SpaceX accused of dumping mercury into Texas waters for years
SpaceX accused of dumping mercury into Texas waters for years
The bombshell allegations may violate the EPA's Clean Water Act.
SpaceX’s Starship launches at the company’s Starbase facility near Boca Chica, Texas, have allegedly been contaminating local bodies of water with mercury for years. The news arrives in an exclusive CNBCreport on August 12, which cites internal documents and communications between local Texas regulators and the Environmental Protection Agency.
SpaceX’s fourth Starship test launch in June was its most successful so far—but the world’s largest and most powerful rocket ever built continues to wreak havoc on nearby Texas communities, wildlife, and ecosystems. But after repeated admonishments, reviews, and ignored requests, the Environmental Protection Agency and the Texas Commission on Environmental Quality (TCEQ) have had enough.
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SpaceX has replied to the CNBC report
https://x.com/SpaceX/status/1823080774012481862
For those not wanting to click an X link
CNBC’s story on Starship’s launch operations in South Texas is factually inaccurate.
Starship’s water-cooled flame deflector system is critical equipment for SpaceX’s launch operations. It ensures flight safety and protects the launch site and surrounding area.
Also known as the deluge system, it applies clean, potable (drinking) water to the engine exhaust during static fire tests and launches to absorb the heat and vibration from the rocket engines firing. Similar equipment has long been used at launch sites across the United States – such as Kennedy Space Center and Cape Canaveral Space Force Stations in Florida, and Vandenberg Space Force Base in California – and across the globe.
SpaceX worked with the Texas Commission of Environmental Quality (TCEQ) throughout the build and test of the water deluge system at Starbase to identify a permit approach. TCEQ personnel were onsite at Starbase to observe the initial tests of the system in July 2023, and TCEQ’s website shows that SpaceX is covered by the Texas Multi-Sector General Permit.
When the EPA issued their Administrative Order in March 2024, it was done without an understanding of basic facts of the deluge system’s operation or acknowledgement that we were operating under the Texas Multi-Sector General Permit.
After we explained our operation to the EPA, they revised their position and allowed us to continue operating, but required us to obtain an Individual Permit from TCEQ, which will also allow us to expand deluge operations to the second pad. We’ve been diligently working on the permit with TCEQ, which was submitted on July 1st, 2024. TCEQ is expected to issue the draft Individual Permit and Agreed Compliance Order this week.
Throughout our ongoing coordination with both TCEQ and the EPA, we have explicitly asked if operation of the deluge system needed to stop and we were informed that operations could continue.
TCEQ and the EPA have allowed continued operations because the deluge system has always complied with common conditions set by an Individual Permit, and causes no harm to the environment. Specifically:
- We only use potable (drinking) water in the system’s operation. At no time during the operation of the deluge system is the potable water used in an industrial process, nor is the water exposed to industrial processes before or during operation of the system.
- The launch pad area is power-washed prior to activating the deluge system, with the power-washed water collected and hauled off.
- The vast majority of the water used in each operation is vaporized by the rocket’s engines.
- We send samples of the soil, air, and water around the pad to an independent, accredited laboratory after every use of the deluge system, which have consistently shown negligible traces of any contaminants. Importantly, while CNBC's story claims there are “very large exceedances of the mercury” as part of the wastewater discharged at the site, all samples to-date have in fact shown either no detectable levels of mercury whatsoever or found in very few cases levels significantly below the limit the EPA maintains for drinking water.
- Retention ponds capture excess water and are specially lined to prevent any mixing with local groundwater. Any water captured in these ponds, including water from rainfall events, is pumped out and hauled off.
- Finally, some water does leave the area of the pad, mostly from water released prior to ignition and after engine shutdown or launch. To give you an idea of how much: a single use of the deluge system results in potable water equivalent to a rainfall of 0.004 inches across the area outside the pad which currently averages around 27 inches of rain per year.
With Starship, we’re revolutionizing humanity’s ability to access space with a fully reusable rocket that plays an integral role in multiple national priorities, including returning humans to the surface of the Moon. SpaceX and its thousands of employees work tirelessly to ensure the United States remains the world’s leader in space, and we remain committed to working with our local and federal partners to be good stewards of the environment.
