Ordinance 2770-26 Data Center Ord - Public Hearing 10/6/2026

PUBLIC NOTICE
MILLBURN TOWNSHIP
MILLBURN TOWNSHIP COMMITTEE
ORDINANCE 2770-26

PUBLIC NOTICE is hereby given that the following Ordinance was submitted in writing, introduced, read by title and passed on first reading at a meeting of the Township Committee of the Township of Millburn, in the County of Essex on Tuesday, September 1, 2026. The ordinance will be considered for final passage and adoption at the public hearing held at a Township Committee meeting beginning at 7:00 p.m. on Tuesday, October 6, 2026 at the Millburn Education Center, 434 Millburn Avenue, Millburn, New Jersey when and where or at such time and place to which said meeting may be adjourned, all persons interested will be given an opportunity to be heard concerning said ordinance. The Millburn Education Center will open for this meeting beginning at 6:45PM and details on the meeting and agenda may be located at town hall, on our website https://www.twp.millburn.nj.us/AgendaCenter or by contacting the Municipal Clerk's Office at 973-564-7092.

BY ORDER OF THE TOWNSHIP COMMITTEE
Christine A. Gatti, RMC, Township Clerk

ORDINANCE NO. 2770-26
AN ORDINANCE AMENDING AND SUPPLEMENTING THE TOWNSHIP OF MILLBURN DEVELOPMENT REGULATIONS AND ZONING ORDINANCE TO DEFINE DATA CENTERS AND PROHIBIT DATA CENTERS IN ALL ZONING DISTRICTS

WHEREAS, the Township Committee of the Township of Millburn is authorized under the New Jersey Municipal Land Use Law, N.J.S.A. 40:55D-1 et seq., to adopt and amend zoning ordinances regulating the nature and extent of the uses of land and of buildings and structures thereon; and

WHEREAS, the purposes of the Municipal Land Use Law include encouraging municipal action to guide the appropriate use or development of all lands in a manner that promotes the public health, safety, morals, and general welfare; securing safety from natural and man-made disasters; providing adequate light, air, and open space; promoting a desirable visual environment; conserving historic sites, open space, energy resources, and natural resources; and promoting renewable energy resources, all as set forth in N.J.S.A. 40:55D-2; and

WHEREAS, N.J.S.A. 40:55D-62 authorizes the governing body to adopt or amend a zoning ordinance relating to the nature and extent of uses of land and of buildings and structures thereon, provided that such ordinance or amendment is substantially consistent with, or designed to effectuate, the land use plan element and housing plan element of the municipal master plan, except as otherwise provided by law; and

WHEREAS, the Township’s Development Regulations and Zoning Ordinance states that its purposes are to establish a pattern for the use of land and structures based on the Master Plan, to implement the Master Plan, and to encourage private and municipal action that will foster development of the Township in a manner that promotes the public health, safety, morals, and general welfare; and

WHEREAS, the 2018 Master Plan Reexamination and Update states that the primary purpose of the Master Plan is to guide the use of land based on past trends, existing conditions, and reasonable expectations for the future, and to maintain and reinforce land use policies that encourage appropriate growth while maintaining the high quality of life enjoyed by Millburn residents; and

WHEREAS, the 2018 Master Plan Reexamination and Update describes Millburn as a predominantly single-family residential community organized into neighborhoods with established business districts, a compact walkable downtown area, significant cultural and recreational assets, access to rail transit, and substantial open-space resources; and

WHEREAS, based upon the 2024 United States Data Center Energy Usage Report prepared by Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory with support from the United States Department of Energy, together with United States Department of Energy findings concerning artificial intelligence and data center infrastructure and United States Energy Information Administration projections regarding commercial computing electricity demand, the Township Committee recognizes that data centers are a distinct and rapidly expanding land use category with electrical-demand and infrastructure characteristics materially different from ordinary commercial, office, retail, institutional, civic, medical-office, or neighborhood-serving uses; and

WHEREAS, the Township Committee finds that data centers may require intensive and continuous electrical service, specialized utility infrastructure, transformers, switchgear, substations, backup generators, batteries, fuel storage, cooling systems, utility upgrades, emergency-service access, security infrastructure, and related accessory facilities, and therefore may create land use, infrastructure, resiliency, water-resource, air-quality, noise, vibration, heat, emergency-service, visual, and community-character impacts materially different from other uses contemplated by the Township’s Zoning Ordinance and Master Plan; and

