Springfield’s “zombie plant” is reanimated once again

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Despite widespread community opposition, the “Zombie Plant” just keeps rising from the dead.

On Thursday, the Supreme Judicial Court denied an appeal by the Springfield City Council asking it to reconsider a lower court’s ruling in favor of developer Palmer Renewable Energy, which has long sought to build a wood-burning biomass power plant in east Springfield. 

The denied appeal has reanimated the possibility of building the plant, which Palmer first proposed in 2008. Palmer could now begin basic site work and constructing the facility’s foundation.

Since the beginning, the plant has faced opposition from activists in Springfield who cited significant environmental and public health concerns. After an extended legal battle, years of organizing and protesting, and countless revivals, the plant finally seemed to have been halted when the state’s Department of Environmental Protection revoked its air permits in 2021. It seemed to have been a closed case. 

But within five months of each other, the Massachusetts Appeals Court and Suffolk Superior Court both issued new decisions in Palmer’s favor earlier this year. The Springfield City Council had been appealing the Appeals Court decision to the Supreme Judicial Court. 

“We are deeply disappointed by this outcome,” Alexandra St. Pierre, one of the Conservation Law Foundation attorneys representing the City Council, said in a statement the firm released on Wednesday. “For years, Springfield residents have fought to stop this facility from contributing to further harm to their health and environment. The Palmer facility will only worsen the public health burdens that residents have long endured. This case isn’t just about permits or legal technicalities. It’s about insisting that communities be protected, heard, and respected.”

The statement went on to note that, though this particular legal battle has ended, “other critical steps in the process remain before the facility can be built.” 

Palmer’s legal team did not immediately respond to request for comment.

As a designated “environmental justice population,” the city of Springfield had fought for nearly 20 years to protect its community from the deeply polluting plant. Studies have shown that biomass rivals coal and gas in its carbon emissions. Along with the Department of Environmental Protection permit revocation in 2021, activists and their allies in the Statehouse had successfully passed legislation that revoked green energy credits for biomass statewide. 

“The message this sends is that corporations have a right to profit at the cost of a communities’ health and the environment,” said Naia Tenerowicz, an organizer with the Springfield Climate Justice Coalition, “despite the changes in state law, open opposition to this project from the community and the Springfield City Council, an updated scientific understanding on the toxicity of woody biomass combustion, and the rapidly worsening climate crisis that have developed since this project’s permits were issued.”

“We will keep fighting this project, for the health and safety of our city and the environment,” she said.

The Shoestring wanted to understand why Palmer Renewable Energy is continuing to push the project forward. A review of legal documents and public records, however, reveals more questions than answers about Palmer’s plans and how the company intends to finance the plant. 

Biomass no longer qualifies for green energy subsidies in the state. And, while one loophole currently exists allowing biomass to be sold as green energy to municipalities, conversations with industry officials reveal that the company might be forgoing such partnerships. In the absence of these green energy incentives, The Shoestring identified two strategies that could make the facility profitable — selling energy directly to the grid or using the plant for the company’s own purposes.

But the company won’t say what its plans are. Neither Palmer Renewable Energy nor the site land owner replied to email requests for comment. When contacted by phone, Palmer Chief Operating Officer Vic Gatto ended the call without answering any questions. 

The legal battle continues 

Activists have been dubbing this new stage in the “Zombie plant” saga the case of the “Frankenpermit.”

This is because the company’s successful legal strategy has been to revive its original permits: two building permits issued by the Springfield City Council and an air permit issued by the Department of Environmental Protection, all in 2011. The permits were previously considered expired because Palmer had failed to commence building in time.

Palmer received its first favorable court decision in January of this year, when a Suffolk Superior Court judge ruled that the Department of Environmental Protection’s decision to revoke its permit in 2021 was “arbitrary and capricious” because it referenced a 2020 letter written by U.S. senators Ed Markey and Elizabeth Warren opposing the plant. Palmer also made this argument in its briefs. The company additionally argued that its original permit was still valid because of the state’s 2010 Permit Extension Act.

The court’s ruling would force the Department of Environmental Protection to issue a new decision on the air permit. (The agency could still decide to revoke Palmer’s air permit, but under different legal grounds.) Currently, the Department of Environmental Protection is in the process of appealing the decision to the Massachusetts Appeals Court. The Department has not issued a statement about the appeal status or timeline. 

In its case against the Springfield City Council, Palmer’s legal team also used the 2010 Permit Extension Act, as well as the 2020 Covid Emergency Act, to argue that its building permits are still valid. Both acts were enacted for economic relief during two global crises, one financial and one viral.

In May, the Massachusetts Appeals Court ruled in Palmer’s favor, overturning a previous Land Court decision and reinstating the building permits. The city of Springfield, represented by the Conservation Law Foundation, appealed the decision to the Supreme Judicial Court shortly afterwards. 

