Stories
Slash Boxes
Comments

SoylentNews is people

posted by martyb on Sunday January 21 2018, @11:23PM   Printer-friendly
from the shake-rattle-and-roll dept.

Why some fracking wells are prone to triggering earthquakes

Some of the biggest fracking-induced earthquakes in the world — including three higher than magnitude 4.0 that could be felt by humans — have taken place in the Kaybob Duvernay Formation near Fox Creek, [Alberta]. But they've happened only in certain areas and only since 2013, even though fracking began there in 2010. Why?

A study led by Ryan Schultz, a seismologist with the Alberta Energy Regulator and a geophysical research scientist at the University of Alberta, shows that the underlying geology determines whether earthquakes can be induced at all by a particular well. But if an earthquake can be induced, then the number of earthquakes increased with the amount of fluid pumped into the well, reports the study published Thursday in the journal Science [DOI: 10.1126/science.aao0159] [DX].

The authors of the study, which also involved researchers at Western University, the University of Calgary, the University of Alberta and Natural Resources Canada, came to that conclusion after analyzing drilling records for around 300 wells in the region submitted to the Alberta Energy Regulator. They found that the reason earthquakes didn't start there until 2013 was because companies didn't start drilling earthquake-prone wells until then.

So what makes a well earthquake prone? Earthquakes happen at faults, where two of the Earth's tectonic plates come together. Earthquakes occur when the two plates slip or slide relative to one another. In order to cause an earthquake, a fracking well needs to have a physical connection via the underlying rock to a fault that is oriented so that the pressure of fluid from the well can change the stress on that fault and increase the chance of it slipping.

Also at the University of Alberta.


Original Submission

This discussion has been archived. No new comments can be posted.
Display Options Threshold/Breakthrough Mark All as Read Mark All as Unread
The Fine Print: The following comments are owned by whoever posted them. We are not responsible for them in any way.
(1)
  • (Score: 5, Interesting) by frojack on Sunday January 21 2018, @11:38PM (5 children)

    by frojack (1554) on Sunday January 21 2018, @11:38PM (#625872) Journal

    In order to cause an earthquake, a fracking well needs to have a physical connection via the underlying rock to a fault that is oriented so that the pressure of fluid from the well can change the stress on that fault and increase the chance of it slipping.

    So I predict a new technique for managing problem faults, such as those the periodically lock, then release violently:

    Lubricate these with fracking by intentionally drilling into the fault, and allowing many smaller swarms of earthquakes to release pent up potential at suspected locked points, avoiding big faults later on.

    I suspect you'd have to practice in some rural backwater, rather than on the San Andreas [wikipedia.org] which is too big to practice on in terms of actual size and potential risk. Maybe in Alaska or some smaller midwest faults.

     

    --
    No, you are mistaken. I've always had this sig.
    • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday January 21 2018, @11:55PM (4 children)

      by Anonymous Coward on Sunday January 21 2018, @11:55PM (#625884)

      I suspect you'd have to practice in some rural backwater, rather than on the San Andreas

      Or not - Southern Commiefornia brings me down [theconversation.com]

      • (Score: 1, Interesting) by Anonymous Coward on Monday January 22 2018, @02:35AM (3 children)

        by Anonymous Coward on Monday January 22 2018, @02:35AM (#625922)

        They've been saying that for a lot of years.

        There was a 7.9 event near Fort Tejon in 1857.
        Even today, that isn't near a major population center. [googleapis.com]
        (A smaller number zooms out.)

        The Frisco event of 1906 was a 7.8 event.

        The San Andreas Fault hasn't ruptured since then.

        Are we due? More or less.
        On average, that turns loose every 110 - 140 years.

        .
        Southern Commiefornia

        Wouldn't that be nice?
        Education at zero cost to the student as far as he can take that.
        No corporations paying poverty wages for part-time jobs without benefits.
        No bloodsucking landlords constantly jacking up rents.
        No one homeless and left out in the cold. (It got down to 43 F last night. Brrrrr!)
        No one dying at 30 because they don't have medical insurance.
        No one going bankrupt because they got sick and the medical insurance they paid for was a scam.

        Sounds awesome!

