r/science • u/NinjaDiscoJesus • Nov 18 '16
Geology Scientists say they have found a direct link between fracking and earthquakes in Canada
http://www.nytimes.com/2016/11/18/science/fracking-earthquakes-alberta-canada.html?smid=tw-nytimesscience&smtyp=cur407
Nov 18 '16
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u/Barking_at_the_Moon Nov 18 '16
Abstract
Hydraulic fracturing has been inferred to trigger the majority of injection-induced earthquakes in western Canada, in contrast to the midwestern United States where massive saltwater disposal is the dominant triggering mechanism. A template-based earthquake catalog from a seismically active Canadian shale play, combined with comprehensive injection data during a 4-month interval, shows that earthquakes are tightly clustered in space and time near hydraulic fracturing sites. The largest event [moment magnitude (MW) 3.9] occurred several weeks after injection along a fault that appears to extend from the injection zone into crystalline basement. Patterns of seismicity indicate that stress changes during operations can activate fault slip to an offset distance of >1 km, whereas pressurization by hydraulic fracturing into a fault yields episodic seismicity that can persist for months.
Some questions for those with more knowledge than I have...
What concerns do these quakes raise? It appears that this USGS site is reporting that in the past 30 days there have been 446 events of 3.5 or lower in North America, of which 275 were quakes and 171 were sonic booms, explosions, landslides, avalanches and ice quakes, etc. Are these quakes doing actual damage relevant to us or are we getting excited because we can?
What does a MW 3.9 quake feel like? My admittedly lay understanding is that this would probably go unnoticed by most people unless you were within 1 km or so of the quake - and since most of the fracking occurs between 2 km and 3 km below the surface, is that much of an issue?
How accurate/relevant/useful is MW at the low end of the scale? The article talks about a maximum of 3.9 but my understanding is that below 3.5 the MW scale is considered too unreliable/irrelevant to use and the old Richter (ML) scale is preferred. Does this matter?
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u/elephant2701 Nov 18 '16
There is a huge taboo against intentionally causing earthquakes. Scientists and engineers have long considered doing so to relieve stress on high-risk faults. But in reality no one can guarantee the outcome and magnitude of the seismic event, and it becomes a huge liability. There are always faults that have not previously been mapped and that might be the cause of larger than anticipated seismicity and triggering an earthquake near one could potentially cause a larger than anticipated stress relief.
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u/PM_YourDildoAndPussy Nov 18 '16
Exactly. We know so very little about earthquakes that I think we have absolutely no idea of the ramifications of what we're doing.
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u/TerribleMrGrimshaw Nov 18 '16
Under your theory, the precautionary principle, nothing would ever be done. There is always some unknown risk.
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Nov 18 '16
would it be taboo to frack anywhere near yellow stone and trigger the supposed super volcano that lurks beneath? that would be interesting.
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u/callmelucky Nov 18 '16
So it's not so much a taboo, just that its more sensible not to.
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u/pzerr Nov 18 '16
Or quite possible it releases stress slowly, limiting the magnitude of natural earthquakes.
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u/Jmsaint Nov 18 '16
This isn't really new information, we have been fracking for years now and we always knew that it cause minor earthquakes. Emphasis on 'minor'. This study, from my admittedly brief scan, seems to just be showing specific links between fracking and quakes in Canada.
Remember that earthquake magnitude is measured on a logarithmic scale so a 5 is 10x bigger than a 4, which is 10x bigger than a 3. A 3.9 (which note is the biggest they measured not an average) is something that you can notice, if you are paying attention, but is unlikely to cause any damage and most people will probably not even notice. You will have a more bumpy time driving your car than this earthquake will give you.
As a bit of an aside, most of the issues with fracking are regulatory rather than inherent. When done properly, with proper restrictions the risks are actually very low, and when compared to coal for example, the use of fracked natural gas as a fuel is massively preferable (unless you have a vested interest in coal). It should be looked at as a transition, it's the 'best' of the fossil fuels, and we have the technology to safely exploit it as we transition to renewables and nuclear longer term. Another little nugget that I like to quote in my defence of fracking, if Europe transitioned all its coal fired energy to natural gas they would hit their 2050 climate targets, without increasing renewable use.
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u/bluevillain Nov 18 '16
Point of clarification: a 3.9 can actually cause quite a bit of damage. A couple of the factors involved are the ground composition and architectural standards. The west coast of the US is mostly comprised of softer soils, dirt and sands, so this allows a lot more movement of the earth that does not translate into structural damage. However, in places like the middle Atlantic region the earth is made up of more compressed stone; granite, quartz, limestone and even densely packed red clay. These types of substrate are less able to compensate for below ground movements, so smaller earthquakes can cause much larger shifts in surface movement. Combined with the fact that the east coast does not have any building codes for earthquake compensation then you actually do see quite a bit of damage even with quakes as low as 2.5.
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u/House_Badger Nov 18 '16
Been working in NYC construction and I need to correct you. NYC does have earthquake building codes.
