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Planning Board Special Meeting

Chatham County · Planning Board
Tuesday, July 14, 2026 at 6:30 pm · Emergency Operations Center, 112 Innovation Way Pittsboro, North Carolina 27312

Special or emergency meeting Data centers and large loadsEnvironment and sustainabilityWater and sewerZoning text amendment

Agenda document Minutes Meeting page Watch Meeting recap

What's on this agenda

Chatham County's Planning Board spent 14 July on the technical limits it might write into data center rules: noise, vibration and light, heat emissions, generators and back-up power, and water use. Staff opened with the timeline for the moratorium the commissioners adopted on 11 February and a legal review, and the vice chair introduced each subject in turn.

Summarized from the published agenda. Read the agenda itself before acting on it.

Meeting recap

What happened, drawn from the records published after the meeting. Minutes

The board did not settle the noise question. A motion to leave the dBA standards as the county's noise ordinance already writes them failed 2-7. The chair argued for a clear infrasound standard measured at the property line, as the dBA limit is, and the vice chair agreed that dBC and possibly dBG need limits of their own but at different numbers, because each weighting scale measures something different.

Public comment pushed further than the board's remit. One speaker asked the board to recommend prohibiting data centers outright rather than writing zoning rules for them. Staff reminded the board twice of its limits: it can only recommend, and any change it proposes to the noise ordinance would have to apply to every industry in the county rather than to one use.

How the votes went

The agenda was approved 8-0. The motion to leave the dBA noise standards as written in the county ordinance failed 2-7.

From the published minutes.

Speaking at this meeting

Chatham County's own rules for public comment — check them before you rely on anything here.

Agenda items (9)

Discussion item · 6Procedural · 1Presentation · 1Public hearing · 1
  1. III Approval of Agenda
    Procedural
    Approved 8-0
  2. IV Framing the Discussion
    Discussion item Data centers and large loads
  3. V Staff Presentation: next steps and timeline for the moratorium, legal review
    Presentation Data centers and large loadsZoning text amendment
    Staff set out two timelines, a longer one finishing recommendations for potential approval in January and a shorter one, and reviewed the legal constraints.
  4. VI Public Input Session
    Public hearing Data centers and large loads
    Speakers asked the board to recommend prohibiting data centers outright rather than regulating them.
  5. VII.1 Board Discussion: Noise
    Discussion item Data centers and large loadsEnvironment and sustainability
    Whether to write new noise limits for data centers or keep the county's existing ordinance, and how to handle low-frequency sound and infrasound.
    A motion to leave the dBA standards as written failed 2-7
  6. VII.2 Board Discussion: Vibration and Light
    Discussion item Data centers and large loadsEnvironment and sustainability
  7. VII.3 Board Discussion: Heat Emissions
    Discussion item Data centers and large loadsEnvironment and sustainability
  8. VII.4 Board Discussion: Generators and Back-up power
    Discussion item Data centers and large loadsEnvironment and sustainability
    Back-up generators, including how many hours a year they run and what tier of diesel engine they use.
  9. VII.5 Board Discussion: Water Use
    Discussion item Data centers and large loadsWater and sewer

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