WHEREAS, on May 27, 2026, Governor Mikie Sherrill announced a comprehensive statewide plan concerning data centers, recognizing the growing impact of data centers on energy demand, resource use, and local communities, and identifying the need for guardrails to protect communities, strengthen transparency, require reporting on energy and water use, ensure data centers contribute to grid infrastructure, address impacts such as light, noise, and pollution, and support meaningful local investment; and

WHEREAS, recent State legislation concerning data centers recognizes the need to address data center impacts on electric service, grid costs, energy efficiency, clean generation, energy storage, demand reduction, interconnection, curtailment, aggregation of related facilities, and attempts to avoid regulation by splitting or restructuring projects; and

WHEREAS, the Township Master Plan establishes goals and objectives to encourage appropriate land uses that promote Millburn’s character as a small suburb of the highest quality; protect established residential neighborhoods; encourage land use and development at an appropriate scale and density; promote the appropriate mix of development in Downtown and other commercial areas; maintain and enhance economic vitality of Downtown and other business districts; promote high-quality retail and commercial activity; maintain pedestrian scale in appropriate business districts; strengthen existing business centers; address sustainability and resiliency; evaluate and improve infrastructure; protect water resources, air quality, open spaces, and natural resources; reduce the risk of future power outages; increase energy efficiency; and reduce fossil-fuel energy consumption; and

WHEREAS, the Township Committee finds that data centers are materially distinguishable from the office, commercial, medical-office, retail, civic, cultural, recreational, residential, open-space, and other land uses contemplated by the Township’s zoning districts and Master Plan, and do not advance the specific land use, commercial vitality, neighborhood protection, appropriate scale and density, pedestrian scale, infrastructure, sustainability, energy-efficiency, open-space, and resiliency goals and objectives set forth in the Master Plan; and

WHEREAS, the Township Committee recognizes that data-center technology, State regulation, utility infrastructure, energy demand, and local land-use impacts are evolving, and intends to request that the Planning Board evaluate this ordinance in the future, including in connection with any future Master Plan reexamination, material change in State law or regulation, or other significant change in data-center technology or utility infrastructure affecting the Township; and

WHEREAS, while the Township recognizes current and evolving State policy measures concerning data centers, the Township Committee finds that, under the Township’s existing Master Plan, zoning districts, land use pattern, infrastructure context, and adopted planning objectives, data centers are not an appropriate land use within the Township, and prohibiting data centers in all zoning districts is designed to effectuate the Township Master Plan and promote the public health, safety, and general welfare; and

WHEREAS, prior to the public hearing on adoption of a zoning ordinance or amendment, N.J.S.A. 40:55D-64 requires referral of the proposed ordinance or amendment to the Planning Board.

NOW, THEREFORE, BE IT ORDAINED by the Township Committee of the Township of Millburn, County of Essex, State of New Jersey, as follows:

SECTION 1. Definition Added. Article 3, Definitions, Section DRZ-301, Words and Phrases Defined, is hereby amended and supplemented to add the following definition in proper alphabetical order, with numbering to be assigned or adjusted by the codifier as necessary:

301.13.0 DATA CENTER - A building, structure, facility, premises, or portion thereof primarily used for the storage, management, processing, routing, transmission, or hosting of digital data, applications, or computing services through servers, network equipment, data-storage systems, or similar electronic infrastructure. The term includes commercial colocation facilities, cloud-computing facilities, server farms, cryptocurrency mining operations, artificial-intelligence computing facilities, high-performance computing facilities, distributed computing facilities, and wholesale digital infrastructure services.

The term data center shall not include:

1. Public utility infrastructure, telecommunications central offices, switching facilities, or similar regulated utility or telecommunications facilities, provided that such facilities are not used primarily for commercial colocation, cloud-computing, cryptocurrency mining, artificial-intelligence computing, high-performance computing, or wholesale digital infrastructure services; or
2. Server rooms, network rooms, computer rooms, or accessory data-processing facilities operated by permitted offices, financial institutions, medical offices, health care facilities, public utilities, schools, educational institutions, governmental agencies, public safety facilities, law firms, technology firms, telecommunications providers, or similar entities, provided that:
   1. the facility is clearly incidental and subordinate to a permitted principal use;
   2. the facility is used only for the internal business, administrative, communications, cybersecurity, research, software-development, operational, or utility functions of the principal occupant;
   3. the facility does not exceed 20 percent of the floor area of the principal building, calculated under DRZ-301.22.1, or 10,000 square feet, whichever is less;
   4. the facility is not the principal use of the property;
   5. no portion of the facility is used primarily for cryptocurrency mining, colocation, cloud-computing services, artificial-intelligence computing services, high-performance computing services, data processing for off-site customers, or wholesale digital infrastructure services;
   6. the total electrical capacity dedicated to servers, computing equipment, data-processing equipment, data-storage equipment, and related network equipment does not exceed 2 megawatts, excluding ordinary building lighting, elevators, office equipment, life-safety systems, and HVAC serving occupied non-data-center floor area; and
   7. the facility is not served by a dedicated electric utility substation, switching station, or similar major electrical infrastructure installed primarily for the facility.

