Section
Preemption, statute, attorney-general review and litigation: the rules that override a county board.
Market Trend · 21 August 2026
In eighteen months the instrument went from a township's 180-day pause to a governor freezing an interconnection queue and a bill in both chambers of Congress. Each rung up the ladder is harder to route around than the one below it.
Market Trend · 21 August 2026
Nine Massachusetts towns voted to block solar or battery storage. The Attorney General struck down the bylaws, one at a time, under a statute most developers have never read.
Market Trend · 18 August 2026
Of 507 counties SitePath tracks for battery storage, five are in a restrictive posture. Meanwhile 114 have written a standalone BESS ordinance and 223 reference NFPA 855.
Weekly Analysis · 21 July 2026
When a Virginia county wanted to keep utility-scale solar out, the state legislature took the decision away from it.
Field Note · 21 July 2026
SitePath merged five county-cluster research dossiers into the canonical store, covering 14 Massachusetts counties and 26 BESS-related ordinance records. Two things stand out for siting professionals.
Weekly Analysis · 4 July 2026
If you develop utility-scale solar, two dates have been circled on your calendar all year. This week, both of them passed within seventy-two hours of each other — and they push you in opposite directions.
Weekly Analysis · 22 June 2026
On July 1, Virginia counties lose a power most of them never expected to lose: the power to say no to a battery.
Field Note · 22 June 2026
In a single week, three more local governments moved to slam the door on data centers, and Virginia lawmakers — who can't ban them — moved instead to tax them.
Field Note · 21 June 2026
Virginia's state budget — normally a fight about schools and Medicaid — has become, this month, a fight about data centers. Two threads are converging on the same deadline.
Weekly Analysis · 15 June 2026
On July 1, Virginia becomes the next state to tell its counties they can no longer ban utility-scale solar. The instinct is to treat that date as the end of a fight. Illinois suggests it is closer to the beginning of one.
Policy Brief · 14 June 2026
For three years, the most important fact about utility-scale solar in the United States has been that the action is local.
Weekly Analysis · 8 June 2026
On July 1, 2026, the ground rules for siting utility-scale solar in Virginia change for the first time since the Virginia Clean Economy Act.
Weekly Analysis · 4 June 2026
On July 1, a handful of Virginia counties that spent the last two years writing utility-scale solar out of their zoning codes will have to start saying yes again — or at least stop saying a flat no.
County ordinances and board resolutions. Municipal and township action sits below this line and is not counted here.
| Category | Value |
|---|---|
| Data centers | 39 counties |
| Utility-scale solar | 12 counties |
| Battery storage | 5 counties |
What The Scoop is. A weekly read on where energy and data-center projects are getting waved through, slowed down, or stopped cold — written from the ordinances, board votes, dockets and filings themselves. Every figure traces to a primary document. If a value cannot be verified against one, it does not run.
Think we got something wrong? Say so — hello@sitepathintel.com. We print corrections; we do not quietly edit. Tips about a hearing, a vote or a filing are always welcome, and we will not name you unless you ask us to.