Earthquakes Correlated With Texan Fracking Sites 259
eldavojohn writes "A recent peer reviewed paper and survey by Cliff Frohlich of the University of Texas' Institute for Geophysics reveals a correlation between an increase in earthquakes and the emergence of fracking sites in the Barnett Shale, Texas. To clarify, it is not the actual act of hydrofracking that induces earthquakes, but more likely the final process of injecting wastewater into the site, according to Oliver Boyd, a USGS seismologist. Boyd said, 'Most, if not all, geophysicists expect induced earthquakes to be more likely from wastewater injection rather than hydrofracking. This is because the wastewater injection tends to occur at greater depth, where earthquakes are more likely to nucleate. I also agree [with Frohlich] that induced earthquakes are likely to persist for some time (months to years) after wastewater injection has ceased.' Frohlich added, 'Faults are everywhere. A lot of them are stuck, but if you pump water in there, it reduces friction and the fault slips a little. I can't prove that that's what happened, but it's a plausible explanation.' In the U.S. alone this correlation has been noted several times."
Correlation is not causation! (Score:2, Insightful)
And yet nothing will be done in the long run (Score:3, Insightful)
Oh please, they could prove beyond a shadow of a doubt that fracking, or some part of its process, causes earthquakes, there won't be the slightest change in procedure. After all, that oil's not going to sell itself sitting in the ground there.
Does money ride on an action being taken? If yes, it's absolutely irrelevant what the effects are of it being done, it's going to be done.
Re:While... (Score:5, Insightful)
Unless, you're releasing a stable fault to freely move that wouldn't have otherwise. Not something I'd want drillers playing with without real data to know for sure.
Re:While... (Score:3, Insightful)
Don't be apologizing for "defending" fracking. There is nothing wrong with it any more than there is with a million other industrial or mining procedures on which the civilization depends and which would have been equally attacked had the environmentalist movement been around when they were invented.
Re:Oh - FRACKING (Score:5, Insightful)
Peer review of correlation. Wow. :-)
Fracking probably accelerates seismic disturbance. But I just can't help thinking of yesterday's discussion thread: http://tech.slashdot.org/story/12/10/02/1930257/the-history-of-correlation-does-not-imply-causation [slashdot.org]
"Yep! These sure appear to be co-incident, according to the data!"
Re:Correlation is not causation! (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:In other news... (Score:4, Insightful)
As far as jobs, this is pretty selectively applied. Windmills will create many construction and long term maintenance jobs. Hydrogen fueling station will create many construction jobs. Niether requires us to pay for fuel at levels that support $70 per barrel, or condemn peoples property for a pipeline, or pollute. There are many ways to work. Some people, like hitmen, have no problems if the jobs are unethical. Others od.
Re:Stats Fail (Score:5, Insightful)
When A is correlated with B, there are 3 possibilities. A causes B, B causes A, or both B and A are caused by a third factor C.
So are you claiming that earthquakes cause fracking? Or are you claiming that some unknown third factor causes both earthquakes and fracking? If you don't have any plausible suggestions for either, causation seems like the most likely explanation.
Re:While... (Score:4, Insightful)
I agree it is just as terrible as mountain topping, and open pit mining that is not filled after use.
I disagree that civilization must rely on these things. There are better ways, they just cost a little more since they tend to internalize costs.
As we can see from your signature you are a hypocrite. Externalizing costs to the rest of society is no different than any other form of socialism.
You mean to say... (Score:2, Insightful)
Correlation is not causation? Give me a break! (Score:4, Insightful)
The people tagging this story with "correlation is not causation" are a perfect example of what Slate is talking about this week on how silly this meme has become. Ok, so are you saying that the frakking does not cause the earthquakes? What, is it the other way around? No, I'm guessing it's a mythical third factor causing both. Some mystery force is causing both the frakking and the earthquakes. Maybe birds. Who knows? But nothing something correlated!
People, the correlation thing is nice and all, but can we please not forget Occam's rasor? The frakking causing the earthquakes really is the simplest explanation, digging out the correlation argument is just as logical as closing your eyes and singing la-la-la. Proving correlation does not prove causation, but it is a necessary step in doing so, not a logical no-no. Even the scientist quoted in the article is aware of the distinction. There is no "gotcha!" here.
Thank you, Slate. I really had not realized how silly this had become.
Re:While... (Score:2, Insightful)
Small earthquakes are also symptoms of larger shifts. You do them no favor by inducing them, or allowing their tap water to ignite as natural gas gets pumped up through aquifers.
Re:While... (Score:2, Insightful)
That may be going a little to far, but the simple fact is: the total energy released in earthquakes represents a constant power input. Fracking may change the timing (for better or worse), but it has no effect whatsoever on the input power, or the total release energy over time.
