Blakely applies more than 30 restrictions to data centers

Data centers are now strictly regulated in Blakely.

Borough council unanimously voted Monday to adopt an ordinance amending its zoning to address data centers, applying nearly three dozen restrictions on future developments while limiting them to a wooded area on the outskirts of town in its northwest corner. Council voted 7-0 to adopt the ordinance following a public hearing Monday night, said borough Manager Chris Paone, who is also Blakely’s zoning officer.

“Blakely is fully in compliance with the (Pennsylvania Municipalities) Planning Code, and we are protected with in excess of 30 rules and regulations that would govern data centers,” Paone said.

Blakely became the second Midvalley community to formally adopt data center zoning. Jessup initially adopted its data center legislation Aug. 19, followed by a reamended ordinance with adjusted boundary lines Nov. 5. Archbald tried to adopt data center zoning Oct. 3, but council was unable to consider the legislation when a motion to vote on it died without a second. The borough will reconsider its data center zoning ordinance during a special meeting Nov. 24 at 5 p.m. at the Borough Building, 400 Church St.

Dickson City will hold a public hearing Dec. 9 at 5:30 p.m. in the Borough Building, 901 Enterprise St., to solicit input on a proposed data center ordinance, and Olyphant is also working on an ordinance addressing data centers.

Data center developers have targeted the Midvalley throughout 2025, with five proposed campuses in Archbald, two in Jessup and a withdrawn proposal in Blakely.

Council’s vote Monday came just over three months after more than 100 residents packed the Blakely Borough Building — with an overflow crowd of about 60 residents waiting outside plus more than 210 others tuning in online — in opposition of a proposal to build up to four data centers on a large swath of undeveloped land with Business Route 6 on its north, Terrace Drive on its east, Woodland Drive and Kingsley Boulevard to its west, and Prynn Street, Hospital Street, Theresa Street, Crystal Street, Sunset Street, Blythe Drive and Keystone Avenue to its south.

Blakely’s newly adopted ordinance makes data centers conditional uses in a single section of town. The conditional use designation requires any future data center developers to adhere to the borough’s nearly three dozen conditions and attend a public hearing where residents can testify for or against the project. Following the hearing, council would then vote on whether to approve the project.

The ordinance includes a zoning map update creating a “Data & Technology Overlay” that limits data centers to the northwest corner of town in a wooded area north of Business Route 6 and west of Scott Road, or Route 347, extending to Blakely’s borders with Dickson City and Scott Twp. The land is an S-2 zone, or an open space/conservation district. Other intensive conditional uses in that S-2 zone include sanitary landfills, solid waste facilities and fracking. Unlike rezoning, an overlay district conditionally allows data centers on the land while retaining the underlying zoning designation.

Residents from West Mountain Road — a small street parallel to Route 347 and the closest homes to the data center overlay — attended Monday’s hearing with concerns over the proximity to their homes, Paone said.

“We tried to put it in the best location for the entirety of the borough,” he said. “Even though it’s closest to their homes, we feel that it’s still going to give them enough of a buffer that it wouldn’t affect them if someone was to build up there.”

Among the conditions, Blakely requires that before council even considers a data center’s conditional use request, developers must conduct environmental impact, health and sound/noise studies at their expense with a qualified professional chosen at the discretion of the borough. The borough also regulates data centers on not just standard dBa noise requirements, but also dBc requirements, which are lower-frequency sounds below the threshold that humans can hear.

Data centers are also limited to 40 feet tall, prohibited from using any type of on-site electrical generation and are required to be built on at least 20 acres.

Other restrictions include that data centers must:

• Be set back 300 feet from all property lines and road rights-of-way, 300 feet from any property line of residential parcels that aren’t part of the project, and 200 feet from any body of water, watercourse or wetland.

• Abide by all state and federal requirements, including submitting all environmental permitting and reports to the borough.

• Receive electrical power from Blakely Borough Electric Light Company — unlike most municipalities, Blakely administers its own electricity — and reimburse the borough for all expenses required for the service, including engineering, site work, rate calculations and training.

• Allow the borough to access the buildings and grounds at least four times a year for inspections, participate in any emergency management and fire training, and provide the borough’s Fire Department with any required equipment such as foam or vehicles to extinguish a data center fire.

• Provide letters from all applicable public utilities certifying the systems have the capacity to meet facility demands while maintaining the same levels of service for existing residents and businesses.

• Strive to use technologies for water conservation, such as closed-loop or recirculation systems for cooling to reduce the demand for public water, including using stormwater.

• Adhere to guidelines on fencing, lighting, vegetation and other aesthetic elements to reduce visual impact.

If needed, council can impose additional conditions on a developer beyond what is in the ordinance, Paone said.

“There’s a lot of control that a municipality has by using conditional use,” he said. “We’re happy to finally get it on the books, and we can move forward now with regular everyday borough business.”