Musk and Shotwell once again blast red tape against the company
The EPA to SpaceX “Nice company you got here.
Sure would be a shame if something happened to it.”
In a follow-up to SpaceX’s blunt critical response to the attacks against it by the head of the FAA, Mike Whitaker during House testimony on September 24, 2024, Elon Musk in a tweet yesterday called for Whitaker to resign.
That blast however was only the start. During a different hearing on September 24th before the Texas state house appropriations committee, Gywnne Shotwell, the CEO of SpaceX, called the actions of the EPA to regulate the launch deluge system for Starship/Superheavy “nonsense.”
“We work very closely with organizations such as the (Texas Commission on Environmental Quality),” she said. “You may have read a little bit of nonsense in the papers recently about that, but we’re working quite well with them.”
…On Tuesday, Shotwell maintained that the the system — which she said resembles “an upside down shower head” — was “licensed and permitted by TCEQ [Texas Commission on Environmental Quality] … EPA came in afterwards and didn’t like the license or the permit that we had for that and wanted to turn it into a federal permit, which we are working on right now.”
…The state agency has said the company received a stormwater permit — a type that’s usually quickly approved — but did not have the permit required for discharge of industrial wastewater produced by launches. That type of permit requires significant technical review and usually takes almost a year to approve. [emphasis mine]
The problem with this demand by both EPA and TCEQ is that SpaceX is not dumping “industrial wastewater produced by launches.” The deluge system uses potable water, essentially equivalent to rain water, and thus does zero harm to the environment. In fact, a single rainstorm would dump far more water on the tidal islands of Boca Chica that any of SpaceX’s Starship/Superheavy launches.
Thus, this demand by the EPA clearly proves the political nature of this regulatory harassment. The unelected apparatchiks in the federal bureaucracy are hunting for ways to stymie and shut down SpaceX, and they will use any regulation they can find to do so — even if that use makes no sense. And they are doing this because they support the Democratic Party wholesale, and thus are abusing their power to hurt someone (Elon Musk) who now opposes that party.
On Christmas Eve 1968 three Americans became the first humans to visit another world. What they did to celebrate was unexpected and profound, and will be remembered throughout all human history. Genesis: the Story of Apollo 8, Robert Zimmerman's classic history of humanity's first journey to another world, tells that story, and it is now available as both an ebook and an audiobook, both with a foreword by Valerie Anders and a new introduction by Robert Zimmerman.
The print edition can be purchased at Amazon. from any other book seller, or direct from my ebook publisher, ebookit.
The ebook is available everywhere for $5.99 (before discount) at amazon, or direct from my ebook publisher, ebookit. If you buy it from ebookit you don't support the big tech companies and the author gets a bigger cut much sooner.
The audiobook is also available at all these vendors, and is also free with a 30-day trial membership to Audible.
"Not simply about one mission, [Genesis] is also the history of America's quest for the moon... Zimmerman has done a masterful job of tying disparate events together into a solid account of one of America's greatest human triumphs."--San Antonio Express-News
The EPA to SpaceX “Nice company you got here.
Sure would be a shame if something happened to it.”
In a follow-up to SpaceX’s blunt critical response to the attacks against it by the head of the FAA, Mike Whitaker during House testimony on September 24, 2024, Elon Musk in a tweet yesterday called for Whitaker to resign.
That blast however was only the start. During a different hearing on September 24th before the Texas state house appropriations committee, Gywnne Shotwell, the CEO of SpaceX, called the actions of the EPA to regulate the launch deluge system for Starship/Superheavy “nonsense.”
“We work very closely with organizations such as the (Texas Commission on Environmental Quality),” she said. “You may have read a little bit of nonsense in the papers recently about that, but we’re working quite well with them.”
…On Tuesday, Shotwell maintained that the the system — which she said resembles “an upside down shower head” — was “licensed and permitted by TCEQ [Texas Commission on Environmental Quality] … EPA came in afterwards and didn’t like the license or the permit that we had for that and wanted to turn it into a federal permit, which we are working on right now.”
…The state agency has said the company received a stormwater permit — a type that’s usually quickly approved — but did not have the permit required for discharge of industrial wastewater produced by launches. That type of permit requires significant technical review and usually takes almost a year to approve. [emphasis mine]
The problem with this demand by both EPA and TCEQ is that SpaceX is not dumping “industrial wastewater produced by launches.” The deluge system uses potable water, essentially equivalent to rain water, and thus does zero harm to the environment. In fact, a single rainstorm would dump far more water on the tidal islands of Boca Chica that any of SpaceX’s Starship/Superheavy launches.
Thus, this demand by the EPA clearly proves the political nature of this regulatory harassment. The unelected apparatchiks in the federal bureaucracy are hunting for ways to stymie and shut down SpaceX, and they will use any regulation they can find to do so — even if that use makes no sense. And they are doing this because they support the Democratic Party wholesale, and thus are abusing their power to hurt someone (Elon Musk) who now opposes that party.
On Christmas Eve 1968 three Americans became the first humans to visit another world. What they did to celebrate was unexpected and profound, and will be remembered throughout all human history. Genesis: the Story of Apollo 8, Robert Zimmerman's classic history of humanity's first journey to another world, tells that story, and it is now available as both an ebook and an audiobook, both with a foreword by Valerie Anders and a new introduction by Robert Zimmerman.
