A company closely affiliated with billionaire entrepreneur Elon Musk wants to dump thousands of gallons of treated wastewater in Texas’ Colorado River.
The company, Gapped Bass LLC, asked to dump up to 142,500 gallons of treated wastewater a day at its property in Bastrop near the river, according to public filings with the Texas Commission on Environmental Quality.
Bastrop — about 30 miles southeast of Austin — is home to a part of the Colorado River that starts in West Texas and flows 800 miles before emptying into the Gulf of Mexico.
The request from Gapped Bass comes a year after Musk, Tesla’s co-founder and CEO, moved his automaker’s corporate headquarters to Austin.
The request also provides a small glimpse into Musk’s growing Texas empire.
Last year, Musk’s transportation and infrastructure company, the Boring Company, purchased 73 acres in northwest Bastrop County, according to media reports at the time.
Filings didn’t name Boring, but rather Gapped Bass. Property records show the Boring Company and Gapped Bass share an address.
They also share executives. Steve Davis, president of the Boring Company, is listed as manager of Gapped Bass. Adam Pashaian, corporate controller for the Boring Company, is a registered agent for Gapped Bass.
Musk’s Boring Company is working to build a network of high-speed, underground tunnels that aims to alleviate highway traffic nationwide. It recently moved its headquarters from California to the Austin suburb of Pflugerville.
It’s not yet known what role the Bastrop facility will play, but the company’s website lists job openings there for welders, mechanics and tunnel and concrete workers.
Representatives with Boring did not respond to requests for comment.
Industrial companies regularly dump billions of gallons of treated wastewater into rivers and oceans every year.
Gary Rasp, a spokesman for the TCEQ, said in an email that the agency is doing a technical review of the request to ensure the plan would protect surface and groundwater.
Several Texas cities, including Austin, get their drinking water from the Colorado River. The river is also used for recreation and is home to dozens of species of aquatic wildlife.
Gapped Bass also requested the option to discharge the treated wastewater onto land via irrigation, according to the online filing.
Wastewater treatment removes pollutants so that water can be reused, but the Environmental Protection Agency has said there is potential for trace levels of contaminants to remain.
Any discharge of treated wastewater into or adjacent to water in Texas must be authorized by the state’s environmental agency.
The commission is now accepting public comments related to the request. It will call a public meeting if there is substantial public interest or if requested to do so by an elected state official, Rasp said.
A timeline for a final decision is not known, but the request could stir opposition from neighbors, who have previously complained about a lack of transparency and potential traffic at the facility.
In May, the Austin Business Journal reported Texas’ environmental agency was investigating the company for three complaints related to wastewater and concrete production.
In the last year, Musk has quietly and quickly expanded his Texas footprint.
SpaceX, which he founded, now operates a launch site in the South Texas beach town Boca Chica, where Musk has said he is renting a home. The space exploration company also recently posted job openings in Austin.
Another of his companies, Neuralink, plans to build a 37-acre lab and office in Austin.