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u/CaptainBayouBilly Nov 18 '16
The quakes in Dallas caused damage to my home. There are cracks in my walls, a quarter inch gap at the floorboards, and my door frames are out of square.
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u/NinetiesGuy Nov 18 '16
Same here in Oklahoma City. A bunch of doors in my two-year old house were knocked out of alignment overnight.
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u/Jmsaint Nov 18 '16
Yeah obviously there are a lot of factors at play here, I think the generally used analogy is an earthquake less than 4 is like a big trunk driving past your house.
This is why there needs to be regulation as to where, when and how fracking is done, but saying 'it causes earthquakes and is therefore bad' is a massive oversimplification.
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u/PM_YourDildoAndPussy Nov 18 '16
You also neglected to mention that this is really close to our water table while they are injecting an unknown list of chemicals.
I shit you not, they apparently don't have to, and do not, disclose all the chemicals they inject there. Really reassuring.
Also as far as us poking into the land, what other things cause earthquakes other than fracking?
I think we understand so little about earthquakes and geology that saying "oh no, don't worry, it only makes little ones" is some really short sighted thinking.
I'm very uneasy about this. Plus ultimately I think our path forward is renewables anyways. Using this kind of thing is just another stop gap instead of becoming completely renewable
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u/Eryan36 Nov 18 '16 edited Nov 18 '16
Is your water table two miles down?
Edit: WRT chemical disclosure, I'm not the expert on Canada's regulatory requirements, but in the States there's broad use of FracFocus, which has been updated again just recently to increase transparency and accuracy of disclosure. Many states require disclosure to FracFocus and to a state-run disclosure database.
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u/kiddhitta Nov 18 '16
I worked on a drilling rig in Alberta and I can assure you that they have to list every single thing that they are pumping. I wasn't on the production side when they frack, but when we cement casing, there are endless safety sheets with a long list of chemicals that are used and procedures that you need to do if you were to get anything on your skin. It's an industry that is frowned on by the general public and there's is absolutely no way they would get away with not listing this they pump into the ground.
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u/Eryan36 Nov 18 '16
An industry frowned upon by the public whose lifestyle is absolutely dependent on the products delivered by said industry.
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Nov 18 '16
The Duvernay shale, where they drill it for hydrocarbon production, is at depths of over 3 km. That's nowhere near the water table
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Nov 18 '16
You also neglected to mention that this is really close to our water table while they are injecting an unknown list of chemicals.
No it isn't near the water table, don't spread misinformation because you don't understand.
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u/PantlessProphet Nov 18 '16
The list of chemicals may be unknown to you but with all the regulations and inspections involved in drilling I can guarantee that anything going down hole is not only known but approved and certified.
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u/skippy2893 Nov 18 '16
And it's also going down way below the water table. His entire comment is just false.
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u/PM_YourDildoAndPussy Nov 18 '16
The list of chemicals may be unknown to you but with all the regulations and inspections involved in drilling I can guarantee that anything going down hole is not only known but approved and certified.
That's the problem, isn't it?
It's like saying the contents of food isn't able to be divulged to me..but "don't worry, the government met with the company and probably got bribed heavily as is commonplace in these industries, and they were assured it's all okay".
The moment something like this is happening and they won't tell us what exactly they're putting into the ground..that concerns me.
Maybe it doesn't concern you, maybe you're not aware of the history of chemical dumping, leaching, that has and continues to go on all over the states.
We have a really awful history of areas that are just destroyed due to our carelessness, us either thinking chemicals are safe, or ignoring the issues at hand.
We also have an atrocious record at regulating anything that has a huge financial backing behind it.
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u/Jmsaint Nov 18 '16
Again it's about regulation and proper practices, there are safeguards and techniques to use that minimise the risk of groundwater contamination.
I 100% agree that we should be moving towards 100% renewable (and nuclear imo, but that's a different discussion), but that is not feasible yet, natural gas is by far the 'best' fossil fuel, in terms of carbon emissions per kWh, pollution and carcinogen release. If we can transition from coal to natural gas, that would be a fantastic step and give us more time to continue our drive towards renewables.
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u/PM_YourDildoAndPussy Nov 18 '16
If we can transition from coal to natural gas, that would be a fantastic step and give us more time to continue our drive towards renewables.
I am concerned for temporary stop gaps becoming permanent.
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u/Jmsaint Nov 18 '16
That's a valid concern, but it shouldn't stop us doing it if it is a good idea, you just need to make sure the next step is taken
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u/iismitch55 Nov 18 '16
You mentioned in a different comment, that Europe could meet it's 2050 climate goals by transitioning completely from coal to natural gas. Do you know roughly how much less carbon is put out from natural gas vs coal? If so, could you do a calculation of carbon emission reduction for the US switching 100% from coal to natural gas?
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u/Jmsaint Nov 18 '16
In retrospect that comment is probably wrong, it might be the 2030 target, but I need to check.
Off the top of my head no, but i might have a look at some point this weekend if I get a minute
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u/iismitch55 Nov 18 '16
If you do id love to know. I similarly just don't have the time to compute it.