        -- OriginalOwner_ [soylentnews.org]

        • (Score: 2) by Freeman on Monday January 22 2018, @05:17PM (2 children)

          by Freeman (732) on Monday January 22 2018, @05:17PM (#626141) Journal

          Or how about, Louis Armstrong was on the right track. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2nGKqH26xlg/ [youtube.com]

          --
          Joshua 1:9 "Be strong and of a good courage; be not afraid, neither be thou dismayed: for the Lord thy God is with thee"
          • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday January 22 2018, @11:05PM

            by Anonymous Coward on Monday January 22 2018, @11:05PM (#626312)

            Alvin Lee and Ten Years After had a related idea (though their notion wouldn't necessarily involve dumping Capitalism, just lessening inequality).
            I'd Love to Change the World [google.com]

            -- OriginalOwner_ [soylentnews.org]

          • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday January 23 2018, @12:01AM

            by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday January 23 2018, @12:01AM (#626346)

            Bleeding Heart Liberal Michael Moore did a movie where he looked around the globe and found nations doing things better than USA.[1] [google.com]

            [1] If you ask the same question multiple times, Google will stop asking stupid questions. [google.com]

            Germany will educate you gratis, as far as you can take that--even if you're not a German national.
            All developed countries except USA have education systems with low costs.
            Cuba is a wonderful example of literacy and education.
            (California had gratis education until Regan became governor.)

            Germany requires that, for a corporation with more than a piddling number of employees, half of the board of directors must be selected by The Workers.

            France has a 35-hour workweek.

            27 percent of residences in Poland are in housing cooperatives. [google.com]
            The Czech Republic has a whole bunch of that too.

            In every developed country except USA, nobody goes bankrupt due to medical costs.
            Some countries will even treat visitors with emergencies gratis.
            (People fleeing Fascist Reactionary oppression in Paraguay get the same gratis medical care as citizens do when those folks cross the border into Socialist Argentina.) [dissidentvoice.org]
            N.B. The costs of USA's for-profit healthcare system are almost twice that of the nation with the 2nd most expensive system.

            -- OriginalOwner_ [soylentnews.org]

  • (Score: 4, Funny) by requerdanos on Sunday January 21 2018, @11:59PM (9 children)

    by requerdanos (5997) Subscriber Badge on Sunday January 21 2018, @11:59PM (#625887) Journal

    Fracking Wells With a Physical Connection to a Fault Are More Likely to Trigger Earthquakes - Ryan Schultz, a seismologist

    In other news,

    SHULTZ UNMASKED AS CAPTAIN OBVIOUS (Alberta, BC) - ...

    I really do respect the research, but I am just pointing out where the result lands on the How-Surprising-Is-This meter.

    [\ - - . - - -]

    • (Score: 4, Insightful) by takyon on Monday January 22 2018, @12:02AM (6 children)

      by takyon (881) <reversethis-{gro ... s} {ta} {noykat}> on Monday January 22 2018, @12:02AM (#625889) Journal

      Tell that to the oil and natural gas companies doing the fracking. "The sciense isn't settled!"

      --
      [SIG] 10/28/2017: Soylent Upgrade v14 [soylentnews.org]
      • (Score: 3, Interesting) by frojack on Monday January 22 2018, @12:51AM (3 children)

        by frojack (1554) on Monday January 22 2018, @12:51AM (#625900) Journal

        I suspect the study is likely to limit drilling into faults in the future, while allowing drilling away from faults.

        I'd also be interested in the economics of drilling into a fault. Is is profitable? Do those wells produce as much oil/gas as non-fault zone wells? One would tend to imagine that a fault would have released a lot of gas that would be trapped in other areas away from faults.

        --
        No, you are mistaken. I've always had this sig.
        • (Score: 2) by requerdanos on Monday January 22 2018, @01:57AM (2 children)

          by requerdanos (5997) Subscriber Badge on Monday January 22 2018, @01:57AM (#625913) Journal

          takyon's "science isn't settled!" point being well taken...

          I suspect the study is likely to limit drilling into faults in the future, while allowing drilling away from faults.

          That would also be rather obvious, but I am getting hung up here: Of "the biggest fracking-induced earthquakes in the world," they note only "three higher than magnitude 4.0 that could be felt by humans."

          "Higher than magnitude 4.0" describes the set of all real numbers greater than four, and so would include earthquakes that shatter the planet to asteroidal bits. But this seems written to suggest "three barely bigger than 4.0" such that if the guy reading the seismometer asks "Hey, can you feel that?" the other folks in earshot cock their heads a little, look and/or listen carefully, and finally say "Oh, yeah... I kinda do feel it."

          And so they may be on the order of "Well, yeah, they were technically recorded but little quakes like that don't count" such that fracking happens with or without attached faults until such time that cheap wind and/or solar prices push fracking out of the cost-effectiveness game.

      • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday January 22 2018, @02:50AM (1 child)

        by Anonymous Coward on Monday January 22 2018, @02:50AM (#625926)

        Tell that to the oil and natural gas companies doing the fracking. "The sciense isn't settled!"

        Add khallow to the list, the "The sciense isn't settled!" is one he makes an honor-point from using (and anything that has remotely to do with "free market and economy" are accepted as obvious in an automated, knee-jerk reaction).

        • (Score: 2, Touché) by khallow on Monday January 22 2018, @06:15AM

          by khallow (3766) Subscriber Badge on Monday January 22 2018, @06:15AM (#625965) Journal

          the "The sciense isn't settled!" is one he makes an honor-point from using

          We could always just look at my scribblings [soylentnews.org] rather than make shit up.