The print edition can be purchased at Amazon. from any other book seller, or direct from my ebook publisher, ebookit. The ebook is available everywhere for $5.99 (before discount) at amazon, or direct from my ebook publisher, ebookit. If you buy it from ebookit you don't support the big tech companies and the author gets a bigger cut much sooner.
The audiobook is also available at all these vendors, and is also free with a 30-day trial membership to Audible.
"Not simply about one mission, [Genesis] is also the history of America's quest for the moon... Zimmerman has done a masterful job of tying disparate events together into a solid account of one of America's greatest human triumphs."--San Antonio Express-News
Technically, by definition in law, it’s industrial wastewater., even though it likely meets EPA’s very own standards for the human consumption of public drinking water. Practically, it’s likely sourced from a nearby municipal water supply.
EPA should stay out of this as it’s a technical and not an actual violation.. Texas has primacy under the USCWA There is no significant harm to the regulatory program or the environment. Their involvement is clearly politically driven.
If it were up to me, I would attempt to design his deluge system so that everything that doesn’t evaporate is captured in basins, then pump it back to a storage tank, chlorinate it a bit to preclude the growth of microorganisms and re-use it during the next firing.
If there is no demonstrable discharge, there is no requirement to obtain an NPDES (or TPDES or whatever Texas calls it) permit. The permit issue becomes moot.
The Trump campaign should make this an issue about whether America will beat the Chinese back to the Moon and to Mars. Frame it as existential, because it is, and lay it before the American people!
Do not get me started with Federal stormwater permits. I’m a civil engineer in WA State and design roads and stormwater facilities to State’s Ecology standards, which are above and beyond most other states. If we trigger stormwater requirements, we have to design the appropriate treatment and detention facilities using the State’s ecology guidelines. In 2021 we were told any Federally Funded projects where we drain to a fish bearing stream (or ditch) that increases the total surface area of the roadway by a single square foot, or more, would trigger a full depth environmental assessment which would take at least 1 year to complete. The feds deemed the state’s treatment facility guidelines to be inadequate as salmon numbers have kept going down throughout the years. We asked them what the Fed’s guidelines were to comply with them, they told us they do not know what the appropriate treatment measures are, but that they know what we were doing was inadequate. (The real issue appears to be that the stormwater runoff contains chemicals from car tires which are killing the fish. Its impractical to treat and detain all stormwater runoff from every single road. The Feds should be looking into eliminating whatever that chemical is instead of forcing every road project to have expensive enhanced treatment facilities.) That was a ramble. Long story short, the Feds do not care what the States’ stormwater permit are.
Mixing politics with engineering and space flight is very worrying. SpaceX is approved for another flight 4 flight profile launch. Has that approval been revoked because of this water deluge concern? If not, this is another reason to launch ASAP. Doing so would entertain and wow the public with another spectacular demonstration of what SpaceX can do. And it would give the proponents of the water system more facts on the ground that show that no harm is being done.
Kyle, at the heart of this matter, is the source of the water. It’s not Stormwater as that always involves atmospheric precipitation as its source.
Again, as I said before, eliminate the discharge and you eliminate the nexus for requiring any permit.
If he is going. to launch multiple times per day per pad ultimately, it’s better for him to reclaim as much water as possible because that’s fresh water, deluge water, he doesn’t have to generate himself or purchase from an outside entity.
M Puckett: Based on everything SpaceX has done for the past fifteen years, I am certain that reuse of the water is in their plans. It just is too soon to focus on that. More important now is to get the rocket operational, and then let its operations pay for such improvements.
In the free world that America used to be, no one would have any problems with that plan. It makes sense and it gets things done. We sadly no longer live in that free world. We (yes WE) have ceded our sovereign power to petty dictators in DC, because somehow we bought into the insane idea that they knew better than us.
There was significant discussion about environmental review and permitting around the deluge system when it was being installed. I’m not sure where the article and comments I read at the time anymore were, but there was a link to the relevant regulations as well as some ex-EPA employees, the upshot of which is that water that has been either heated or cooled a certain amount above the source temperature *could* be considered industrial waste, it was something that the evaluating team would officially have to consider and report on, but that in almost all cases, the amount of temperature increase that would be expected by a deluge system the scale of what SpaceX has would be immediately evaluated as “this is not industrial wastewater requiring more than usual catchment techniques.” And if fact that was what was publicly reported at the time and is evident from the visible construction and equipment. So this looks like another case of SpaceX being told one thing, getting permission to proceed, and now, months or years later, with Elon being even more persona non grata, it’s “I’ve altered the deal. Pray I don’t alter it further.”
“… We (yes WE) have ceded our sovereign power to petty dictators in DC, because somehow we bought into the insane idea that they knew better than us. …”
Better that one agency, in this case the FAA, be the deciding authority, than SpaceX having to play whack a mole to prevent the many interest groups from asserting their right or authority to shutdown launches. I assume the FAA is the organization which enables SpaceX to be approved to land Starship on the other side of the Earth. Good luck to SpaceX when it goes to where?, the UN?, to ask permission to drop Starship into the Indian Ocean.
This all seems so reckless and destructive. What if Starship explodes while in orbit? Or comes down in pieces on another country? Without friends, the vultures of the world will tear SpaceX to pieces, stripping the company of all of its assets.
Holy cow, folks. Angels dancing on the head of a pin.
It’s not about “water,” it’s about control.
Here’s the Deal;
We get to call them stupid, and they get to run the World.
Grapes of Wrath (1940)
“Who Do We Shoot?”
https://youtu.be/7JEYHczRar8
1:36