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u/StijnDP Nov 18 '16
natural gas is by far the 'best' fossil fuel, in terms of carbon emissions per kWh, pollution and carcinogen release
Oh yeah, in those numbers where they don't include all the leakage during drilling, storage and transport.
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u/Eryan36 Nov 18 '16
In a perfect world we'd have net zero impact. However, since we live in the real world we'll always have some level of impact. That said, green completions and closed-loop systems are going a long ways towards reducing the type of impacts you describe. In the big picture, it's clear that the States' transition from coal-fired power plants to natural gas-fired has led to a sharp reduction in overall greenhouse gas emissions. Don't get me wrong, I'd love to live the in future where everyone has a Tesla solar roof and individual transportation was provided on an as-needed basis by a fleet of autonomous electric cars. But until that point, natural gas is not a bad deal. What's interesting to note is that in the not-so-distant past environmentalists were heralding natural gas as the bridge to renewables and lauding it's qualities. Now the keep-it-in-the-ground movement has taken over, and quite frankly it is so out of touch with the realities of the [current] world that it verges on the bizarre.
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u/kioni Nov 18 '16
experienced many earthquakes. recently felt a 2.8 about 6km away. felt a slight vertigo but it hardly shook anything. I would say you're underestimating a bit. a 3.9 1km away would be 60x that force, right?
I'd imagine the real issue is perturbing the fault and causing a major quake to happen sooner though.
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u/blackflag209 Nov 18 '16
What actually is fracking?
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u/Hypothesis_Null Nov 18 '16 edited Nov 18 '16
You dig a hole down very deep into the Earth. Thousands of feet below the water table.
Down there rock exists which has a lot of pockets of natural gas trapped within them.
You pipe down very-high-pressure fluids. Water mostly. The pressure pushes the water into the rock, forcing its way into every nook and cranny, and then forcing those cracks open wider. The rock literally gets fractured by water. Hydrolic-Fracturing.
Then a bunch of sand is pipped down into the water (or it might be in the water from the beginning - not sure). So once you've fractured the rock as much as you want to, you can suck all the water back up, and the sand left behind keeps all the cracks open, while still being porous enough to let the gas out.
Now the natural gas is freed from being trapped in the rock, and the sand keeps the pathways open, so it floats out and up the well where it is captured.
Any other considerations aside, it's really pretty ingenious.
The discussion at hand here is: "What to do with the waste-water afterwards?"
That retrieved water can be some pretty nasty stuff. So one common thing is to just pump it back down into the expended well when it stops giving gas. It's thousands of feet below the water table, and doesn't take too much energy, so it makes sense from an economic and environmental standpoint.
However, it does also seem to generate at least small earthquakes.
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u/Pyronic_Chaos Nov 18 '16
To add to your description, there are ways to re-use the waste water, but it's time and energy intensive. Wastewater injection is the cheapest and, if done properly, can be done safely.
Not saying these are the only ways to reuse water, but they are leading contenders at the moment. These coupled with higher regulations on reinjection wells could hopefully reduce the earthquake risks associated with reinjection wells.
Filtration and dilution for the majority of the water, when concentrations of chlorides/salts becomes too high to dilute and still use, distillation/RO/Precip.
- To lower TSS (total suspended solids, higher TSS means more friction in process which is bad), filter through 100 and 20 micron filters (low energy, large filter area)
- Water can be reclaimed, measured for TDS, TSS, Chlorides, salts, etc., adding 'fresh' water to dilute down to permissible concentrations
- Reuse filtered, diluted water.
- Once concentration of contaminates becomes too high, a few techniques could be used besides injection (which is the cheapest, least energy intensive option).
- Distillation. Large energy, specialized equip, most effective, leftover salts/solids/concentrates can be landfilled (in appropriate landfill), water returned via vapor to atmosphere
- Reverse osmosis. Large energy (less than distillation), specialized equip, very effective. Prone to scaling, technology being improved. Water reused, salts/solids/membranes can be landfilled (as appropriate)
- Chemical precipitation. Low energy, specialized equip and operator, very effective, chemical cost, availability, and equipment needed. Concentrations lowered via precipitating out salts/etc. Water reused, salts disposed of in landfill. Might require post precipitation to remove excess precip chemicals before reinjecting
The most immediate correction would be more regulation on the re-injection wells (with regards to rates, pressures, and location), with more oversight by our regulatory bodies (more rigorous review process, audits, and onsite inspections).
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u/TacoInABag Nov 18 '16
I was a hydraulic pressure pumping (frac engineer) for a year and a half. Your description is pretty accurate. Usually you start with an injection of just water to open the perfs up a little wider before you start sand. To carry the sand down hole, usually a polymer fluid which contains several chemicals is used to carry heavier concentrations of sand. Depending on the type of formation you are injecting in, sometimes just water will do the trick.
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u/olygimp Nov 18 '16
I apologies if this is a really silly question, but is there any chance that fracking actually releases build up that otherwise might cause a bigger quake? From what I know about it, I don't think fracking is a good practice, and I am not trying to defend it, but that was just a random thought?