          While this does indicate that large earthquakes are much more uncommon relative to normal earthquake producing faults (where a drop in frequency of 10 per unit increase in magnitude is common), it still indicates to me that that these earthquakes are following a Poisson-type distribution and in particularly, can produce larger earthquakes than have been seen to date though at considerably reduced frequency. That plus the considerable increase in earthquakes over the past few years indicates to me that we do have risk of larger earthquakes and should take measures to reduce that likelihood.

          That's the difference between someone who says shit and someone who understands the subject and presents a reasoned argument based on that understanding.

    • (Score: 2) by Gaaark on Monday January 22 2018, @12:12AM

      by Gaaark (41) on Monday January 22 2018, @12:12AM (#625893) Journal

      Yeah, seems like another duh moment for the human species.

      Will we ever learn? Let's bring out the Surprise meter again.

      --
      --- Please remind me if I haven't been civil to you: I'm channeling MDC. ---Gaaark 2.0 ---
    • (Score: 1) by Gault.Drakkor on Monday January 22 2018, @08:50PM

      by Gault.Drakkor (1079) on Monday January 22 2018, @08:50PM (#626232)

      From the summary:

      a fracking well needs to have a physical connection via the underlying rock to a fault that is oriented so that the pressure of fluid from the well can change the stress on that fault

      I am not a geo. But i work for a geo company. There are many faults out there, in numbers and description. Depending on the rock, region, total depth, etc you could be drilling through multiple faults per borehole.

      The point of this research it seems to me is better knowledge of WHAT faults are a problem. It was, as you said, obvious that faults were involved, but this provides a better description of the problem faults.

      Car analogy: "People with physical contact with cars are more likely to be injured by cars." Scientists: "Not everybody that touches a car is injured. Injuries are more likely when people are in physical contact with cars with faulty brakes."

  • (Score: 4, Interesting) by linkdude64 on Monday January 22 2018, @12:08AM

    by linkdude64 (5482) on Monday January 22 2018, @12:08AM (#625892)

    These types of articles are not intended for the educated populace.

    They are unfortunate requirements in a world where lawyers, judges, and pennypinching-types will deny all reason, common sense, morality, or courtesy until something undeniable is placed in front of them, and until that time, they will run amok with everything from developmental psychology to war that best suits their financial interests.

  • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday January 22 2018, @12:48AM (4 children)

    by Anonymous Coward on Monday January 22 2018, @12:48AM (#625899)

    What idiot needed a study to figure that out?

    • (Score: 2) by takyon on Monday January 22 2018, @02:08AM (2 children)

      by takyon (881) <reversethis-{gro ... s} {ta} {noykat}> on Monday January 22 2018, @02:08AM (#625915) Journal

      Albert

      --
      [SIG] 10/28/2017: Soylent Upgrade v14 [soylentnews.org]
    • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday January 22 2018, @07:23AM

      by Anonymous Coward on Monday January 22 2018, @07:23AM (#625979)
      The denialist idiots who continue to deny that fracking has problematic effects. This might only be common sense, but when there is a manufactroversy, every little bit of scientific evidence, no matter how painfully obvious, is ammunition.
  • (Score: 2) by drussell on Monday January 22 2018, @03:19AM (1 child)

    by drussell (2678) on Monday January 22 2018, @03:19AM (#625932) Journal

    I have not read any of the linked information, nor do I really know any of the background for this, but...

    "Fracking Wells With a Physical Connection to a Fault Are More Likely to Trigger Earthquakes"

    ...sounds like something that... uh... might be expected, even with a layman's grasp of geophysics.... Duh.

    The bigger question, really, is how can well can we quickly grasp onto the knowledge of how all these things work and get at least a basic understanding of how this stuff interacts. That would be incredibly useful information and is being studied but it is certainly not yet completely understood.

    • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday January 22 2018, @03:35AM

      by Anonymous Coward on Monday January 22 2018, @03:35AM (#625933)

      ...sounds like something that... uh... might be expected, even with a layman's grasp of geophysics....

      Geophysics?
      What you talking about? Everybody knows it's turtles all the way down, make no mistakes (or faults).

  • (Score: 1) by khallow on Monday January 22 2018, @06:23AM

    by khallow (3766) Subscriber Badge on Monday January 22 2018, @06:23AM (#625968) Journal
    One thing that I think people are missing here is that there is a difference between "Are More Likely to Trigger Earthquakes" and "Are More Likely to Trigger Small Earthquakes". If the energy input of pumping high pressure, low density water underground is not dissipated by a swarm of small earthquakes, then it will likely be dissipated by fewer larger earthquakes. That's more likely to result in damaging earthquakes.
(1)