SpaceX consumes millions of gallons of Brownsville water amid scarcity

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As municipalities throughout the Rio Grande Valley contend with the reality that water scarcity is a long-term issue with no easy solution, many have turned to water conservation efforts that target their highest volume users.

Those efforts have included implementing drought contingency plans that call for reduced water consumption and higher water bills, but also by approving new restrictions on high volume customers, such as commercial car washes.

However, over the last three years, another company has quietly become one of Brownsville’s highest volume water users just as the water scarcity crisis has begun to worsen.

That company is SpaceX, which court documents reveal has been purchasing millions of gallons of potable water from the Brownsville Public Utilities Board, or BPUB.

SpaceX uses high volumes of water as part of its “deluge system,” which operates to suppress fire, dust and debris when the company carries out test fires or vehicle launches at its Boca Chica launch site.

As part of its responses to litigation filed by the environmental nonprofit group, SaveRGV, which claims the deluge system is a source of pollution, the company has admitted that it uses hundreds of thousands of gallons of water every time the launch site is used.

“The deluge system expels a maximum of approximately 180,000 gallons of potable water on the launch pad during an ignition event to control fire and prevent the dispersal of dust and sand,” Katy Groom, SpaceX’s director of environmental regulatory affairs, stated in a 24-page sworn statement filed as part of the ongoing litigation on Oct. 22.

At the time, SpaceX had used the deluge system 16 times, the company stated in further court documents.

“From the time of that email (from SaveRGV) in July 2023 until (SaveRGV) filed suit in October 2024, SpaceX used that deluge system sixteen times,” the company stated in a Nov. 4 court filing.

But since then, SpaceX has conducted two more launches of its Starship Super Heavy vehicle — first, on Oct. 13, just four days after SaveRGV filed the suit, and then again on Tuesday.

That totals to at least 18 uses of the deluge system, or about 3.24 million gallons of water since last summer.

But documents from the BPUB, including its required Annual Comprehensive Financial Reports, or ACFRs, show that SpaceX has consumed far more water than that.

But precisely how much water the spacefaring company consumes each year remains murky as BPUB is currently fighting to withhold utility account information that The Brownsville Herald has sought via Texas Public Information Act, or TPIA, requests.

BPUB is refusing to release information regarding how much water SpaceX is purchasing, how much the company is paying for it, or how the utility delivers the water to the company.

The utility cites numerous exceptions under the TPIA that it thinks will allow it to withhold the information, including assertions that information is confidential to prevent giving an advantage to a competitor.

“Therefore, specific information regarding usage, pricing, and/or means of delivery provided to SpaceX by the Brownsville PUB embedded within a utility service agreement constitutes competitively-sensitive information that, if released, will give advantage to Brownsville PUB’s competitors by enabling them to undercut offers submitted by Brownsville PUB to potential customers,” BPUB stated in a Nov. 13 letter seeking the Texas Attorney General’s Office permission to withhold the information.

BPUB cites those competitors as other space exploration companies, including:

>> Blue Origin, owned by billionaire Jeff Bezos and headquartered in Washington state;

>> Rocket Lab Interstellar Technologies, a Tokyo-based space startup company;

>> Arianespace, a French company;

>> Chinese and Indian space programs;

>> Perigee Aerospace, a privately owned Korean company;

>> ABL Space Systems, headquartered in Segundo, California;

>> Relativity Space, headquartered in Long Beach, California;

>> Firefly Aerospace, headquartered in Cedar Park, with locations in Briggs, and Vandenburg Space Force Base in California; and

>> United Launch Alliance, headquartered in Centennial, Colorado.

Only one of those companies has maintained any type of operations within the Valley, and none of them have been or are within BPUB’s service area.

United Launch Alliance shuttered its rocket manufacturing plant in Harlingen last year, the Valley Morning Star previously reported.

BPUB is also seeking to withhold SpaceX’s usage and utility billing information, citing the potential for “the risk or vulnerability of persons or property, including critical infrastructure, to an act of terrorism or related criminal activity…”

Further, the utility cites a resolution that its board of directors approved on May 22, 2023 to redefine what qualifies as a “competitive matter” and is therefore exempt from disclosure under the TPIA.

BPUB’s letter to the AG indicates that it may also be providing SpaceX with electricity in addition to water.

“It is clear that the requestor, who is NOT the accountholder (sic) to any of the addresses, is asking for information regarding usage information of a Brownsville PUB electric customer, which is specifically identified in both state law and the Competitive Matters Resolution as being excepted from disclosure,” the BPUB letter states.

Nonetheless, the utility’s own required annual reports show that SpaceX has quickly become one of its highest volume water consumers.

SpaceX first appears on BPUB’s list of top 10 water users in its ACFR for fiscal year 2021-22, which ended on Sept. 30, 2022.

In that report, the “Space Exploration Technologies Corp.,” or SpaceX, is listed at No. 4 in the list of “ten largest customers last two years.”

Other high volume users include the El Jardin Water Supply Corp. and the Military Highway Water Supply Corporation, which supply water to thousands living in the rural areas surrounding Brownsville, the Brownsville Navigation District, Brownsville ISD, Texas Southmost College, UTRGV, Cameron County and two hospitals.

The report shows that SpaceX consumed nearly 5 million gallons of water that fiscal year, producing $380,280 in annual revenue.

However, the company’s name does not appear in BPUB’s ACFR the following year. Instead, at No. 4 on the list, the report reads, “Unnamed Industrial Customer,” with an asterisk that states, “Name of company kept confidential in accordance with applicable agreement.”

That anonymous company consumed 7.22 million gallons of BPUB water during fiscal year 2023, at a rate of $519,120, the report shows. That fiscal year ended on Sept. 30, 2023 — just five months after SpaceX first realized its need for the deluge system.

The company didn’t begin using the water deluge system until “after its April 20, 2023 test flight of Starship-Super Heavy resulted in fire and other damage to the launch site and the dispersal of dust and debris,” Groom’s affidavit states.

But one year before the company installed and began using the system, it had already made BPUB’s top 10 highest water users list.

Court filings further reveal that it receives the water — which SpaceX characterizes as “potable” and “the same drinking water provided to neighboring residents” — by truck.

“The water used in the deluge system is potable water trucked in from the Brownsville Public Utilities Board. The water is stored in clean, dedicated tanks and pumped to the system via clean, dedicated pipes installed for that purpose,” Groom’s affidavit states.

The vast majority of the water ends its journey to Boca Chica in a cloud of steam.

“Most of the deluge water vaporizes due to the heat when the rocket engines ignite and dissipates as a cloud of steam,” Groom stated.

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