Nexamp, a clean energy company, shared an image of a similar site online, showing an already existing battery site. The Village of Sherburne is considering a proposal to build a battery storage facility on Knapp Road in Sherburne. The public hearing will take place at the Sherburne Fire Department at 7:30 p.m. on Wednesday, July 8. (Submitted photo)

SHERBURNE – On Wednesday night the Town of Sherburne will hold a public hearing to extend the moratorium on battery energy storage sites.

The public hearing will take place at the Sherburne Fire Department at 7:30 p.m. on Wednesday, July 8.

The moratorium was put in place on January 14th in order to give the town time to create an energy storage law to protect the interests of town residents. Extending the moratorium will give the town another six months to get the law in place.

The moratorium was put in place after the clean-energy company Nexamp announced their plan to build a lithium-ion battery storage facility on a 2-acre plot of land located at 392 Knapp Road in Sherburne. The facility would allow the batteries to be charged from NYSEG’s electrical grid during off hours. The batteries would store the power and sell it back to NYSEG during peak hours.

The Sherburne community has voiced many concerns with the location of the project and the possible environmental implications. Over 600 people have signed a petition against the battery storage site, and a protest was held near the property location earlier this month.

Since the last public hearing on the issue, the Town of Sherburne has been working with attorney Dylan Harris to create the law. According to Sherburne Supervisor Charles Mastro, Harris is currently working with six different municipalities to come up with similar laws. “Our goal is to have the preliminary law in the in the next month,” Mastro said. “Then we will give it to the fire department to get input so we can keep refining it.” Mastro said he hopes to have the law finalized and ready to pass by November and explained that the goal is to have it be as tough as possible in order to protect the town.

The Sherburne planning board has also been working on their comprehensive plan. The updated version will include a section on battery storage and data centers.

“Legally, we can’t ban this, but we can guide it so it is done in the best way,” Mastro said. “We are just trying to do our part to protect ourselves as best as we can.”

The public will be allowed to ask questions, although each speaker will have a limited amount of time to speak. Representatives from Nexamp will also be in attendance.

While the battery project is taking place in the Town of Sherburne, the Village of Sherburne would also be heavily impacted by the project due to the proximity and the responsibility of the Sherburne Fire Department, which is under the oversight of the Village of Sherburne. Mayor William Acee said from his perspective he is a firm no on this project. The Village Board has not taken an official stance on the project. “There are, on average, one runaway thermal fire per month due to battery storage,” Acee said, “and the gasses emitted are extremely toxic.”

Acee said if a different battery type were being used, he might be convinced to change his stance on the project. Mastro has also stated that he believes there are safer alternatives to lithium-ion batteries.

The public hearing will take place at the Sherburne Fire Department at 7:30 p.m. on Wednesday, July 8th.

(A previous version of this story had the wrong hearing date and was corrected.)