Remote access by the principal occupant’s employees, contractors, agents, affiliates, customers, or other authorized internal users shall not, by itself, cause the facility to be considered a data center

1. De minimis residential data-processing facilities consisting of servers, computing equipment, data-storage equipment, network equipment, or other data-processing facilities located on a lot containing a dwelling and operated by a resident of that dwelling, including facilities used for cryptocurrency mining, artificial-intelligence computing, high-performance computing, hosting, or data processing for off-site customers, provided that:
   1. the activity is otherwise permitted as a home occupation or accessory residential use; and
   2. the total electrical capacity dedicated to all servers, computing equipment, data-processing equipment, data-storage equipment, and related network equipment located on the premises does not exceed 50 kilowatts.

SECTION 2. DRZ-604 Amended. DRZ-604, Prohibited Uses of the Township of Millburn Development Regulations and Zoning Ordinance is hereby amended and supplemented to add the following prohibited use:

1. Data Centers.
   1. Data centers, as defined in DRZ-301, are prohibited in all zoning districts in the Township of Millburn.
   2. A data center shall not be permitted as a principal use, accessory use, conditional use, office use, research use, telecommunications use, utility use, warehouse use, institutional use, public utility use, home occupation, or any other use category.
   3. No building, structure, facility, dwelling, dwelling unit, accessory building, lot, tract, premises, equipment installation, or portion thereof shall be used, occupied, converted, constructed, installed, expanded, reconstructed, or approved for use as a data center.
   4. A person shall not avoid this section by splitting a data center into smaller facilities, tenants, meters, service requests, lots, buildings, rooms, equipment installations, phases, ownership entities, or operating agreements.
   5. Separate facilities or equipment installations shall be treated as one use if they are under common ownership or control, are on the same lot or on contiguous lots, operate as part of one system, or share substantial electric, cooling, network, backup power, security, utility, or operating infrastructure.
   6. This section shall not prohibit server rooms, network rooms, computer rooms, accessory data-processing facilities, de minimis residential data-processing facilities, public utility infrastructure, telecommunications central offices, switching facilities, or similar facilities that are excluded from the definition of data center under DRZ-301.
   7. Upon request of the Zoning Officer, an applicant, owner, tenant, or operator shall provide information reasonably needed to determine whether a use is a data center. Such information may include floor area; electrical capacity dedicated to servers, computing equipment, data-processing equipment, data-storage equipment, and related network equipment; utility infrastructure; equipment purpose; and whether computing, data-processing, or data-storage capacity is provided, sold, leased, hosted, or otherwise made available to external customers, clients, platforms, networks, entities, or third parties.

J.    All uses not expressly permitted in this ordinance are prohibited.

K.    All uses not expressly permitted in this ordinance are prohibited.

SECTION 3. Referral to Planning Board. This ordinance shall be referred to the Township of Millburn Planning Board for review and report pursuant to N.J.S.A. 40:55D-64.

SECTION 4. Repealer. All ordinances or parts of ordinances inconsistent with this ordinance are hereby repealed to the extent of such inconsistency only.

SECTION 5. Severability. If any section, subsection, paragraph, sentence, clause, phrase, or provision of this ordinance is declared invalid, unconstitutional, or unenforceable by a court of competent jurisdiction, such determination shall not affect the validity of the remaining portions of this ordinance, which shall remain in full force and effect.

SECTION 6. Effective Date. This ordinance shall take effect upon final passage, adoption, and publication according to law.

Posting Details – Ordinance 2770-26
Millburn Township Committee
Date Posted on Millburn Public Notices Page and Bulletin Board: 9/2/2026
Date Notice Archived: 10/31/2026