SJC Rules on Solar Facility Special Permit Denials in Sunpin Energy Services v. Petersham
By Matthew Connolly and Matthew Snell
In July 2026, the Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court (“SJC”) confirmed that the authority of a zoning board to deny local permits is limited only to those instances where such denial is necessary to protect public health, safety, or welfare based on individualized and site-specific reasons. In Sunpin Energy Services, LLC v. Zoning Bd. of Appeals of Petersham, 497 Mass. 794 (2026) (“Sunpin”), the SJC further defined the limited circumstances where a local zoning board may deny a special permit for a proposed solar energy system under what is commonly known as the “Dover Amendment” to The Zoning Act, G.L. c. 40A, § 3.
The Facts and Law Among the Trees
Under the Dover Amendment, “[n]o zoning ordinance or by-law shall prohibit or unreasonably regulate the installation of solar energy systems or the building of structures that facilitate the collection of solar energy, except where necessary to protect the public health, safety or welfare.” Id.
In 2021, Sunpin applied for a special permit for a 4.3 megawatt (“MW”) solar-generating facility in Petersham. Sunpin, 497 Mass. at 796-97. The town’s solar bylaw provided for a single zoning district that allowed solar facilities as of right on a five-acre, town-owned parcel, and solar facilities elsewhere in the town subject to the receipt of a special permit from the zoning board. Id. at 796.
Although Sunpin’s proposal satisfied the requirements of the town’s bylaw regarding solar facility siting, one of three board members voted not to approve, resulting in the denial of the special permit application under G.L. c. 40A, § 9, twelfth par., which requires unanimous approval. Sunpin, 497 Mass. at 800. The dissenting board member primarily based her decision on the fact that construction of the site would require clearing several acres of trees, which she concluded would “derogate from the intent and purpose” of the town’s bylaw. Id. at 797-98.
On motion for summary judgment, the Land Court upheld the zoning board’s denial. Id. at 799. The Appeals Court then vacated that decision because the board’s denial improperly preferred forest preservation over solar energy siting and contained conjecture about future development in the town. Id.
The SJC’s Two-Part Test
In the decision, the SJC set forth a two-pronged analysis to govern when a local zoning board’s denial of a special permit for a solar project will be upheld. First, the denial must be narrowly focused “to protect” (rather than more broadly to “promote”) the public health, safety, or welfare, and such necessity must be site- and project-specific in recognition of the “special status and strong encouragement of solar energy systems” under Massachusetts law. Id. at 804, 806. The SJC held that avoidance of unnecessary deforestation can be a proper consideration of public health and welfare for a zoning board. Id. at 806. However, the SJC found that the Petersham zoning board did not analyze whether the deforestation caused by this project would harm the public, leading the SJC to vacate the board’s denial of Sunpin’s special permit. Id. at 806-07.
Second, a zoning board cannot unreasonably regulate the permitting of solar energy facilities, generally. The SJC determined that the Petersham zoning board did not properly apply the Dover Amendment’s restrictions because the permit denial was in part based on a lack of clear community benefits and hypothetical concerns about increased future development. Id. at 804. The SJC noted that Petersham is 97 percent forested and reasoned that a bar on deforestation would amount to a “blanket” ban on all similar solar facilities. Id. at 796, 805. Such a blanket ban is an unreasonable regulation of solar facility permitting under the Dover Amendment. Id. at 805.
The SJC ultimately vacated the board’s decision and remanded the case to the board for reconsideration. It specifically instructed the board to “apply the site-specific analysis required . . . including whether avoiding deforestation at this particular site is necessary to protect the public health, safety, or welfare and, if so, how this site differs from others in the town where large solar energy systems may be sited.” Id. at 807.
Takeaways
This decision provides clarity for zoning boards on the scope of issues that may support denial of a special permit for a solar energy project, while reminding those boards that Massachusetts law and public policy provide for a “narrow ambit” within which a municipality may deny a solar project. Further, the SJC reminds municipalities that the Dover Amendment is intended to promote siting of solar facilities and heavily limits the possibility of such denials (the intent is to “support and not unduly interfere” with siting of solar projects). Generalized concerns about public welfare that are not specific to the proposed site and project, even if they are otherwise legitimate, will not be enough for a municipality to deny a special permit for a solar facility.
As a final point, the SJC acknowledged in a footnote that, in the time since the Petersham zoning board initially denied Sunpin’s permit, the Legislature enacted the 2024 Climate Act, codified at G.L. c. 21A, § 30 and G.L. c. 25A, § 21 (as applicable for small solar projects). Sunpin, 497 Mass. at 807 n.7. New projects for small solar and other clean energy facilities will now be subject to new regulations promulgated by the Department of Energy Resources, 225 C.M.R. 29.00, which provide the baseline of standards for local governments to follow in permitting and siting solar facility projects. Under these regulations, permitting for small solar projects (<25 MW) could now be reviewed under a consolidated local permitting process, where municipalities will continue to make initial determinations about the applicability of the Dover Amendment. (A solar developer could instead seek local permits separately, rather than through the new consolidated process.) Large solar projects (>25 MW) now undergo a consolidated process at the Energy Facilities Siting Board for all state and local permits. The Siting Board will therefore make initial determinations about the applicability of the Dover Amendment for large solar projects.
Matthew Connolly and Matthew Snell are partners at Nutter McClennen & Fish, LLP and co-chairs of the firm’s Environment and Energy Practice Group. Matthew Connolly also co-chairs the BBA’s Real Estate Section.
