It's Official - USGS Cites Fracking Waste Injection As "Primary Cause" Of OK Earthquake Swarms [View all]

[hatrack]

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“Deep injection of wastewater is the primary cause of the dramatic rise in detected earthquakes and the corresponding increase in seismic hazard in the central U.S.,” the USGS said in a press release.

Several scientists and seismologists with the USGS, the University of Colorado at Boulder, the Oklahoma Geological Survey, and the Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory have published a paper in the journal Science that calls for greater transparency from the oil and gas industry, as well as collaboration between industry, government, and the public, in order to mitigate the impacts of these “human-induced earthquakes.”

There were more earthquakes of magnitude 3 or higher in Oklahoma last year than in California. Several were of a magnitude greater than 5 and caused considerable damage. The problem has become so prevalent that Oklahomans have started seeking earthquake insurance, which insurers used to dismiss with a laugh. But even as seismic activity increased since the rise of fracking in 2008, the industry and Oklahoma regulators took no meaningful action to protect residents, which is no surprise given how integral the oil and gas industry is to Oklahoma’s economy.

The USGS is not the first to come to the conclusion that wastewater injection is causing the quakes—and not even the first to publish that conclusion in Science. But until now there has been no comprehensive plan for managing underground injection programs in such a way that lessens the impacts of the induced seismicity on the state and its residents. That is, essentially, the void the USGS scientists and their co-authors were attempting to fill.


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http://www.desmogblog.com/2015/02/26/usgs-fracking-wastewater-disposal-wells-are-causing-oklahoma-earthquakes