The Environmental and Regulatory Scrutiny Elon Musk’s Firms Have Confronted — ProPublica

Earlier than and after the 2024 election, Elon Musk made it clear he disliked environmental laws and regarded them a barrier to innovation, particularly given the short timelines his corporations desire to function on.

The billionaire spent greater than $250 million to assist elect President Donald Trump and, within the first months of Trump’s second time period, Musk led the Division of Authorities Effectivity, making cuts to the federal paperwork and regulatory workers, together with environmental businesses, earlier than a dramatic falling out with the president.

Musk-controlled corporations have additionally developed affect in Texas, a state already identified for a lighter contact on environmental regulation. Along with his lobbyists’ profitable observe document within the Texas Legislature, Gov. Greg Abbott cited Musk as inspiration for the state creating its personal DOGE-style workplace.

A brand new investigation from ProPublica, the Texas Newsroom, the Houston Chronicle and the Texas Tribune has discovered Musk and a Houston-area member of Congress have pushed Texas and native officers to rent Musk’s Boring Co. for a $760 million flood management venture within the metropolis.

Reporters Lauren McGaughy and Yilun Cheng discovered that Rep. Wesley Hunt helped pitch Boring’s involvement despite the fact that the corporate builds tunnels narrower than those extensively studied by flood management specialists for the venture. An engineering knowledgeable warned that the amount of the tunnels the corporate is proposing will not be adequate throughout a flood emergency. One other mentioned that the proposed tunnels, which might be constructed at shallow depths, might intrude with current utility traces and bridge foundations.

Boring has described its venture in pitches to lawmakers as an “modern and cost-effective answer.” However specialists and a few native officers query whether or not Boring needs to be awarded the contract. One Democratic county commissioner instructed the newsrooms that Musk shouldn’t be concerned within the Houston venture, arguing he has proven “blatant disregard for democratic establishments and environmental protections.”

Hunt, Musk and representatives from Boring didn’t reply to the newsrooms’ request for remark earlier than publication of the Aug. 28 story. After publication, Hunt and Musk defended the venture on X, the social media platform that Musk owns. Musk claimed that the tunnels would price lower than alternate options and that further tunnels might enhance stream, however he supplied no additional particulars.

Officers in Houston haven’t selected a contractor for the tunneling venture but, and it stays to be seen which environmental laws will come into play.

Prior to now, Boring has discovered methods to navigate round environmental guidelines. A Boring tunnel venture in Las Vegas has skirted environmental, constructing and labor laws, a earlier ProPublica and Metropolis Forged Las Vegas investigation discovered.

Different Musk-owned corporations have confronted related criticism. Over the previous 12 months, environmental teams have additionally raised considerations about an xAI supercomputing facility in Memphis, Tennessee. Musk didn’t reply to ProPublica’s request for remark.

Adam Kron, a senior lawyer on the environmental advocacy group Earthjustice, mentioned any firm ignoring or avoiding laws fully reminds him of the fracking increase within the early 2010s, when corporations moved rapidly to drill, poisoning some native communities’ groundwater within the course of. “There’s a gold rush mentality of getting on the market [first] and paying the high quality later, as soon as you may show it,” Kron mentioned. “When you may have that sort of tradition, you do see extra of the infamous makes an attempt to not search the right permits or not adjust to the requirements.”

Right here’s what to learn about Boring and different Musk-affiliated corporations’ historical past of bumping up towards environmental laws.

Boring Co.

In Las Vegas, a earlier ProPublica investigation discovered Boring was capable of skirt constructing, environmental and labor laws by structuring a transportation venture as a totally personal enterprise and leaning on its native connections.

Boring is developing a deliberate 68-mile tunnel system beneath Las Vegas the place Teslas ferry passengers beneath the town’s city core. The venture averted prolonged evaluations by constructing its first part close to the conference middle underneath the auspices of the tourism authority. Since then, Boring has obtained county approval for dozens of extra miles of tunnels underneath obscure holding firm names.

Since Boring’s Las Vegas venture started, it has been cited or fined for wastewater violations. It additionally paid retroactive charges for permits after being caught tunneling with out them, reporters Daniel Rothberg and Dayvid Figler discovered. Employees for the corporate have filed complaints with the state Occupational Security and Well being Administration about “ankle-deep” water within the tunnels, muck spills and extreme chemical burns. Nevada OSHA fined the corporate greater than $112,000, after an investigation in 2023, however Boring has disputed the regulator’s allegations and contested the violations.

