{"id":7510,"date":"2015-04-23T07:07:27","date_gmt":"2015-04-23T12:07:27","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/olduvai.ca\/?p=7510"},"modified":"2015-04-23T07:07:27","modified_gmt":"2015-04-23T12:07:27","slug":"are-oklahomas-quakes-caused-by-wastewater-disposal","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/?p=7510","title":{"rendered":"Are Oklahoma\u2019s Quakes Caused By Wastewater Disposal?"},"content":{"rendered":"<h3><a href=\"http:\/\/oilprice.com\/Latest-Energy-News\/World-News\/Are-Oklahomas-Quakes-Caused-By-Wastewater-Disposal.html\" target=\"_blank\">Are Oklahoma\u2019s Quakes Caused By Wastewater Disposal?<\/a><\/h3>\n<p>No matter what other problems may or may not be linked to hydraulic fracturing, or fracking, the disposal of wastewater from oil and gas drilling almost certainly is primarily responsible for the recent spate of earthquakes in Oklahoma, normally a seismologically quiet state.<\/p>\n<p>That\u2019s the conclusion of a report issued April 21 by the Oklahoma Geological Survey (OGS), in which the state geologist Richard D. Andrews and Dr. Austen Holland, the state seismologist, said the rate of earthquakes near major oil and gas drilling operations that produce large amounts of wastewater demonstrate that the quakes \u201c<a href=\"http:\/\/hosted.ap.org\/dynamic\/stories\/U\/US_OKLAHOMA_EARTHQUAKES_DISPOSAL_WELLS?SITE=AP&amp;SECTION=HOME&amp;TEMPLATE=DEFAULT\">are very unlikely to represent a naturally occurring process<\/a>.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Andrews and Holland concluded that the \u201cprimary suspected source\u201d of the quakes is not hydraulic fracturing, or fracking, in which water and chemicals are injected under high pressure to crack shale to free oil and gas trapped inside. It said the source is more likely the injection of wastewater from this process in disposal wells, because water used in fracking cannot be re-used.<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"http:\/\/oilprice.com\/Energy\/Crude-Oil\/Who-Is-Saudi-Arabia-Really-Targeting-In-Its-Price-War.html\"><strong>Related:\u00a0Who Is Saudi Arabia Really Targeting In Its Price War?<\/strong><\/a><\/p>\n<p>\u201cThe OGS considers it very likely that the majority of recent earthquakes, particularly those in central and north-central Oklahoma, are triggered by the injection of produced water in disposal wells,\u201d the statement said. It warned that residents should prepare for \u201ca significant earthquake.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p><span class=\"Apple-style-span\">Oklahoma recorded 585 earthquakes with a magnitude of 3 or greater,<a href=\"http:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Richter_magnitude_scale#Examples\">\u00a0the equivalent of the force felt in Oklahoma City at the time of the terrorist bombing in 1995<\/a>. This is a significant increase from 109 earthquakes of the same magnitude in 2013. Before 2008, when fracking became a popular drilling technique in the state,\u00a0<a href=\"http:\/\/www.reuters.com\/article\/2015\/04\/21\/us-oklahoma-fracking-quakes-idUSKBN0NC2F220150421\">there were fewer than two earthquakes in Oklahoma each year<\/a>, on average.<\/span><\/p>\n<p>&#8230;click on the above link to read the rest of the article&#8230;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Are Oklahoma\u2019s Quakes Caused By Wastewater Disposal? No matter what other problems may or may not be linked to hydraulic fracturing, or fracking, the disposal of wastewater from oil and gas drilling almost certainly is primarily responsible for the recent spate of earthquakes in Oklahoma, normally a seismologically quiet state. That\u2019s the conclusion of a [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[3,4],"tags":[222,331,412,2826,4907,4906],"class_list":["post-7510","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-energy-2","category-environment","tag-earthquakes","tag-fracking","tag-hydraulic-fracturing","tag-oklahoma","tag-oklahoma-geological-survey","tag-wastewater-disposal"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7510","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=7510"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7510\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":7511,"href":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7510\/revisions\/7511"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=7510"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=7510"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=7510"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}