Elon Musk’s rocket company SpaceX is responsible for sending NASA astronauts into space, but recently, there’s been controversy over the company’s responsibility to care for the land back on Earth. After failed rocket launches left debris and environmental damage on federal public land in Texas, the government is now allowing SpaceX to take over that land in an exchange deal. A recent lawsuit from conservation groups and a Native American tribe aims to put a stop to the transaction.
The Land and What Happened
Since 2014, SpaceX has housed a rocket launching facility near Boca Chica, Texas. The rocket launches take place near the Lower Rio Grande Valley National Wildlife Refuge, which is managed by the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service (USFWS). The land is also considered sacred to the Carrizo-Comecrudo Nation.
In the early 2020s, the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) limited the company, which has billions of dollars in contracts with the federal government, to three launches per year. Then, in 2025, the FAA expanded that number to 25.
While not common, launch failures happen. In 2025, five SpaceX rockets exploded. These explosions are so powerful that they can discharge metal and concrete for miles into the nearby National Wildlife Refuge. In one case, debris was found 6 miles away.
Environmental groups like the Center for Biological Diversity maintain that this SpaceX facility inflicts serious harm on wildlife and the landscape. A 2024 study from the Coastal Bend Bays & Estuaries Program monitored shorebird nesting on land near the launch site. Even successful launches damaged nests and destroyed eggs. A launch takes normally harmless small rocks and sand, and displaces them at such a high speed that they become dangerous projectiles.
In 2024, local environmental nonprofit Save RGV sued SpaceX for violating the Clean Water Act, saying the launches released nonpermitted coolant fluids into the environment.
There is an existing blueprint for environmentally-conscious space operations. In Florida, NASA’s Kennedy Space Center, which has been launching rockets for over 50 years, is located near Merritt Island National Wildlife Refuge and Canaveral National Seashore. It has an environmental protection program and works closely with the USFWS to minimize potential damage.
The Plan
In March, USFWS announced a potential land swap deal with SpaceX. Essentially, the company would gain control of 715 acres of land from the national wildlife refuge. In return, it would give 683 acres of its land to the government agency. The land SpaceX would be handing over is adjacent to the Laguna Atascosa National Wildlife Refuge.
The USFWS presented the swap as a common-sense exchange that would help conservation. “Through the proposed exchange, USFWS would divest of lands likely to be impacted by SpaceX activities, and SpaceX would exchange land that includes desirable habitat for conservation,” the agency said in a press release.
The Lawsuit
On June 10, the Center for Biological Diversity, South Texas Environmental Justice Network, the Carrizo-Comecrudo Nation, and Save RGV filed a lawsuit to block the exchange. They allege that USFWS violated the National Wildlife Refuge System Improvement Act of 1997 and the National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA) by allowing SpaceX to damage national wildlife refuge land.
They also claim that the agency violated the National Historic Preservation Act because part of the land it’s giving away includes portions of the Palmito Ranch Battlefield, a National Historic Landmark from the Civil War.
These groups argue that the exchange is unfair. Essentially, SpaceX is getting land that it has already damaged. “Instead of taking any enforcement actions or working with SpaceX to reduce or eliminate its harm to the refuge, the Service accepted the damage to the lands and now points to the supposed lowered conservation value as justification for the land exchange,” a press release said.
“The refuge is a national public treasure with immense ecological and cultural value. The tract being swapped to SpaceX, whose arrival here has been an unmitigated disaster, will permanently sever the very heart of the wildlife corridor established by Congress in 1979,” Mary Angela Branch, board member at Save RGV, said in a press release.
“This corridor, running along the Rio Grande River, is prime wildlife habitat, and nothing gained in this ‘swap’ will be equal. This will be a huge loss. The federal government should protect our public land for future generations, not turn them into hellscapes for soon-to-be trillionaire corporate interests.”
“This refuge is sacred to me and to the Carrizo/Comecrudo People,” Juan Mancias, member of the Carrizo-Comecrudo Nation of Texas, explained. “Our ancestors have lived with this land, these waters, and these migration pathways since time immemorial. We are not separate from this place — we are of this continent, and our connection to it cannot be bought, exchanged, or erased. The transfer of these sacred lands to SpaceX continues a long history of colonial dispossession and tribal erasure.”
GearJunkie reached out to USFWS for comment, but did not receive a response by the time of publication.
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