Boring had already been hit with a number of violations over its administration of business wastewater at its headquarters in Bastrop, Texas, by the Texas Fee on Environmental High quality. The corporate, whereas typically denying the allegations, was ultimately fined greater than $9,000 and required to make modifications on the website, in accordance with a TCEQ spokesperson. In 2023, the corporate utilized for a allow to dump greater than 100,000 gallons per day of business wastewater from Boring and SpaceX into a close-by river, however it was met with native resistance. A 12 months later, Boring agreed to switch wastewater to a brand new metropolis remedy plant, anticipated to open in early 2026.

Boring didn’t reply to ProPublica’s request for remark.

xAI

In June 2024, the Memphis Chamber of Commerce introduced xAI, Musk’s synthetic intelligence firm, was organising an information middle at a former manufacturing website within the southern a part of the town. That got here as a shock to some members of the Metropolis Council, certainly one of whom instructed NPR she first heard about it on the native night information.

Inside a number of months, Musk mentioned the information middle, dubbed Colossus, was on-line. The ability primarily powers the corporate’s chatbot and generative picture maker, Grok, which is built-in into X.

The electrical energy wanted for the computing energy was double what the native utility might instantly present, so xAI used methane gasoline mills to carry the information middle on-line, burning fossil fuels and not using a allow or air pollution management applied sciences for practically a 12 months.

“It’s an precise gasoline plant in the midst of a neighborhood, and also you don’t want any allowing?” Democratic state Rep. Justin Pearson, who lives 3 miles from the information middle, instructed CNN in Could. “One thing has failed drastically and considerably with our system of checks and balances.”

In January, amid wider neighborhood push again, xAI utilized for a allow for 15 mills on website. Opponents have aerial imagery they are saying reveals greater than 30 mills showing to be operational on website as late as April. Firm officers have mentioned they wouldn’t set up air pollution controls on any of the generators till the allow was authorised, which occurred in early July.

The corporate maintained permits weren’t obligatory to start out due to an exemption for mills on website for lower than a 12 months, a rationale Shelby County’s Well being Division agreed with. Wendi C. Thomas lately reported for ProPublica and MLK50: Justice By way of Journalism on how the town’s Chamber of Commerce went to uncommon lengths to advertise xAI. Memphis’ mayor has backed and defended the venture, saying the town will tackle air pollution considerations with “impartial environmental consultants” and “neighborhood profit insurance policies.” Tennessee’s governor has touted the alternatives the power will carry to the town. The EPA was starting to look into whether or not the exemption utilized to xAI in October of final 12 months; new EPA head Lee Zeldin lately met with the corporate.

Group members packed an April listening to on the permits, and state representatives for the realm have questioned the mayor’s belief in xAI, particularly as the corporate plans to arrange a second knowledge middle in Memphis.

Environmental advocates have mentioned that xAI wanted permits due to the dimensions of the mills and the scope of the air pollution. In early April, the Southern Environmental Legislation Heart estimated the generators might produce, in a 12 months, between 1,200 and a couple of,000 tons of nitrogen oxides, a smog-forming air pollution related to poor respiratory well being in close by areas, in addition to the carcinogen formaldehyde.

The corporate’s mills are only some miles from a traditionally Black neighborhood already thought of a poisonous air air pollution scorching spot due to greater than a dozen polluting services close by, together with a metal plant, a refinery and energy plant. The county has seen persistently low air high quality and the very best price of ER admission for bronchial asthma assaults in Tennessee. ProPublica’s air toxics map confirmed a most cancers danger scorching spot 4 occasions the nationwide common close by earlier than xAI moved in.

Rules and allowing are in place as a result of unchecked air pollution can have wide-ranging impacts on a close-by neighborhood, no matter trade, mentioned Jennifer Duggan, govt director on the Environmental Integrity Venture, a watchdog nonprofit. “The environmental legal guidelines on the books are designed to guard public well being and our pure sources. If there isn’t a enforcement, when there are violations of these legal guidelines, then there isn’t a safety from industrial air pollution for these communities.”

Whereas the influence to a neighborhood is determined by the trade in query, in addition to size and seriousness of the air pollution, Duggan mentioned, it may well imply elevated danger of untimely mortality, greater well being care prices, misplaced faculty days, misplaced productiveness for employees, beginning defects and even psychological trauma.

Permits typically require services to function safely and set up air pollution controls, Duggan mentioned. If these controls are usually not put in — or turned off — “then you definately’ve acquired extra air pollution within the air than the regulation permits,” which places individuals in danger.

The corporate didn’t reply to ProPublica’s request for remark.

