SpaceX Land Deal at Texas Starbase Faces Legal Challenge

Environmental groups are suing to stop a potential land deal between SpaceX and the federal government, which they say could destroy wildlife habitats in southern Texas.

The legal challenge comes after Elon Musk‘s SpaceX made its massive public stock market debut in June, with an offering valuing the company at roughly $2 trillion. The IPO has brought liquidity to SpaceX employees and could reshape the real estate market in Brownsville, TX, near the company’s Starbase facility.

In a suit filed last month, several conservation groups allege the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service is breaking the law with a plan to give SpaceX 715 acres near Starbase. Under the terms of the deal the government announced in March, SpaceX would, in turn, give about 683 acres nearby to two wildlife preserves.

In March, the Fish and Wildlife Service said the potential land swap “would facilitate greater protections for fish and wildlife resources at” the Lower Rio Grande Valley National Wildlife Refuge, which surrounds Starbase.

The agency says the deal should provide conservation benefits to the system as a whole. But the land offered in trade “has been degraded by SpaceX’s expanding operations and failed rocket launches,” said the plaintiffs.

“Our protected public lands are being gifted for the benefit of the world’s richest man, who could trash them while playing with his exploding rockets,” Laiken Jordahl, an advocate at the Center for Biological Diversity, said in a statement.

“We’re not letting Trump and his political cronies lock the American people out of Texas’ cherished public lands just to give Elon Musk another payday,” Jordahl said.

The Fish and Wildlife Service and SpaceX both did not respond to requests for comment. Neither the company nor the government has yet answered the lawsuit in court.

Suit alleges violation of longstanding conservation laws

Diagrams the government released with the deal show that SpaceX wants to acquire a strip of land along the Rio Grande and by the Starbase facility, where SpaceX has launchpads and some other structures.

The rocket company is already building facilities that border the land, known as the Boca Chica tract. The Fish and Wildlife Service said in the deal that it would divest of land “likely to be impacted by SpaceX activities” in the process.

In return, SpaceX would give several parcels that border the Lower Rio Grande Valley National Wildlife Refuge, as well as the nearby Laguna Atascosa National Wildlife Refuge. This land, the government said, would be an ideal habitat for endangered animals, including ocelot, northern aplomado falcon, piping plover, and Kemp’s ridley sea turtle.

But the Center for Biological Diversity, South Texas Environmental Justice Network, and Corrizo/Comecrudo Nation of Texas told a DC district court that the land deal breaks several laws.

They claim the deal gives away historic lands and degrades the refuge overall, and would violate the National Historic Preservation Act, National Environmental Policy Act, and National Wildlife Refuge System Improvement Act.

Bekah Hinojosa, co-founder of the South Texas Environmental Justice Network, called the plans “hostile land grabs.” The government set up the conservation areas in the 1970s, and they now stretch across 132,000 acres. SpaceX’s operations already disrupt the land, they said.

“This habitat land is meant to be preserved for future generations, not for billionaires to find later and destroy,” Hinojosa said

How SpaceX has changed South Texas

SpaceX opened its operation here in 2014, and since then, it has vastly expanded as a site for rocket launches.

This part of the southern tip of Texas stands to gain from SpaceX’s massive IPO, which could create a housing boom for the many company employees in the otherwise remote area.

The median listing price in Brownsville is a paltry $290,000, which is down 7.9% year over year and far below the national median of $425,000.

In April, there were 1,617 active listings in Brownsville—with only 67 of those listings priced above $1 million.

Although SpaceX has brought newfound wealth to the southern tip of Texas, the company’s presence has not been without controversy.

About 80 residents living in South Padre Island, Port Isabel, and Laguna Vista, TX, filed a separate lawsuit alleging that sonic booms from SpaceX rockets damage their homes.