On 5 November an earthquake measuring 5.6 rattled Oklahoma and was felt as far away as Illinois. Â
Until two years ago Oklahoma typically had about 50 earthquakes a year, but in 2010, 1,047 quakes shook the state.
Why?
In Lincoln County, where most of this past weekend's seismic incidents were centered, there are 181 injection wells, according to Matt Skinner, an official from the Oklahoma Corporation Commission, the agency which oversees oil and gas production in the state.
Cause and effect?
The practice of injecting water into deep rock formations causes earthquakes, both the U.S. Army and the U.S. Geological Survey have concluded.
The U.S. natural gas industry pumps a mixture of water and assorted chemicals deep underground to shatter sediment layers containing natural gas, a process called hydraulic fracturing, known more informally as âfracking.â While environmental groups have primarily focused on frackingâs capacity to pollute underground water, a more ominous byproduct emerges from U.S. government studies â that forcing fluids under high pressure deep underground produces increased regional seismic activity.
As the U.S. natural gas industry mounts an unprecedented and expensive advertising campaign to convince the public that such practices are environmentally benign, U.S. government agencies have determined otherwise.
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According to the U.S. Armyâs Rocky Mountain Arsenal website, the RMA drilled a deep well for disposing of the siteâs liquid waste after the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency âconcluded that this procedure is effective and protective of the environment.â According to the RMA, âThe Rocky Mountain Arsenal deep injection well was constructed in 1961, and was drilled to a depth of 12,045 feetâ and 165 million gallons of Basin F liquid waste, consisting of âvery salty water that includes some metals, chlorides, wastewater and toxic organicsâ was injected into the well during 1962-1966.
Why was the process halted? âThe Army discontinued use of the well in February 1966 because of the possibility that the fluid injection was âtriggering earthquakes in the area,â according to the RMA. In 1990, the âEarthquake Hazard Associated with Deep Well Injection--A Report to the U.S. Environmental Protection Agencyâ study of RMA events by Craig Nicholson, and R.I. Wesson stated simply, âInjection had been discontinued at the site in the previous year once the link between the fluid injection and the earlier series of earthquakes was established.â
Twenty-five years later, âpossibilityâ and âestablishedâ changed in the Environmental Protection Agencyâs July 2001 87 page study, âTechnical Program Overview: Underground Injection Control Regulations EPA 816-r-02-025,â which reported, âIn 1967, the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers and the U.S. Geological Survey (USGS) determined that a deep, hazardous waste disposal well at the Rocky Mountain Arsenal was causing significant seismic events in the vicinity of Denver, Colorado.â
There is a significant divergence between âpossibility,â âestablishedâ and âwas causing,â and the most recent report was a decade ago. Much hydraulic fracturing to liberate shale oil gas in the Marcellus shale has occurred since.
According to the USGS website, under the undated heading, âCan we cause earthquakes? Is there any way to prevent earthquakes?â the agency notes, âEarthquakes induced by human activity have been documented in a few locations in the United States, Japan, and Canada.
The cause was injection of fluids into deep wells for waste disposal and secondary recovery of oil, and the use of reservoirs for water supplies. Most of these earthquakes were minor. The largest and most widely known resulted from fluid injection at the Rocky Mountain Arsenal near Denver, Colorado. In 1967, an earthquake of magnitude 5.5 followed a series of smaller earthquakes. Injection had been discontinued at the site in the previous year once the link between the fluid injection and the earlier series of earthquakes was established.â
Note the phrase, âOnce the link between the fluid injection and the earlier series of earthquakes was established.â
So both the U.S Army and the U.S. Geological Survey over fifty years of research confirm on a federal level that that âfluid injectionâ introduces subterranean instability and is a contributory factor in inducing increased seismic activity.â How about âcausing significant seismic events?â
Fast forward to the present.
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Overseas, last month Britainâs Cuadrilla Resources announced that it has discovered huge underground deposits of natural gas in Lancashire, up to 200 trillion cubic feet of gas in all.
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On 2 November a report commissioned by Cuadrilla Resources acknowledged that hydraulic fracturing was responsible for two tremors which hit Lancashire and possibly as many as fifty separate earth tremors overall. The British Geological Survey also linked smaller quakes in the Blackpool area to fracking. BGS Dr. Brian Baptie said, âIt seems quite likely that they are related,â noting, âWe had a couple of instruments close to the site and they show that both events occurred near the site and at a shallow depth.â
But, back to Oklahoma. Austin Hollandâs August 2011 report, âExamination of Possibly Induced Seismicity from Hydraulic Fracturing in the Eola Field, Garvin County, Oklahomaâ Oklahoma Geological Survey OF1-2011, studied 43 earthquakes that occurred on 18 January, ranging in intensity from 1.0 to 2.8 Md (milliDarcies.) While the reportâs conclusions are understandably cautious, it does state, âOur analysis showed that shortly after hydraulic fracturing began small earthquakes started occurring, and more than 50 were identified, of which 43 were large enough to be located.â
Sensitized to the issue, the oil and natural gas industry has been quick to dismiss the charges and deluge the public with a plethora of televisions advertisements about how natural gas from shale deposits is not only Americaâs future, but provides jobs and energy companies are responsible custodians of the environment.
It seems likely that Washington will eventually be forced to address the issue, as the U.S. Army and the USGS have noted a causal link between the forced injection of liquids underground and increased seismic activity. While the Oklahoma quake caused a deal of property damage, had lives been lost, the policy would most certainly have come under increased scrutiny from the legal community.
While polluting a local communityâs water supply is a local tragedy barely heard inside the Beltway, an earthquake ranging from Oklahoma to Illinois, Kansas, Arkansas, Tennessee and Texas is an issue that might yet shake voters out of their torpor, and national elections are slightly less than a year away.
By. John C.K. Daly of Oilprice.com
He replied that it was being looked into and not to worry.
Now, the USGS website, Recent Earthquakes, has been edited to show ONLY ones greater than 3.0. and the Lincoln County information has been generalized (buried) into the world wide info. Now, I cannot even check to see if "that shaking I felt" was yet another earthquake nearby.
What the Hell? I thought USGS was not a sell out to the Oklahoma Corp. Commission???
Meanwhile I am still repairing multiple cracks in my house walls, running from the ceilings to the floors.
There have been many comments that injection of fluids into fractures and fault zones can trigger ss