Littleton Commission Continues Battery Storage Vote Pending Fire Department Review

LITTLETON — August 5, 2025 — Littleton Conservation Commission defers battery storage vote and opens Long Lake dock enforcement discussion. The commission voted unanimously August 5 to continue the Notice of Intent for a proposed battery energy storage facility at 97 and 99 Mill Road to August 19, directing Commission Chair Chase Kerby and members Kyle and Michael Livingston to meet with applicant consultant Steve Byrne and Littleton Deputy Chief Coffee to review a fire hazard mitigation and emergency response plan before any approval vote — the project sits within a Zone 2 wellhead protection area with downstream wetlands. In the meeting's most extended debate, the commission took a non-binding 5-1 straw poll supporting a natural regeneration approach, rather than mandatory replanting, to resolve a 33 Star Hill Road enforcement order in which nine native living trees — including red maple, American elm, and black cherry — were removed within the 100-foot buffer during invasive-species clearing; arborist Chuck Karen argued that planting nursery stock under a nearly complete canopy would fail, while Kerby called the no-replanting approach "a moral hazard." The commission also agreed to pursue a formal public hearing, abutter notification, and Select Board consultation before taking any enforcement action on what photographs showed as at least four unpermitted docks and a long-standing anchored water trampoline on town-owned Long Lake conservation shoreline.