2016 Earthquake Discussion

[Jim Kyle]

And by the way, fraccing has been going on for something approaching 70 years.

Lots longer than that. Shooting a well with a nitroglycerine torpedo was the original method of fracturing the formation, and that was being done more than 100 years ago. I attended the cleanup from what may have been the last nitro accident in the oil patch, back in 1955 near Wilson, OK, and ruined two tires by driving over fragments of the rig and torpedoman's truck. Rusty Sullivan, believed to have been the last torpedoman, and two others were blown to bits when the torpedo they were preparing to lower into the hole fired prematurely and detonated 100 quarts of nitro in the truck.... Interestingly, several other folk on the site survived the blast.

[Just the facts]

I meant the latter, that no water naturally produced from a fracked well could be injected. If your last sentence is correct then how can anyone deny that fracking isn't the cause - because it is clearly a 2-step process, unless someone can do the first half without producing the second half. It is absolutely no different than pushing someone out a 20 story window and then saying I didn't kill them the stop at the bottom did. Technically correct, but without the push there would be no impact at the bottom.

[Bellaboo]

I meant the latter, that no water naturally produced from a fracked well could be injected. If your last sentence is correct then how can anyone deny that fracking isn't the cause - because it is clearly a 2-step process, unless someone can do the first half without producing the second half. It is absolutely no different than pushing someone out a 20 story window and then saying I didn't kill them the stop at the bottom did. Technically correct, but without the push there would be no impact at the bottom.

I'm going with the drilled formation is a big part of the problem. The Mississippi Lime is a huge water producer. And the fact that they've drilled a ton of wells in the last 4 years plays into this. If they would stay with the Woodford there would be far less problems.

[baralheia]

I meant the latter, that no water naturally produced from a fracked well could be injected. If your last sentence is correct then how can anyone deny that fracking isn't the cause - because it is clearly a 2-step process, unless someone can do the first half without producing the second half. It is absolutely no different than pushing someone out a 20 story window and then saying I didn't kill them the stop at the bottom did. Technically correct, but without the push there would be no impact at the bottom.

So, here's the problem with that line of thinking: Almost all wells produce water to some degree. Even if no wells were ever frac'd, this would still be the case - fracking doesn't cause the well to suddenly start producing water in normal operation. You will pretty much ALWAYS have to deal with wastewater when pumping oil and gas out of the ground because the rock containing oil very often also contains some water. A well doesn't necessarily have to be frac'd to produce, either. Fracking is common practice in formations in Oklahoma because it makes the well produce more oil/gas much quicker than it would otherwise, but it's not a given that all wells get frac'd.

[Just the facts]

Now we are getting nowhere fast. This is all I am saying - Urbanized is making a distiction between the process of breaking up the rock and disposing of the wastewater that results and I am saying that not everyone is making that distinction when they say 'fracking' because they see the whole thing as one process with 2 parts. That's it.

[jerrywall]

Seems to me, by people more in the know than I am, that what folks are saying is that even if fracking was stopped today, and a permanent ban was put into place, there would still be millions or billions of drilling wastewater produced on an ongoing basis that would need to be disposed of?

[Just the facts]

True - but does the disposal of non-fracking wastewater cause earthquakes? It didn't use to.

[jerrywall]

True - but does the disposal of non-fracking wastewater cause earthquakes? It didn't use to.

I don't know. Have we significantly increased the amount of non-fracking wastewater being disposed? One of the biggest mistakes someone makes is confusing cause and effect. The earthquake swarms weren't happening before Obama was in office. Oklahoma also voted against Obama twice, and in fact was the reddest state against him in both elections. Coincidence?

An increase in the amount of fracking can be as much a symptom as a cause. A symptom of a significant increase of oil and gas drilling in Oklahoma.

[mkjeeves]

I immediately tune out articles and commentary about induced seismicity that use "fracking" in the title or prominently in the article itself. Using that term betrays either an agenda, or ignorance regarding the differences between fracking and injection wells, or both. I have no connection whatsoever to the industry, but if you pay even casual attention you should know the differences. I prefer to get my information from people who actually know more than I do.

Except when it doesn't and fracing itself leads to induced earthquakes. (We covered all this when the study was first published but why not again for those not paying attention intentionally or otherwise.)