In its appeal, Springfield argued that the Appeals Court decision “goes against the interest of justice.” Over 30 Springfield organizations signed onto a letter asking the court to take up the case and consider the public interest and legal precedent at stake. 

But with the permit battle moved to the courts, city residents and organizations had limited options for participation, according to Mireille Bejjani, a co-executive director of the New England environmental justice organization Slingshot, which has supported efforts to block the plant. 

“It’s not a space that allows for public engagement and scrutiny and accountability in any way,” she said. “It is often behind closed doors. A limited number of people can participate in the conversations.”

Reviving permits that are over a decade old would allow Palmer to circumvent new city and state regulations that have been codified since the company first proposed the facility 17 years ago. In Springfield’s appeal, the Conservation Law Foundation wrote that the “building permits issued in 2011 [are] being extended more than twenty-four times their original lifespan” 

In 2013, for example, the city of Springfield issued a new zoning ordinance to impose stricter regulation on permitting for new developments. Palmer did not have to undergo any new permitting because it was grandfathered in.

More recently, in March 2024, the state government passed a law requiring developers seeking air permits to conduct a cumulative impact analysis. That study, which was not mandatory at the time of Palmer’s permit application, takes into consideration a community’s existing vulnerabilities and exposure to public health risks. A cumulative impact analysis would have been especially important in Springfield, a city that is already disproportionately burdened by pollution. The Asthma and Allergy Foundation of America named Springfield as the country’s asthma capital in 2018 and 2019.

St. Pierre warned of the precedent that would be set if Springfield’s appeal were unsuccessful. 

“This could be a thing now where you’re having these permits living on forever and ever and getting by any changes in the law because of these extension acts, which I just don’t think the Legislature thought about and intended that to happen,” St. Pierre said.

She added, “Science changes, the laws change. Now we understand how certain communities bear a higher proportion of the burden from different environmental stressors.”

In its 2022 recommended final decision on the matter of the air permit, the Department of Environmental Protection recommended that if Palmer applied for a new air permit, it would need to complete a cumulative impact analysis, health impact assessment, and updated review of biomass burning technologies. The department also said it would need to update its air modeling study and comply with “procedures to ensure that Springfield residents, including the members of [environmental justice] Populations, have a meaningful opportunity to be fully informed about PRE’s air permit application and voice their concerns or opinions.”

Ongoing legislative activism

With the building permit case shut, activists are organizing on a tight deadline to close two potential pathways to funding for Palmer.  

One significant funding pathway was already blocked in 2021, when the state passed a climate bill that made biomass ineligible for credits through the Renewable Energy Portfolio Standard. But the law left two loopholes through which biomass facilities could still qualify for state energy subsidies. 

The first left biomass eligible for the Alternative Portfolio Standard, which operates similarly to the Renewable Energy Portfolio Standard and expands the range of energy sources that qualify for subsidies.

The other loophole kept biomass on the list of “non-carbon emitting sources” for the state’s city- and town-owned electric companies, known as municipal light plants, to source their energy from. Municipal light plants were previously a significant source of potential profit for Palmer, which entered into eight power purchase agreements with MLPs across the state in 2020. All of these MLPS eventually terminated their contracts.

Activists have unsuccessfully tried to close this loophole for years.

The state’s 2021 climate bill did impose a five-year moratorium on biomass’ eligibility as a “non-carbon emitting source” until the Executive Office of Energy and Environmental Affairs conducted a study assessing the environmental and public health effects of biomass emissions. 

The state never conducted the study. 

“The study was made moot due to a series of policy changes since the 2021 law,” Maria Hardiman, a spokesperson for the EEA, told The Shoestring. 

Activists also tried to close the MLP loophole during the last legislative session, as the state was preparing to pass another omnibus climate bill. State Rep. Orlando Ramos and state Sen. Adam Gomez, both from Springfield, introduced amendments to close both loopholes. The amendments were passed in the Senate but taken out of the House bill at the last minute, according to activists.

“The legislators felt like there wasn’t a risk anymore,” said Tenerowicz, the Springfield Climate Justice Coalition organizer. “Now the risk is extremely real, extremely high, extremely imminent, and I’m hoping that that will make a difference.”

Tenerowicz is organizing with the Springfield Climate Justice Coalition to encourage legislators to pass two bills to close the loopholes. (Gov. Maura Healey’s proposed 2025 environmental omnibus bill also includes provisions to close these loopholes.)

State lawmakers would need to pass the MLP loophole bill by Jan. 1, 2026, to keep biomass off the list of “non-carbon emitting sources.”

Questions about profitability

Given Palmer’s continued investment in legal advocacy and major recent victory, the company appears to be positioning to continue with the construction of the biomass facility. So far, the company has not released any information on its building plans and timeline. 

