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Amazon founder Jeff Bezos-owned Blue Origin last week filed a public comment on the Federal Aviation Administration’s plan to evaluate the environmental impact of granting commercial license to Elon Musk-owned SpaceX’s Starship at Kennedy Space Center (KSC), Florida, urging upon the federal agency to set limits on the number of launches. This did not go down well with the Tesla CEO.
What Happened: As the FAA works on preparing an Environmental Impact Statement (EIS) of SpaceX launches from the base, Blue Origin presented seven considerations for the agency. These include capping the rate of Starship-SuperHeavy (Ss-SH) launch, landing and other operations as well as limiting its operations to limited times. SpaceX intends to launch 44 Ss-SH missions per year under a lease with NASA at the LC-39A launch complex at KSC Florida, the Bezos-led company said. It noted that SpaceX’ Ss-SH test missions at the Starbase launch facility at Boca Chica, in Texas, were already facing environmental scrutiny.
Among the other considerations sought by Blue Origin were infrastructure improvements or other operational changes to mitigate the effects of Ss-SH that could need pause at other providers’ launch sites, and SpaceX or government indemnifying third parties for any losses caused by Ss-SH operations.
Blue Origin also called upon instituting mandatory penalties for SpaceX for conducting operations not included in an active EIS or for any other launch violations.
See Also: How To Invest In SpaceX
Musk Blows The Top: Palantir co-founder Joe Lonsdale, a tech venture capitalist, reacted sharply to the comments. Tagging Bezos, he said on X, formerly Twitter, “Blue Origin with the ultimate loser crony note. Very anti-space economy, and decel. Reminiscent of retail trying to block the "impact" of e-commerce. Shameful.”
Musk joined the conversation and recalled the past rivalry between the two space companies. He noted that previously Blue Origin had sued to stop SpaceX from using what the latter currently uses as its primary launchpad at 39A. Also, the Bezos-led company tried to patent landing a rocket on a ship, even though that idea had been around for 70 years, he added.
In a separate post, the billionaire said, “Sue Origin,” making a pun on the Bezos-led company’s name.
Musk called Blue Origin’s response an “obviously disingenuous response” in yet another post. “Not cool of them to try (for the third time) to impede SpaceX's progress by lawfare,” he added.
Musk and Bezos are respectively the world’s first and second richest individuals, according to the Bloomberg Billionaires’ Index. Musk’s net worth of $210 billion is slightly ahead of Bezos’ $209 billion. The billionaires’ space ventures have been at odds with each other on multiple occasions in the past. In 2021, Blue Origin filed a protest with the federal Government Accountability Office, for NASA’s $2.9 billion contract award to SpaceX to build a lander for American astronauts to return to the moon but went on to lose the case.
The Procure Space ETF (NASDAQ:UFO) ended Tuesday’s session down 1.08% to $15.55, according to Benzinga Pro data.
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