SpaceX

Whereas SpaceX repeatedly launches its Falcon rockets to ship satellites and astronauts into orbit, Musk’s final objective for the corporate is far additional afield. Starship, SpaceX’s large mixed reusable rocket and launch automobile, is meant to ultimately assist ship people and cargo to Mars, and it’s at present a part of NASA’s effort to return astronauts to the moon.

However this system has already run into points right here on Earth, together with violations of unpolluted water laws throughout launch exams and a cross-border investigation into falling particles.

Starship’s launch pad is alongside the Texas shoreline, lower than 5 miles from the Mexico border, surrounded by a state park and a nationwide wildlife refuge established to guard the biodiversity of the decrease Rio Grande River. Among the many animals on this refuge are fragile shorebird populations. When requested about Starship exams in 2018, Musk mentioned on the Texas website “we’ve acquired loads of land with no one round, and so if it blows up, it’s cool,” a remark that angered the residents of a close-by village.

The primary Starship launch vaporized a part of the launch website and threw particles so far as 6 miles. Then the EPA and Texas Fee on Environmental High quality mentioned Starship launches in 2023 and 2024 violated the Clear Water Act for discharging untreated industrial wastewater. SpaceX utilized for a wastewater allow in July 2024 and later mentioned it “essentially” disagreed with the allegations from regulators however settled for about $150,000 to “focus our power on finishing the missions.” In February of this 12 months, state regulators granted SpaceX a allow.

Starship’s fast-moving schedule has suffered setbacks this 12 months, with explosions throughout three launches or exams up to now. Mexico has threatened to sue over particles and potential environmental contamination crossing over the border. SpaceX mentioned in response there have been “no hazards to the encompassing space.”

However the Federal Aviation Administration lately authorised SpaceX for as much as 25 Starship launches a year, and the Trump administration has signed an govt order asserting makes an attempt to “eradicate or expedite” environmental overview of rocket launches by the FAA, ProPublica’s Heather Vogell and Topher Sanders reported.

SpaceX didn’t reply to ProPublica’s request for remark.

Tesla

Whereas the recognition of electrical autos like Tesla in California has led to a notable decline in carbon air pollution from vehicles there, the corporate’s manufacturing unit within the state has been repeatedly admonished for releasing poisonous air air pollution and different poisonous chemical substances into the encompassing neighborhood. Tesla’s Bay Space facility has obtained extra air high quality warnings up to now 5 years than all different corporations in California, save one: a Chevron refinery, in accordance with reporting by The Wall Road Journal.

By 2022, the corporate had been fined by each the native air high quality district over well being considerations and the EPA for breaking federal air high quality legal guidelines. In June 2024, the district ordered Tesla to right ongoing violations of poisonous air air pollution coming from the manufacturing unit’s paint outlets, allegations the corporate denied. The corporate is at present within the technique of implementing an abatement plan, in accordance with a spokesperson for the Bay Space Air District.

Individually, dozens of California counties sued Tesla in 2024 over claims of illegally dumping hazardous waste produced at its facility and native service facilities. The corporate settled the lawsuit for $1.5 million, not admitting to wrongdoing however agreeing to 5 years of obligatory coaching and impartial waste audits.

Musk had already moved Tesla’s headquarters to Texas in 2021, partly over complaints about California regulatory tradition. However, as the Journal reported in November 2024, Texas regulators have additionally cited the corporate for actions at Tesla’s large Gigafactory simply exterior of Austin, together with for dumping untreated wastewater, releasing air pollution in extra of its allow after which not reporting it.

A former Texas worker despatched a whistleblower memo to the EPA in 2024 accusing the corporate of asking workers to mislead authorities regulators, the Journal reported, together with creating an “elaborate ruse” throughout an inspection to verify a troubled furnace handed an emissions take a look at. Each the EPA and Texas environmental regulators opened a “preliminary inquiry” associated to the memo in November 2024, in accordance with the Journal. The EPA didn’t reply to ProPublica’s query in regards to the standing of the inquiry and pointed us to the TCEQ. A TCEQ spokesperson mentioned it couldn’t remark “to help the integrity of all prison investigations performed by TCEQ.”

Tesla didn’t reply to the Journal’s request for remark. However a day after the story was revealed, Musk reposted an X consumer who talked about the Journal story, including the message: “Legacy media is a sewage pipe of lies.”

Tesla didn’t reply to ProPublica’s request for remark.

The individuals affected by environmental violations are usually not simply the close by neighborhood, Duggan mentioned, however the employees at polluting services as nicely. “They’re actually on the entrance line in sure industries,” she mentioned.