But, amid new state policies resulting from permitting and environmental legislation and the ongoing push to close two remaining loopholes, questions remain about how the corporation plans to profit from the facility. 

The state has already revoked biomass’ eligibility for renewable energy credits. And, some suspect that Palmer might not be relying on MLPs to finance the project this time around. 

Energy New England and the Massachusetts Municipal Wholesale Electric Company, the two main energy trading organizations that serve the region’s municipal light plants, both told The Shoestring they do not intend to enter into any agreements with Palmer. 

Energy New England had previously included Palmer in its 2019 green portfolio options advertised to its clients and even circulated a contested fact sheet touting biomass as a “a green, clean, common sense solution.” Now, the company told The Shoestring that it is supporting the proposal to remove biomass from the list of eligible MLP non-carbon emitting sources. 

Until the loophole is closed, however, it is still possible for Palmer to enter into power purchase agreements with the MLPs.

Testimonies, legal documents, and letters obtained by The Shoestring reveal that, prior to the 2021 air permit revocation, Palmer was also lining up private investments and working to enter the forward capacity market — an auction in which facilities bid three years in advance to promise to supply energy to the regional grid.

One letter from Palmer Chief Operating Officer Vic Gatto to the Springfield Department of Code Enforcement reveals the company’s interest in selling energy directly to the regional energy grid through the forward capacity market. ISO New England, the grid manager, is currently reforming this program to shorten the three-year lead time to a shorter, seasonal lead time. Set to launch in 2028, it is unclear how biomass will fit into these new energy supply plans. 

Palmer Renewable Energy was previously in the queue to interconnect to the grid, but it withdrew in October 2019. They may, however, reapply to enter the queue in the future if construction commences.

In an amended complaint the company filed in the Department of Environmental Protection case in 2023, the company claimed it had lost “over $11,000,000 it has invested in the Facility project” due to the department’s permit revocation.

According to testimony documented by the Department of Environmental Protection, in 2019 the company had entered into a $182 million joint venture agreement with an organization listed only as ATG, “[with] JP Morgan [being] the lead bank for the ATG investment.” The company had also entered into various other agreements with engineering companies to facilitate the plant’s construction. 

In 2018, Palmer Paving Corporation was sold to Peckham Industries for an undisclosed sum. Palmer Paving Corporation is a separate company from Palmer Renewable Energy, but both were owned by the Callahan family. In 2011, MassLive reported that the family’s political contributions to city candidates approximately tripled around the time of the biomass project proposal. Peckham is a family-owned construction company and materials supplier based in New York. This means that Peckham Industries now owns the land the facility is set to be built on.

The biomass project does not appear to be owned by Peckham, at least according to a 2018 MassLive article, that said the Palmer project would still be the Callahan family’s. But, John Peckham, then-president and CEO of Peckham Industries, said in the article that the company had “made allowances in [its] site plan should that project move forward.”

In addition to construction and paving, Peckham is also a supplier of hot mix asphalt for “residential, commercial and heavy highway markets.” It operates five hot mix asphalt plants across New England and New York, including one in Springfield that it acquired in the Palmer Paving deal. 

In its 2025 “Environmental, Social, and Governance Report,” Peckham provided an update on its plan to upgrade the Springfield hot mix asphalt plant. The company wrote that Eversource conducted a “scoping study, in which Eversource scopes out the feasibility and potential issues to building a new power generation facility.”

Palmer Renewable Energy and Peckham Industries did not reply to requests for comment, so it can not be confirmed whether the potential “new power generation facility” is connected to the biomass project.

The project’s original environmental notification form from 2008 teased the possibility for the facility to “provide cogeneration steam to Palmer Paving.” (Cogeneration is the process of generating both heat and energy in a single plant). The company wrote it would further explore “the incorporation of cogeneration at the site” in its 2011 conditional approval from the Department of Environmental Protection. The Shoestring hasn’t uncovered any additional documents related to this plan. 

In 2020, Peckham also bought Westfield company JSL Materials, another asphalt producer and owner of multiple quarries that produce stone, gravel, and sand for paving projects. The Springfield Republican wrote that the deal gave Peckham “a big portion of the local supply chain for road building.”

What happens next will depend on the Department of Environmental Protection’s new decision on the air permit, the Legislature’s ability to close several loopholes, and Palmer’s execution of a profitable project plan. 

As all of that continues to unfold, activists and lawyers are calling attention to the environmental and racial dimension of this long-standing case. They say it is not coincidental that the company continues to push this project forward in the city of Springfield. 

“In the United States, siting and zoning and permitting have been, in my opinion, the number one tool of racism,” said Rusty Polsgrove, the former associate director of Arise for Social Justice, who also served on the state’s Commission on Energy Infrastructure Siting and Permitting. “They think they can get away with it. I think it’s because they know, and I think everybody knows, the pressures on communities that face intersecting issues.”

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