PEMBROKE — Oct. 20, 2026 — Pembroke’s Special Town Meeting adopted a zoning bylaw for battery energy storage systems Tuesday night after voters amended the Planning Board’s proposal, doubling from 150 to 300 feet the setback required where a medium- or large-scale battery facility’s parcel directly abuts an active residential use or a Residence A district lot line, despite town counsel’s warning that the change could draw attorney general disapproval.
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What voters changed
Planning Board Vice Chair Alysha Siciliano-Perry moved the bylaw as printed in a handout distributed at the meeting, with two oral corrections: the Tier 2 heading in its permitting table should end at 5 megawatt-hours rather than 10, and electrical substations should be dropped from a sentence encouraging battery systems to locate alongside solar arrays, power generation stations or similar facilities.
Susan Bollinger then moved to change the bylaw’s abutting residential lot line buffer from 150 to 300 feet, leaving the rest of that clause unchanged. As printed, the clause requires all battery structures, containers, paved equipment pads and secondary enclosures to keep that distance from the property line wherever a battery parcel directly abuts an active residential use or a Residence A lot line. It falls under setback rules that open by addressing medium-scale Tier 2 and large-scale Tier 3 systems. Siciliano-Perry described Tier 1 as household battery packs, which the bylaw allows by right as an accessory use in every district.
After a resident moved the question, voters ended debate and adopted the amendment by majority show of hands. The moderator then declared the amended bylaw passed, saying it required a two-thirds vote.
The setback debate
Bollinger said the original draft carried 300 feet before the Planning Board reduced it, and that her amendment would not change which properties qualify.
I think that residents in Pembroke should reasonably be able to expect that a large-scale industrial size battery yard would not go on the residential property next to them
— Susan Bollinger 40:58
She noted the bylaw already sets 300 feet next to schools and similar facilities, where staff help people evacuate, and argued that people at home may be unable to evacuate quickly. She later said she was not opposed to battery storage and that, in reviewing past attorney general decisions, she found rulings in which the office struck specific language while letting the rest of a bylaw stand.
Siciliano-Perry said 150 feet mirrors the town’s existing industrial setback from residential properties and cited the state Department of Energy Resources model bylaw as using 50 feet, warning the state would refuse a setback that makes projects impractical. The August 2026 state model first defers to district setbacks; its 50- to 75-foot figures for lots abutting residential districts appear as optional examples, alongside a caution against setbacks so large they amount to a de facto prohibition. Siciliano-Perry added that the fire chief, who served on the drafting committee, proposed the bylaw’s 300-foot distance for schools, hospitals and nursing homes.
Town Counsel Michelle Randazzo said it is untested whether the attorney general would view 300 feet as effectively prohibiting battery facilities.
if they view a 300-foot setback as effectively prohibiting the siting of any BESS facility then they may end up disapproving the bylaw in its entirety
— Michelle Randazzo, Town Counsel 54:22
Asked by Kathleen Keegan whether the state could replace 300 feet with 50, Randazzo said she had not seen the attorney general substitute a number that way and thought the office might instead disapprove the language, sending it back to Town Meeting.
Alan Peterson, who described himself as a retired public facilities director, said 300 feet would create an economic barrier to most battery projects, citing time-of-use electricity pricing and schools elsewhere with battery stations within 50 feet. Another speaker, who said they had sat on a past battery storage appeal, backed 300 feet.
