Oklahoma 5.7 earthquake linked to oil extraction wastewater

[Ichingcarpenter]

Scientists have linked the underground injection of oil-drilling wastewater to a magnitude-5.7 earthquake in 2011 that struck the US state of Oklahoma.

Wastewater injection from drilling operations has been linked to seismic events in the past, but these have typically been much smaller quakes.

They also have tended to occur in the first weeks or months of injection.

The study in Geology suggests that "induced seismicity" can occur years after wastewater injection begins.

Wastewater was first injected into Oklahoma's Wilzetta oilfields, near the town of Prague, some 18 years prior to the November 2011 series of quakes that included three of magnitude 5 or greater.

The new study adds to an increasing body of evidence that the injection of wastewater is correlated to an increase in seismic events.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/science-environment-21952428

[yesphan]

1. In spite of all the scientific evidence

This is the quote that will be used and broadcast....

But seismologist Austin Holland of the Oklahoma Geological Survey said while the study showed a potential link between the earthquake and wastewater injection, "it is still the opinion of those at the Oklahoma Geological Survey that these earthquakes could be naturally occurring".

[RC]

2. A glass of water sitting on a nearby table had white caps in it.

Several flash drives hanging from lanyards were doing a dance.
And I was in Kansas City Missouri when it happened.

[redstatebluegirl]

3. You will never read about this in the Oklahoma City Newspaper

they will either not cover it at all or bury it. Don't want to piss off Devon or Chesapeake Energy now would we.... That is what is wrong with Oklahoma right now, the people do not get the whole story, they get what they are fed by the media who are bought and paid for by the oil and gas companies that run the state...pity...

[Ichingcarpenter]

4. Columbia University

Road damage


Scientists have linked a rising number of quakes in normally calm parts of Arkansas, Texas, Ohio and Colorado to below-ground injection. In the last four years, the number of quakes in the middle of the United States jumped 11-fold from the three decades prior, the authors of the Geology study estimate. Last year, a group at the U.S. Geological Survey also attributed a remarkable rise in small- to mid-size quakes in the region to humans. The risk is serious enough that the National Academy of Sciences, in a report last year called for further research to “understand, limit and respond” to induced seismic events. Despite these studies, wastewater injection continues near the Oklahoma earthquakes.

The magnitude 5.7 quake near Prague was preceded by a 5.0 shock and followed by thousands of aftershocks. What made the swarm unusual is that wastewater had been pumped into abandoned oil wells nearby for 17 years without incident. In the study, researchers hypothesize that as wastewater replenished compartments once filled with oil, the pressure to keep the fluid going down had to be ratcheted up. As pressure built up, a known fault—known to geologists as the Wilzetta fault--jumped. “When you overpressure the fault, you reduce the stress that’s pinning the fault into place and that’s when earthquakes happen,” said study coauthor Heather Savage, a geophysicist at Columbia University’s Lamont-Doherty Earth Observatory.


http://www.earth.columbia.edu/articles/view/3072


Besides poisoning their aquifers their building codes are not up to earthquake building standards such as California and Washington State so human and building damage would be high as compared to the same size quake.

I''m more worried about the lifeblood of the aquifers though both implications of fracking are alarming.