer had provided a projected taxable value in the millions and asked for the methodology and firm behind that projection before the board could agree on a tax or incentive strategy.

No formal county action was taken beyond directing staff to continue refining permit language and tax-assessment questions. The board agreed to keep watching legislative and Public Service Commission (PSC) developments and to include explicit permit guardrails addressing battery removal, fire safety, and monitoring in any conditional-use approval package.

Next steps: staff will refine recommended permit conditions, seek additional information on valuation methodology, and present refined zoning/tax language to the board at a future meeting.