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posted by takyon on Wednesday June 12 2019, @09:40AM   Printer-friendly
from the energy-drain dept.

Submitted via IRC for Bytram

Catalog of north Texas earthquakes confirms continuing effects of wastewater disposal

In their report published in the Bulletin of the Seismological Society of America, Louis Quinones and Heather DeShon of Southern Methodist University and colleagues confirm that seismicity rates in the basin have decreased since 2014, a trend that appears to correspond with a decrease in wastewater injection.

However, their analysis also notes that new faults have become active during this period, and that seismicity continues at a greater distance from injection wells over time, suggesting that "far-field" changes in seismic stress will be important for understanding the basin's future earthquake hazard potential.

"One thing we have come to appreciate is how broadly injection in the basin has modified stress within entire basin," said DeShon. The first thing researchers noted with wastewater injection into the basin "was the reactivation of individual faults," she added, "and what we're now starting to see is essentially the leftover energy on all sorts of little faults being released by the cumulative volume that's been put into the basin."

[...] The researchers found that overall seismicity in the Fort Worth Basin has been strongly correlated in time and space with wastewater injection activities, with most seismicity occurring within 15 kilometers of disposal wells.

Tracking Induced Seismicity in the Fort Worth Basin: A Summary of the 2008–2018 North Texas Earthquake Study Catalog [DOI: 10.1785/0120190057] [DX]


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  • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday June 12 2019, @11:11AM (10 children)

    by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday June 12 2019, @11:11AM (#854611)

    Total additional seismic energy from anything injection is strictly less than the energy spent doing the injection (as some of it is lost as heat).
    Calculate for yourself the energy cost of even a light (magnitude 5) earthquake, in nice practical units like gallons of gasoline: http://earthalabama.com/energy.html [earthalabama.com]

  • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday June 12 2019, @12:11PM (5 children)

    by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday June 12 2019, @12:11PM (#854629)

    That's total crap. The energy released by these earthquakes does not come from the water, it comes from the gravitational and inertial pressure exerted by the Earth's crust, both from above and from below. The injection appears to act as a catalyst, triggering and guiding the buildup of energy along existing (but dormant) fault lines.

    According to your "logic", the amount of energy required to trigger an avalanche would be equal to the amount to energy it would take to carry all that snow and debris back up the mountainside.

    • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday June 12 2019, @03:43PM (3 children)

      by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday June 12 2019, @03:43PM (#854680)

      obviously without understanding any. Go and read Wikipedia or something, to get some sense behind your abused vocabulary.
      For a start, we do not have any "catalysts" in mechanics. We have stability, or a lack of it, like in snow (or whatever) on a sufficiently inclined slope.
      And if you apply the organ you're using as a brain, you'll notice that unlike snow, the bedrock is most unlikely to melt away come spring. Whatever strain energy it accumulates, WILL get released sooner or later. The later it is, the MORE of it goes out. This is well known for many decades, even if total news to you.
      If anything, any action triggering earlier energy release is making the seismic events LESS damaging.

      • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday June 12 2019, @09:09PM (1 child)

        by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday June 12 2019, @09:09PM (#854838)

        Oy carumba! Go learn how tectonics work before you claim anyone is wrong (unless you're claiming that you are wrong).

        It's people like you that cause these kinds of earthquake problems in TX and OK.

        • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday June 12 2019, @09:31PM

          by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday June 12 2019, @09:31PM (#854853)

          It did not make you any smarter.
          As for tectonics, I guess I learned how it works years before you learned how not to pee into your diapers. You could learn it too, if you leased a brain somewhere, or unexpectedly grown your own.

      • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday June 12 2019, @09:11PM

        by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday June 12 2019, @09:11PM (#854840)

        hmmm... who knows what kind of monster might be lurking down in those injection holes from the wet kleenex catalized by a topless picture of ms texas 2001 mixed with wasted monthly fertility blood, baby poo diapers and some asortment of excreated medicin?
        maybe the growing texzilla just needs more room to grow and is pushing / compacting the cave its groswing in for us to register as seismic activity?

    • (Score: 1) by khallow on Thursday June 13 2019, @02:42AM

      by khallow (3766) Subscriber Badge on Thursday June 13 2019, @02:42AM (#854973) Journal

      The energy released by these earthquakes does not come from the water, it comes from the gravitational and inertial pressure exerted by the Earth's crust, both from above and from below. The injection appears to act as a catalyst, triggering and guiding the buildup of energy along existing (but dormant) fault lines.

      Then why is the energy release from these earthquakes on the order of the energy put into the system by the water pumping? In addition, earthquake frequency of these regions scales inversely as the energy released by the earthquake, not its moment. That's typical of slippery faults that don't have a lot of potential to build up energy for earthquakes, not faults that have a lot of potential energy waiting for release.

  • (Score: 2) by RamiK on Wednesday June 12 2019, @12:15PM

    by RamiK (1813) on Wednesday June 12 2019, @12:15PM (#854630)

    Total additional seismic energy from anything injection is strictly less than the energy spent doing the injection (as some of it is lost as heat).

    It's like driving over a punctured and deflated tire for a while and then patching and pumping it back again thinking it's as good as new. By drilling through the bedrock and depressurizing the basin you destabilize the structural integrity of the walls even if you end up pouring wastewater back to restore pressure.

    --
    compiling...
  • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday June 12 2019, @03:21PM (1 child)

    by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday June 12 2019, @03:21PM (#854671)

    We also like scientific understanding on this world. You are referencing a system with a huge amount of potential energy. Destabilizing thst system can cause energy to be released, and the only relation to the energy you put in is how destabilized you made the system.

    Short answer, you're looking at first order effects and using seemingly correct but overly simplified logic. Ever heard of an exothermic reaction?

    • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday June 12 2019, @04:12PM

      by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday June 12 2019, @04:12PM (#854691)

      is a sure sign of understanding neither.
      For one, rather unlike some sealed canister of fuel sitting in your garage, Earth crust is constantly subject to tectonic forces. Like this:
      https://cddis.nasa.gov/slrtecto/eurtect.html [nasa.gov]
      Wake me when us puny humans start moving continents around. Even if by centimeters per year. Till then, go and learn some about the energies involved in processes on a planetary scale. Some kinds of hubris really are not sane, even if imagining our mosquito bites have world-shattering effects fills someone's heart with self-importance.

  • (Score: 2) by ElizabethGreene on Wednesday June 12 2019, @04:50PM

    by ElizabethGreene (6748) Subscriber Badge on Wednesday June 12 2019, @04:50PM (#854709) Journal

    I believe the issue isn't the energy they are adding to the system, but that there is already a system with significant potential energy constrained by friction. The injected water acts as a lubricant, allowing the system to release some of that energy.

    I'm of two minds on this.
    1. Are small quakes of less impact than large ones? If so, can we use this technology to reduce the impact of high energy faults e.g. San Andreas?
    2. Can we cut down on the source by using downhole inspection to identify and sleeve the portions of wells that are producing mostly water?