Study Links Ohio Earthquakes to Fracking

Earthquakes in Oklahoma haven't been shown to be directly linked to the act of fracing itself (yet), other than as JTF posits in the larger picture of how things are being done now.

[Bellaboo]

Except when it doesn't and fracing itself leads to induced earthquakes. (We covered all this when the study was first published but why not again for those not paying attention intentionally or otherwise.)

Study Links Ohio Earthquakes to Fracking

Earthquakes in Oklahoma haven't been shown to be directly linked to the act of fracing itself (yet), other than as JTF posits in the larger picture of how things are being done now.

From the article -

The study, published this week in The Bulletin of the Seismological Society of America, found that fracking, formally known as hydraulic fracturing, may have built up subterranean pressure and caused slippage in an existing fault that contributed to dozens of mild earthquakes in Poland Township, Ohio, in March. Two of the earthquakes were large enough to be felt, though they did not do any damage.

'May have' - Not definitive that it is the problem but is possible. - I lean more to injection wells, only on the fact that there is just as much 'fracking' in western Oklahoma and no quakes. Probably due to the lack of faults out there ?

[mkjeeves]

From the article -

The study, published this week in The Bulletin of the Seismological Society of America, found that fracking, formally known as hydraulic fracturing, may have built up subterranean pressure and caused slippage in an existing fault that contributed to dozens of mild earthquakes in Poland Township, Ohio, in March. Two of the earthquakes were large enough to be felt, though they did not do any damage.

'May have' - Not definitive that it is the problem but is possible. - I lean more to injection wells, only on the fact that there is just as much 'fracking' in western Oklahoma and no quakes. Probably due to the lack of faults out there ?

I agree the consensus is injection wells are causing the problems in Oklahoma (and I said that.)

I said "yet" because the study indicates there probably is a link between fracing and earthquakes with the incident in Ohio. We have both fracing activity and various fault lines, known and unknown in Oklahoma, thus it seems reasonable and logical we may have had or will have an earthquake directly related to fracing here.

[Urbanized]

True - but does the disposal of non-fracking wastewater cause earthquakes? It didn't use to.

Neither did disposal of wastewater from fracced wells, which have been around for decades.

The X factor that has led to so large of an increase in produced water is simply an increase in overall PRODUCTION. And as someone in the industry explained on the board somewhere recently, the production increase has largely been because of advances in horizontal drilling technology. "Fracking" is just a polarizing shorthand term that instantly communicates something that sounds destructive and dirty, and a term which many members of the uninitiated public first heard of in the film "Gasland". I'm not in the industry and pretty open to both sides of the issue. I just know enough to recognize that when an article too closely associates induced seismicity with "fracking" that I need to read it with a grain of salt. Again, like I said before, I like to get my news from someone who HOPEFULLY knows more than I do about a topic, and who HOPEFULLY is giving me said news as free of agenda as possible. That goes for BOTH sides.

[ljbab728]

That was a nice little shake just now.

[Pete]

Biggest shaker I've felt downtown...

[Achilleslastand]

That was a nice little shake just now.

Yep, the dogs were looking like what the heck was that.

[ZYX2]

Lasted about 20 seconds or so in Stillwater. Shook my desk and the building I'm in a decent amount.

[SSEiYah]

That had to be high 4s.

[Pete]

This is really starting to get concerning.

They seem to be getting bigger and more frequent.

Almost shook my large TV off it's stand.

[sooner88]

That was the biggest one that I have felt... not the longest but definitely the strongest.

[bchris02]

This is really starting to get concerning.

They seem to be getting bigger and more frequent.

Almost shook my large TV off it's stand.

The scariest ones for me though are the ones that happen in the middle of the night. What can you do though? Like tornadoes, earthquakes have become a fact of life when you live in Oklahoma. Let's hope they don't start going north of 5.0.

[Pete]

Yes, pretty sharp jolt then about 5 seconds of significant shaking at my place.

Quite unnerving.

[SSEiYah]

5.1, does that make it the 3rd largest?

[Pete]

^

Yes.

[ZYX2]

An earthquake of such a large magnitude is quite concerning. I'm afraid that these will become normal.

[Achilleslastand]

Woods county is what 200 miles away or so, can imagine this felt a lot worse in Woodward.