Any and all claims being made by SpaceX should be verified by an objective third party. We should never simply take a company at their word, but that is especially true of a company that has Elon Musk, a man known to disseminate falsehoods as its Chair, CEO, and CTO.
The cornerstone of all annual business ethics training so many drones (like me) have to endure every year: If you’re known for being dishonest, people will stop believing you. According to the training, they’ll also stop doing business with you, so maybe it’s a bit out of date.
According to the training, they’ll also stop doing business with you, so maybe it’s a bit out of date.
It is baffling. I, for one, would never buy any product or service from a company associated with Musk, but many other people are not so discerning.
Musk != SpaceX
Related, yes, but not equivalent.
Water is hauled off... where? Beyond the environment?
It's OK. There's a creek down the road that doesn't have any fish left. It goes right out to the gulf, so it's all good.
Probably to a proper treatment facility like all other potentially bad water goes.
Mars.
while CNBC's story claims there are “very large exceedances of the mercury” as part of the wastewater discharged at the site, all samples to-date have in fact shown either no detectable levels of mercury whatsoever or found in very few cases levels significantly below the limit the EPA maintains for drinking water.
I think this discrepancy may have been caused by a typo in the Texas Commission on Environmental Quality report.
Texas allows pollutors to self-report in "good faith". Why would we give any credence at all to a self-report (or hired self-report)?
If the EPA or TCEQ didn't measure it themselves during an unscheduled visit, then all measurements should be disregarded.
If the TCEQ measured it, the EPA needs to double check their work. The typos in the report are a cause for concern, and the Texas agency needs to be put under scrutiny.
So you still think there's a mercury problem?
https://x.com/SpaceX/status/1823378186836889699
CNBC updated its story yesterday with additional factually inaccurate information.
While there may be a typo in one table of the initial TCEQ's public version of the permit application, the rest of the application and the lab reports clearly states that levels of Mercury found in non-stormwater discharge associated with the water deluge system are well below state and federal water quality criteria (of no higher than 2.1 micrograms per liter for acute aquatic toxicity), and are, in most instances, non-detectable.
The initial application was updated within 30 days to correct the typo and TCEQ is updating the application to reflect the correction.
Interesting, glaring red flag and no one caught it, or cared, until someone made a stink about it. Credit where credit's due, that's what journalism does. This tells me there were zero eyes that cared on this entire permit process.
Can you stop spamming the fucking thread.
Wow.
I wonder what CNBC is gonna say about that.
That's pretty embarrassing if that's what happened partially triggering this article.
Also that poor person who wrote the report up is probably going to get an earful too now.
I wonder what CNBC is gonna say about that.
If they have integrity, they'll issue a retraction/correction. However, I do not have high hopes.
that poor person who wrote the report up is probably going to get an earful.
LOL, yeah. I bet they never expected their report to get blown out of proportion to this extent.
https://x.com/SpaceX/status/1823378186836889699
CNBC updated its story yesterday with additional factually inaccurate information.
While there may be a typo in one table of the initial TCEQ's public version of the permit application, the rest of the application and the lab reports clearly states that levels of Mercury found in non-stormwater discharge associated with the water deluge system are well below state and federal water quality criteria (of no higher than 2.1 micrograms per liter for acute aquatic toxicity), and are, in most instances, non-detectable.
The initial application was updated within 30 days to correct the typo and TCEQ is updating the application to reflect the correction.
https://x.com/SpaceX/status/1823378186836889699
CNBC updated its story yesterday with additional factually inaccurate information.
While there may be a typo in one table of the initial TCEQ's public version of the permit application, the rest of the application and the lab reports clearly states that levels of Mercury found in non-stormwater discharge associated with the water deluge system are well below state and federal water quality criteria (of no higher than 2.1 micrograms per liter for acute aquatic toxicity), and are, in most instances, non-detectable.
The initial application was updated within 30 days to correct the typo and TCEQ is updating the application to reflect the correction.
we have explicitly asked if operation of the deluge system needed to stop
If that question is being asked then maybe it should be stopped.
What a weird take to make.
They are constantly in talks with these people. They probably ask this exact question every time they've used it and sent them more data about it.
Should you stop eating? I think you better since the question is being asked!
My point is that Space X obviously think this is a concern. If they were totally confident their actions are sufficient they wouldn't keep asking.