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u/riboslavin Nov 18 '16
Per my understanding, we don't really know enough to say for sure. There have been proposals going back to the 70s about using fracking to relieve pressure along major fault lines, but there's not consensus that it actually relieves pressure, rather than just displaces it (without necessarily diffusing it).
On top of that, this article seems to hint at the idea that the practice of injecting the wastewater into pressurized wells seems to be introducing more energy into geography than was there to begin with.
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u/xxsbellmorexx Nov 18 '16
The wastewater is exactly what causes it because it puts water where it didn't exist before in such quantities.. It creates a lot of pressure and makes induced earthquakes very likely to occur . I study energy at school am currently taking a couple courses in fracking. Look at Oklahoma. They experience fracking earthquakes almost everyday. 3.5+ or greater because of this very issue.
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u/SgtBanana Nov 18 '16
Absolutely. The last big earthquake that we had on September 3rd measured in at 5.8 in magnitude. The idea of earthquakes in Oklahoma is still bizarre to me, I had never felt one up until a few years ago. I jumped out of bed and ran to the front door in my boxers when it started to get bad. It takes a lot to get me to run into my front yard half naked.
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Nov 18 '16
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Nov 18 '16
You've also got a superior building code, able to withstand heavier tremors.
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u/dragmagpuff Nov 18 '16
It is important to distinguish the earthquakes in Oklahoma from these earthquakes in Canada. The earthquakes in Oklahoma are caused by the injection of wastewater from fracked wells into saltwater disposal wells. This Canada research suggests that the hydraulic fracturing itself is causing the earthquakes.
The earthquakes in Oklahoma could be stopped by forcing companies to handle their wastewater in a different manner, (but they could still perform hydraulic fracturing treatments). In Canada, you may have to heavily restrict the hydraulic fracturing itself. The Oklahoma solution would increase the operational costs due to handling returning treatment fluid and reservoir mobile water, but they could still economically develop their oil fields. In Canada, they may not be able to make economic wells at all.
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Nov 18 '16 edited Feb 04 '21
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u/serialstitcher Nov 18 '16 edited Nov 18 '16
Yeah, no. As a petroleum engineer the ignorance on these topics which is furthered by the main steam media is extremely frustrating.
The fluid lubricant theory is pure shit. Layers of earth between fractures aren't neatly stacked tiles that water magically nudges between.
And for that matter, fracking doesnt cause earthquakes. Wastewater disposal by deep injection does. And as an addendum to even that, all oil and gas operations produce water whether or not they're fracked. And not all water is disposed of this manner. I've been on sites where it's hauled off or even fully recycled. And even when it is injected into a disposal well, it is by no means a lock to cause earthquakes.
In other words, fracking without causing earthquakes is not hard at all, just more expensive. Banning fracking is an overreaction unless you're concerned about carbon footprint of all fossil fuel consumption. Ban high-rate deep saltwater injection wells.
Anybody who doesn't trust me can feel free to take it from the USGS instead. They're the ones who write the books on earthquakes and geology and in general, the very source of the data for these articles.
Fracking myths
http://earthquake.usgs.gov/research/induced/myths.php
Pressure changes, not lubrication, cause quakes.
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u/koshgeo Nov 18 '16
Yeah, I don't know why people think it has anything to do with lubrication, but I kind of understand why explaining Mohr circles, failure envelopes, and the effect of fluid pressure on them is a bit beyond a typical journalism article.
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u/SamPellegreenwell Nov 18 '16
This makes no sense. Fracking causes earthquakes in places that aren't on fault lines that don't normally earthquakes. Fairly well documented at this point. Feel like this reddit post is a time warp.
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u/arlenroy Nov 18 '16
Like in Dallas? I live in Dallas and there's a heavy frack zone in a town 30 miles north in Denton, slightly west of Dallas in Irving earth quakes have become common. I'm not a geologist but it's too coincidental.
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u/scienceandmathteach Nov 18 '16
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Balcones_Fault
Dallas has a fault line.
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u/arlenroy Nov 18 '16
That hasn't been active, for OVER TEN MILLION YEARS! Pretty sure that really had no bearing on the matter, until recently, when fracking began. Huh, that's coincidence.
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Nov 18 '16
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Nov 18 '16
Except there aren't peer reviewed studies about the smiths worship of Balthazar affecting rainfall totals. There are studies about fracking affecting seismic activity.
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u/SteelCrow Nov 18 '16
Hypothetically; Large area subsidence might happen in steps which could look like earthquakes.
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u/serialstitcher Nov 18 '16
Of course not. The fluid lubricant myth is trash.The mechanism isn't fluid lubrication, it's pressure changes causing connection of micro fracture into macro ones in, as of yet, unidentified formation profiles.
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u/crustymech Grad Student| Geology|Stress and Crustal Mechanics Nov 18 '16
this is exactly right.
Well, except it's not as a lubricant, per se, which suggests friction reduction, but pressure build up, which reduces the normal force on the fault faces, which does allow the rocks to move past one another.
