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Lowell planning board backs 360-day moratorium on new data centers and asks council to tighten definition, clarify expansion and enforcement
Summary
The planning board voted unanimously to recommend a 360-day moratorium on new data-center applications, urging the City Council to refine the definition to focus on high-performance computing installations, explicitly address expansions of existing sites, and strengthen enforcement and community-benefit provisions.
The Lowell Planning Board voted unanimously on March 2 to send a positive, nonbinding recommendation to the City Council supporting a 360-day moratorium on new data-center development, while urging specific clarifications to the draft ordinance.
Chair introduced the moratorium as a temporary pause to let staff study impacts and draft zoning language addressing power, water, sewer capacity, noise, operational limits and legal implications. The draft would prohibit acceptance of new applications for construction and operation of data centers for 360 days unless the zoning code is amended sooner.
Residents and neighborhood advocates filled the public-comment period and urged swift action.…
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