As New York communities position themselves for long-term growth and resilience, they are increasingly faced with proposals for large-scale, technology-driven developments. From semiconductor fabrication plants and battery manufacturing facilities to data centers and cryptocurrency mining operations, these projects are reshaping the development landscape—especially in suburban and rural towns.
These projects often bring promises of jobs, tax revenue, and long-term economic development. But they also introduce a range of planning, zoning, and environmental challenges that towns must address through their local land use authority.
For town officials, and particularly for Planning Boards and Zoning Boards of Appeals (ZBAs), the rise of these projects means engaging with complex applications that can test the limits of existing land use regulations, infrastructure capacity, and environmental safeguards. In this context, traditional tools like site plan review, special use permits, and zoning variance decisions are more important than ever.
This article explores how large technology projects intersect with the planning and zoning responsibilities of towns under New York State law, and how environmental review under the State Environmental Quality Review Act (SEQRA) can help inform and support local decision-making.
The Planning Challenge: New Scale, New Stakes
Historically, large-scale industrial developments were often confined to urban or traditionally industrialized areas. But as supply chains shift and energy infrastructure evolves, high-tech and energy-intensive facilities are now being proposed in places where zoning codes may not have anticipated them.
In many cases, these proposals involve:
- Hundreds of acres of land.
- Round-the-clock operations with heavy energy and water demands.
- New construction in previously undeveloped or lightly zoned areas.
- Proximity to homes, schools, farmland, or sensitive environmental features.
These land use changes raise questions about compatibility, cumulative impacts, and whether current zoning districts and comprehensive plans reflect community priorities.
Planning Boards and ZBAs are now faced with applications that push the bounds of what their local zoning frameworks were designed to accommodate. This makes careful, transparent review and public engagement essential.
Common Environmental and Land Use Impacts
Whether reviewing a proposed data center, chip plant, or battery facility, towns are likely to confront a series of recurring issues, including:
- Energy and Water Demand: High-tech operations can stress local utilities, requiring upgrades or expansion of public infrastructure.
- Traffic and Access: Heavy construction equipment, truck deliveries, and employee traffic can overload local roads and intersections.
- Noise, Light, and Visual Impacts: Large facilities often operate 24/7 and can generate significant ambient noise and light pollution, especially in residential or agricultural districts.
- Environmental Protection: Large footprints and intensive operations may pose risks to wetlands, wildlife habitat, or local air and water quality.
- Stormwater and Wastewater Management: Impervious surfaces and industrial processes may require new or expanded facilities for managing runoff and waste.
- Cumulative Impacts: Even when individual proposals are manageable, multiple large projects in a single region can create aggregate environmental, infrastructure, and land use burdens.
Planning and Zoning Boards are often the first to hear about these concerns, either from residents at public hearings, or through technical evaluations conducted during the environmental review conducted under SEQRA.
SEQRA as a Land Use Planning Tool
While often viewed as a mere environmental regulation, SEQRA can also be a powerful planning and zoning tool. It helps ensure that towns evaluate the full scope of potential impacts before making land use decisions.
Under SEQRA, Planning Boards and ZBAs may act as lead agencies when they are the entities primarily responsible for approving a project. Alternatively, they may serve as involved agencies whose approvals are necessary for the project to proceed.
SEQRA requires a thorough review process, which may include:
- Environmental Assessment Forms (EAFs): These forms help determine whether a project may have a significant environmental impact.
- Environmental Impact Statements (EISs): If significant impacts are likely, a full EIS is required to evaluate alternatives, mitigation measures, and cumulative effects.
- Public Participation: SEQRA requires public notice, hearings, and opportunities for comment, giving local residents and officials the chance to contribute to the administrative record of an application and shape outcomes.
- Mitigation and Conditions: SEQRA allows towns to condition approvals on implementation of impact mitigation, aligning closely with local planning goals.
For Planning Boards and ZBAs, the SEQRA process provides the technical foundation to make informed land use decisions, using a prescribed process to ensure fairness.
How Planning Boards Can Engage with Large Projects
Planning Boards are most often responsible for site plan review, subdivision applications, and special use permit approvals, key tools for regulating how a use is implemented within a zoning district.
When reviewing large technology projects, Planning Boards should:
- Assess Compliance with Comprehensive Plans: Does the project align with the town’s vision for future development?
- Evaluate Technical Impacts: Planning Boards should carefully review submissions related to stormwater, traffic, utilities, landscaping, and environmental buffers.
- Impose Mitigation Measures: Conditions can include noise barriers, vegetative screening, hours of operation limits, or off-site infrastructure upgrades.
- Coordinate with Other Agencies: This includes county Planning Boards, NYS DOT, NYS DEC, or other permitting authorities.
- Facilitate Public Comment: Early and meaningful public participation leads to better outcomes and reduces the risk of community opposition.
For some projects, Planning Boards may also require developers to submit fiscal or community impact studies—providing data on potential costs to public services and infrastructure.
The ZBA’s Role: Gatekeeper of Exceptions
The ZBA can serve as the interpreter and gatekeeper of a town’s zoning ordinance. Considerations for large tech projects may include:
- Area Variances: For height, setback, or lot coverage requirements.
- Use Variances: If the proposed use is not permitted in the zoning district.
- Appeals of Code Interpretations: When there is a dispute over how zoning provisions apply to novel technologies.
ZBAs are required to follow specific statutory criteria, particularly for use variances, which require applicants to demonstrate unnecessary hardship. These standards are intentionally difficult to meet, ensuring that zoning integrity is preserved.
When large projects seek variances, the ZBA plays a critical role in determining whether those exceptions are justified or whether they undermine the purposes of local zoning.
Proactive Steps Towns Can Take
Rather than reacting to proposals as they arise, towns can proactively plan for the types of large developments that may seek to locate in their jurisdiction. Strategies include:
- Zoning Code Updates: Modernizing codes to account for emerging industries (e.g., defining “data centers” or “battery storage facilities” as specific uses).
- Overlay Districts: Creating zones where large-scale industrial or tech development is permitted with clear performance standards.
- Moratoria and Studies: If overwhelmed by applications, towns can enact temporary moratoria while conducting studies or updating comprehensive plans.
- SEQRA Findings Integration: Integrate SEQRA findings into permit conditions and zoning enforcement processes.
- Consultants and Counsel: Engage planning consultants, engineers, and legal advisors early to ensure thorough and defensible review.
The goal is not to prevent development, but to guide it in a way that respects the town’s goals, protects the environment, and minimizes unintended consequences.
The Central Role of Planning and Zoning
As New York State towns confront the realities of hosting large technology projects, Planning Boards and Zoning Boards of Appeals are at the heart of the conversation. These local bodies are not just gatekeepers, they are stewards of community character, guardians of infrastructure capacity, and champions of thoughtful, lawful development.
By using the tools of land use regulation and environmental review, towns can ensure that the benefits of growth do not come at the expense of the environment, public health, or neighborhood stability. The work of planning and zoning in this context is more than administrative, it is foundational to how communities define and shape their future.
Jacob H. Zoghlin is a Partner in Underberg & Kessler LLP’s Litigation department and chairs the firm’s Environmental & Energy and Municipal Law practice groups. His practice focuses on environmental, land use, energy, and municipal law. He regularly represents towns, developers, and community members in matters involving SEQRA, zoning, permitting, and land use litigation. You can reach Jacob at (585) 258-2834 or jzoghlin@underbergkessler.com.
Reprinted with permission from the March/April 2026 edition of the New York Association of Towns (NYAOT) Talk of the Towns & Topics publication and available as a PDF file here.