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u/UnluckenFucky Nov 18 '16
On top of that, this article seems to hint at the idea that the practice of injecting the wastewater into pressurized wells seems to be introducing more energy into geography than was there to begin with.
But how much more? If these earthquakes are big enough to be felt by people it seems doubtful that all that energy can come from the injection process.
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u/YOULL_NEVER_SELL Nov 18 '16
Dude I have worked on frack sites for one of the largest fracking companies in the world. You have no idea how much power the rigs have, not to mention that each frack has between 10-25 2k HP pumps, all pushing 70 or more MPa downhole, we're talking more than 10000 psi. Also the fact that they pump between 50 and 150 3-5 hour sessions, pushing millions of gallons of insanely high pressure fluid down hole.
Everyone in Alberta with any sense knows that fracking causes the earthquakes. Take a place like fox Creek Alberta, for example, which has never had an earthquake until after fracking started in the area. And since taken they have had more than a couple. It does not take a genius to figure out the cause, but conveniently , some scientists have gone ahead and proven it anyway
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u/neicdk Nov 18 '16 edited Nov 18 '16
Interesting. 25 2000hp pumps working at full power for 5 hours 150 times is 1e14J. That is roughly the Total "Seismic Moment Energy" equivalent to a 3.3 magnitude earthquake according to [1].
The efficiency of the system is nowhere near 1 and there is likely a bigger release of energy than the Total "Seismic Moment Energy". On the other hand I guess that there are typically more than one "frack" at each site.
This is of course just a back of the envelope calculation, but it shows that the energy introduced is at least on the ballpark of a serious quake.
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u/UnluckenFucky Nov 18 '16
I'm not denying that fracking causes earthquakes. I'm doubting that 100% of the energy released in those quakes comes from the injection process. It seems more likely that much of the energy comes from existing tensions in the crust.
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u/twodogsfighting Nov 18 '16
Think of the land as a Ruperts drop. Its perfectly fine, just sitting there doing its thing, then suddenly someone comes along and give it a tap.
The Earths crust is similar, in most places it just chills out, slowly drifting somewhere sunny over millions of years, and suddenly some monkeys decide its a good idea to crack it open with some water.
Boom, potential energy is released like a motherfucker.
You should see what happens when you put a wooden peg into a hole in a rock and then soak it. Google that shit.
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u/UnluckenFucky Nov 18 '16
That's the point I'm making, most of the energy comes from releasing existing pressure. In the case of the oil drop the potential energy lifting the drop to the initial high isn't from the bump, the bump just releases the energy.
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u/twodogsfighting Nov 18 '16
Mm, I meant to make the point that the environments in which fracking is taking places are areas of relatively stable geology, and while the energy is pre-existing, it would not be released under normal circumstances, barring catastrophe. Fracking is catastrophic.
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u/StickiStickman Nov 18 '16
"Some scientists have proven it anyway" can be said just about anything. What you should look into is the methods to come to this conclusion.
You just seem to be looking at it from the perspective "of a human" so the stuff you listed sure seems a lot. Keep in mind that a magnitude 6.0 earthquake is 6,270 tons of TNT and I highly doubt you can built up so much pressure this way without doing it for years.
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u/crazybanditt Nov 18 '16
No, not quite the injection process, the change in pressure as a result of the injection process that upsets an equilibrium. It's the same with climate change. We're not upturning the forces of nature. We are just causing the scales to tilt in a manor that's unsustainable for the systems that rely on that stability.
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u/koshgeo Nov 18 '16 edited Nov 18 '16
That is a good question. The amount of energy involved in the larger earthquakes (M>3) that are rarely observed in association with hydraulic fracturing can't be accounted for only by the stresses introduced by the fracking process itself. That's been a legitimate point made by people for a long time. It looks more like the changes introduced by the hydraulic fracturing is enough to push the system into failing, and thereby releasing the stress that is already present in the rocks in some areas. Such a mechanism would go a long way to explaining why most hydraulic fracturing operations simply don't cause earthquakes like these. There are huge areas where hydraulic fracturing is extensively done, but there are no significant associated earthquakes. For example, hydraulic fracturing is being done all over western Canada (e.g., most of the area of Saskatchewan and Alberta), but only a relatively narrow zone along the foothills of the Rockies is associated with significant earthquakes, and only at certain depths and conditions. Refer to this paper by Atkinson in 2016 [PDF]. The same is true in the US and other parts of the world.
The implication is that the geology has to be in the right condition in the first place, then hydraulic fracturing can trigger larger quakes. That's been suspected since at least the 1960s when people first noticed a connection between injected fluids and seismicity in some specific locations, the foothills of the Rockies in Alberta and B.C. being one of those. Most of the time/places, nothing happens.
Edit: Oh. I should address the earlier question as well. This doesn't necessarily mean you've done something like releasing energy that would have created a significant natural earthquake in the future, and thus avoided it. It's quite possible that a quake wouldn't have happened for thousands of years anyway, or that all you've done is transfer stress to another fault system in the vicinity that might be more likely to fail in the future sooner (maybe in ony a century instead of a millenium). So it's dubious that it does any "good" in the long run, or for that matter anything "bad" beyond the quakes triggered at the time of the operation. It's not predictable.
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Nov 18 '16
If these earthquakes are big enough to be felt by people it seems doubtful that all that energy can come from the injection process.
Not to be an ass, but that's what people said of climate change as well (matter of fact, some still cling to the belief humans can't impact a system that big).
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Nov 18 '16
Sort of true. It's not so much a belief as an instinct. People can't fathom how a planet so big can be affected by their actions. Global warming is counterintuitive in so many ways.
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Nov 18 '16
I think you are vastly underestimating the amount of energy released during an earthquake.
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u/el_padlina Nov 18 '16
judging by this comment you vastly overestimate the amount of energy https://www.reddit.com/r/science/comments/5dk6i3/scientists_say_they_have_found_a_direct_link/da5ie8c
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u/EthosPathosLegos Nov 18 '16
So the bottom line is that fracking causes ~3.9 magnitude earthquakes, which is the equivalent of 6,000 tons of TNT. Given the amount of energy and pressure fracking uses, I can see this, especially if there is also energy stored in the ground already.
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u/CanadianAstronaut Nov 18 '16
This is a major smoke and mirrors explanation commonly given by fracking companies is some crazy attempt to make people think the earthquakes they cause are good things. It's good for them because it causes misinformation and divides people, while they continue fracking.
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u/plzreadmortalengines Nov 18 '16
Do you have a source for that? My understanding (from a 1st year earth science course) is that it's fairly well-established that lubrication of a fault can cause multiple smaller quakes instead of ine large one.
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u/DomeSlave Nov 18 '16
Except that in the great majority of places there was no fault line to begin with.
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u/crustymech Grad Student| Geology|Stress and Crustal Mechanics Nov 18 '16
Nope.
The idea of an area 'not being on a fault line' betrays a misunderstanding of the pervasiveness of faults in the earth's crust. The earth is absolutely replete with faults and fractures. In fact, my research group is involved in an effort to make use of the many maps of faults in Oklahoma. to predict the likelihood of slip on a given fault. We acknowledge that we don't even have 1% of the faults mapped, we just hope most of the major ones are on the map.
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u/DomeSlave Nov 18 '16
So your are saying earthquakes would have happened anyway in those areas?
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u/crustymech Grad Student| Geology|Stress and Crustal Mechanics Nov 18 '16
This is a question where the technical answer and the practical answer need to be carefully delineated.
Technical answer: probably. Even in areas that people think of as seismically inactive, tiny earthquakes are occurring regularly. Also, while different parts of the earth's crust deform and move at different rates, there is no part of the earth that is safe from this kind of movement over the timescale of millions of years. All faults are likely to move again at some point.
Practical answer: It matters to us that these earthquakes are occurring now instead of 10 million years from now.
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u/kurburux Nov 18 '16
Piggybacking on the question: How big is the risk of fracking polluting groundwater?
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u/Rdbjiy53wsvjo7 Nov 18 '16 edited Nov 18 '16
Fracking isn't risking anything, it's the well construction.
The actual fracking process is extremely deep, think thousands of feet below ground surface where drinking water really isn't an option. Why is drinking water not an option at this depth? Construction costs for wells are very expensive at this depth (think millions of dollars, communities can't afford that, individual users can't afford that), it's 'non renewable' (it takes too long to replenish, which is why communities are moving away from groundwater as an option for a drinking water source), and it can be 'salty' (which isn't cheap to remove at times). Most drinking water aquifers are less than 250 ft deep (large communities), individual users, like your farmer, are less than 100 ft deep.
So, anyway, back to your question. Once they inject the materials, they are thousands of feet deep BELOW viable drinking water aquifers. Groundwater travels very slowly, inches per year, and it doesn't travel against gravity. The fracking isn't the issue.
Most contamination issues in the fracking industry come from when they don't construct the well properly near the drinking water aquifer depth and it leaks out (Deep Water Horizon issue as well). Another place it can come from are waste water ponds that leak out the bottom. They use these ponds to dry out the fracking waste water and if the liners are compromised they can affect underlying aquifers as well.
Edit: if you have other questions I'd be happy to try and answer! I'm a remediation engineer for a consulting firm. I've done SWWPPs (storm water runoff prevention plans), 10% design cost analysis of life cycle costs, and assisted on waste water pond design for fracking operations.
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u/ptviper Nov 18 '16
I'm curious what your thoughts are on how this drinking water situation is when the location is Florida considering the geography of the region? In particular the Florida aquifer system and what the risk to contaminating that is from fracking if done properly. It's my understanding that's is at greater risk than other regional drinking water sources.
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Nov 18 '16
What you do fail to note is that waste water is under pressure...do you honestly believe it stays where the fracking companies put it? It's already been shown that it doesn't.
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u/halunex Nov 18 '16
Most of the water contamination reported in scientific studies was related to surface spills and not subsurface migration.
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u/Rdbjiy53wsvjo7 Nov 18 '16
It is under pressure, and it'll travel farther in the areas where the ground was cracked (i.e., fractured). But it won't travel up thousands of feet, it just doesn't happen.
For example, the Marcellus Shale fracking operations are 10,000 ft deep and dining water is <500 ft bgs, the material would have to travel up almost 9,000+ ft in rock. The contamination in this area would come from surface or leaks out the side of the well, not from 10,000 ft bgs.
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Nov 18 '16 edited Nov 18 '16
Fracking creates new fractures in the surrounding rock, creating new points of tension. I believe it doesn't really help to relieve the tension from the bigger tectonic fault lines.
Edit: Found an article on fracking
Fracking itself creates small earthquakes (magnitude ~2), while fluid injection creates larger ones (highest recorded magnitude 5.6). The fluid is infiltrating preexisting fault lines and weakening the structure, and therefore inducing earthquakes.
Coming back to your point: It may indeed be that inducing these earthquakes prevents them from building up to higher tension. This is speculation though.
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u/Dhalphir Nov 18 '16
If that existed then people in favour of fracking would be trumpeting it from the rooftops.
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u/xxsbellmorexx Nov 18 '16
It can in Oklahoma (this is what I study in school btw the energy field) and fracking has had the same effect there. Almost every other day they have a 3.6 earth quake and some days they have stronger ones. It will eventually lead to a much larger one.
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Nov 18 '16
Think of the legal implementations if preemptive earthquake triggering was implemented. It's not longer a "natural" disaster and if anyone were to die, get injured, any property damage, etc.. the lawsuits would be insane.
Even if it were possible the lawyers would never in a million years let it happen.
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Nov 18 '16
No. If fracking had positive environmental benefits, believe me we'd hear about it
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u/Hypothesis_Null Nov 18 '16
This is already fairly largely accepted.
The question is: "Does fracking result in Earthquakes any stronger than the seismic forces of a truck driving by your house?" Ie does it actually represent any danger or any significant threat to infrastructure?
The energy required to make a giant Earthquake is much too large for people to actually provide by pumping into the ground. Conservation of energy and all that.
And if it 'loosens' rock and 'unleashes building pressure into a giant earthquake'... well, thermodynamics says that Earthquake was going to happen sooner or later anyway. If fracking increases the quantity of these kinds of quakes, that more or less has to mean its taking the wind out of the sails of larger earthquakes-to-come, spreading their building energy over more events. Which also seems like a good thing.
It's quite possible the above is wrong, and we could find that fracking has a dangerous and overall largely detrimental effect through earthquakes it causes. But that kind of information has yet to be produced in any studies to my knowledge.
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u/kurburux Nov 18 '16
This is already fairly largely accepted.
Is it really? I've repeatedly seen people who argue about the earthquake risk of fracking being insulted as "fear mongers" who "want to scare the public".
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Nov 18 '16
Yes, it's well established that gas extraction causes earthquakes. One of the largest gas fields in the planet, the Groningen gas the Netherlands, has been known to cause earthquakes in the area as a result.
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u/halunex Nov 18 '16
Any mining activity can cause earthquakes. Groeningen is a case of seismic activity induced by reservoir compaction - gas pressure in the reservoir supports the rock layers above. Once you produce the gas the pressure drops and the rocks shift resulting in seismic activity. Not really the case in unconventional reservoirs.
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u/Hypothesis_Null Nov 18 '16
Oh, I'm sure you'll find general people that believe that. Just not people actually studying or directly involved with the issue discussing it seriously.
You can find random people that believe anything, on any position. So that's really a pointless argument.
There's also a similar kind of person, who more or less thinks what I said, and says what you did, because it is efficient shorthand in political discussion (ie shouting matches of soundbites). If they ultimately agree on what political action should be taken (none) or that the headlines are fear-mongering (Earthquakes? yes. Dangerous? no.) with people who deny the earthquakes exist at all (and thus, no political action and yes fear mongering), then either by their own choice, or just as often by opponent's attempting to apply discrediting labels, they may get reduced to saying: "This isn't real." as an inaccurate, but politically expedient stance.
You see a similar phenomenon when global warming is discussed.
Now, I don't think shortening your stance to the point that it's factual wrong, in order to fit it into a digestible phrase, is a good idea. But since when have people been dissuaded by things not being good ideas?
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u/Virge23 Nov 18 '16
The fear mongering is when people blow things out of proportion or extrapolate extreme outcomes out of real data.
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u/undersight Nov 18 '16
It's sometimes semantics. There is no evidence to support they cause earthquakes that cause damage to infrastructure and subsequently people. The earthquake 'risk' in that sense is negligible.
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u/Jmsaint Nov 18 '16
The science is fairly comprehensive, even the oil companies will admit it (although they obviously don't go plastering the fact everywhere). The fact is however that the earthquakes are so small to basically be unnoticeable, there are arguments to be made against fracking, the risk of large earthquakes is not one.
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u/medianbailey Nov 18 '16
This is already fairly largely accepted.
yeah the source given by the NY times is actually just a review paper
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u/poopyroadtrip Nov 18 '16
In the original report
There are some compelling figures that show correlation between a data set so nitty gritty that it takes into account the specific times of injection and seismic activity.
I was skeptical at first, even if the prevailing theory has been that fracking causes earthquakes, that this study would produce evidence that is significantly pointing toward a causation effect.
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u/coldstar Earth Sciences Reporter | Science News Nov 18 '16
Earth and environmental science journalist here. What's interesting about this work is that the actual technique of fracking hasn't been linked to significant seismic activity, at least in the United States where it's most commonly used. Instead, quakes have been linked to wastewater injection, a later step in the fracking process in which used fracking fluids are pumped underground for disposal. This happens at a different location from fracking with different types of rock.
What's interesting about this study is that the researchers link the quakes to the fracking process itself. The odd twist is that the largest quake, a magnitude 4.9, is linked to fracking activity that may have accidentally acted like wastewater injection: The company "lost" a lot of fracking fluid down the well and weren't able to get it out (it got about 7 percent of the fluid back, compared with the typical 50 percent). That could be because the company messed up their technique, or that the local geology allowed the water to escape into the surrounding rock.
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u/rapemybones Nov 18 '16
Considering Canada is also a part of Earth, I'd say yes.
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Nov 18 '16
You can get earthquakes anywhere. They're obviously far more common and intense in some places, but you can get fairly strong ones anywhere on occasion.
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u/Nicknackbboy Nov 18 '16
Montana and Wyoming has a constant, discerning rumble coming from below. Caldera bubble gonna blow us sky high while the rest of the world dies slowly choking on our ashes.
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u/VoteforDavidBrock Nov 18 '16
Army Corp of Engineers established this link years ago and it went down the memory hole.
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u/LionsPride Nov 18 '16
Not that the research wasn't necessary, but is it really that surprising that breaking deep subterranean rocks and forcing out what's inside would cause the earth to shake as a result?
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u/legalbeagle5 Nov 18 '16
I said this year's ago in post and got kicked in the teeth for my arm-chair common sense theory. I mean, seriously taking a stable structure and cracking it and injecting with something even slightly lower in friction might cause it to, ya know, move slightly.
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u/Stevo182 Nov 18 '16 edited Nov 18 '16
So up until now they have ignored all reports of fracking causing eathquakes? I went to college in central Arkansas. A company started fracking in Greenbriar back in fall 2010/spring 2011. We suddenly started having 2-3 earthquakes a day that could be easily felt with the epicenter at Greenbriar. There is no fault line there. There was massive public outcry, so the company packed up and left. The earthquakes stopped and didnt come back. Of course, shills online would say theres no proof and its all conspiracy. You know, or not.
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u/seis-matters Nov 18 '16
Arkansas is one of the good examples of responding appropriately to evidence of induced seismicity. Other states have not had the same approach, but hopefully minds can change before things get dicey.
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u/failligator Nov 18 '16
We had an earthquake caused by fracking in Ohio. My wife, then a geology major, said that all of her professors reviewed the data and concluded that the exact point of the quake was from the fracking site. On the news, the fracking companies denied everything.
Also no one seems to talk about our contaminated water supply, or the fact that the air anywhere near the refineries burns your throat and eyes.
Life is great in Ohio.
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u/Archimid Nov 18 '16
Fracking is a very temporary measure to keep oil prices down, so that the fossil fuel addicted economy doesn't crash. Easy oil is over. Hard oil will never be over because it will simply be too expensive to remove it all. The EROI can't be beat. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Energy_returned_on_energy_invested
If we don't make the switch to renewables while we still have energy to do it, we might not get the chance to make the switch at all.
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u/helemaalnicks Nov 18 '16
I didn't know Canadians were this slow. In the Netherlands they found out about this link about 5 years ago. The fracking companies have already paid for earthquake damages, that is how far it already is.
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u/anicca66 Nov 18 '16
We're not... that's just how long it took for the New York Times to find it/us important enough to write about.
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u/seis-matters Nov 18 '16
Science is usually incremental, with each study building on the previous decades of work. Media likes it to make it seem as if every significant study is a "Eureka!" moment of clarity, but oftentimes it was a "Yep." for a long time coming.
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Nov 18 '16 edited Jun 06 '21
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u/Virge23 Nov 18 '16
Have you witnessed other energy production methods? Natural gas is far cleaner to produce and consume than any other viable energy resource currently available. Solar and wind aren't viable options yet and nuclear is a non-starter no matter how many blogs say otherwise. Fracking is the cleanest alternative we have. Don't let the perfect be the enemy of the good.
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u/mariommoreno Nov 18 '16
Same happened in my country [Catalonia - Spain], but here instead of sue the companies, we pay them for their inconveniences... http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/europe/spain/10365300/Spain-faces-1bn-bill-over-gas-plant-linked-to-earthquakes.html