Sometimes I think there's a group of people who just want power to be expensive: they resent technology and the change it brings, and will look for any excuse to insist that cheap power is bad - not on the merits, but truely because they don't want to ever have to change their beliefs as the world changes.
Re:While... (Score:5, Insightful)
I understand it fine. Here is the externality that occurred in my area:
They fracked an old NatGas well, to do so they pumped water + some relatively safe stuff down the well. Then they pumped that stuff back up, it was now of course highly polluted with various hydrocarbons. Then they dumped the waste water off at a water treatment plant meant for human waste not industrial waste. The water was not properly treated and ended up in our reservoir that our drinking water comes from.
What would you call that?
What would you call the end result of abandoned open pit mine that is full of poisoned water? What would you call the result of mountain topping with the loss of headwaters of streams to both filling and what streams are left being too polluted for fish to live in?
Modern mining practices are one exercise in externalizing costs after the other. They specialize in externalizing as much costs as possible.
Re:While... (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:While... (Score:4, Insightful)
We call them "Texas Oil Barons".
For the cost of reinstalling the slave-holding tyrants of Kuwait, we could have instead built a sustainable, biologically derived methane infrastructure that would deliver more gas at less cost than fracking, while creating career jobs on American soil.
But that would drive the price of Texas Oil down. Way down. Which cannot be allowed!
Re:Oh - FRACKING (Score:5, Insightful)
In many cases, there are important metrics called the "strength of correlation". This is an important consideration when determining a causation. Additionally, there is the necessity of determining alternative causes. For example, when a school does better on some sort of testing after several teachers are fired, it COULD be because those teachers sucked that bad, or it could be directly related to the change in morale with the other teachers, or it could even be related to a change in management style, or a change in classroom size, or any number of other factors.
When one considers that a series of earthquakes are seen that correlate with fracking sites (biggest earthquakes ever recorded, always within 2miles of the site in multiple sites), there is precious little else to consider as likely alternatives other than a very unlikely set of happenstance or coincidence.
It's certainly possible that it's a coincidence, but a strong correlation tends to indicate that this is not the case. Understanding statistics at a deep level will ehlp you understand this more.
ALL surveys show a correlation. Inferring a causation is simply trying to eliminate as many other co-correlations as possible and demonstrating that the original correlation holds up even when other possible causes are removed.
Can you think of other causes for unusually strong earthquakes happening to cluster around fracking sites?
Re:While... (Score:5, Insightful)
Sometimes I think there's a group of people who just want power to be expensive: they resent technology and the change it brings, and will look for any excuse to insist that cheap power is bad - not on the merits, but truely because they don't want to ever have to change their beliefs as the world changes.
And sometimes you WANT to think other people's genuine motivations are somehow malicious so that you don't actually have to analyze the problems with your own.......
Re:And yet nothing will be done in the long run (Score:1, Insightful)
Oh please, they could prove beyond a shadow of a doubt that fracking, or some part of its process, causes earthquakes, there won't be the slightest change in procedure. After all, that oil's not going to sell itself sitting in the ground there.
Does money ride on an action being taken? If yes, it's absolutely irrelevant what the effects are of it being done, it's going to be done.
I like fracking because liberals aren't quite sure what line to tow.
According to liberals:
Fracking is evil when it's for oil.
Fracking is good when it's for natural gas.
HOLD IT! Now that oil companies are heavily investing in natural gas, the environmental effects due to getting it and processing it must be scrutinized!
Natural gas bad! Better than coal, but bad!
Make a documentary blaming fracking for cancer, earthquakes, etc. Fracking is bad!
WAIT GUYS I'VE GOT THE LATEST LIBERAL MEMO RIGHT HERE LET'S ALL GATHER 'ROUND AND GET EDUCATED! That documentary had some problems (it was bullshit) so now natural gas is good again, and so is fracking. However, we've got to get some GREEN companies and government regulation behind it! We can't have those oil companies using their expertise and existing infrastructure for collection, refinement, and distribution to make a profit.
Re:And yet nothing will be done in the long run (Score:5, Insightful)
Talk about projection. No one thinks that simply except for you.
Fracking is neither good nor bad, just poorly used and improperly regulated. Apply the cleanwater act and many peoples reservations about it would be greatly reduced. Force them to disclose what is in their fracking fluids and how they dispose of the hydrocarbon laced wastewater and even more folks would be put at ease. Force all hydrocarbon well operations to case the borehole the entire length and again objections would be reduced.
Giving them a free pass on normal regulation, require no disclosure and allow them to select which holes are cased and which are not while shifting any environment cost onto the tax payer is what causes so many objections.
Why is stating that natural gas is less bad than coal but worse than nuclear not true?
Re:While... (Score:4, Insightful)
Or perhaps a lot of little, benign microquakes that lead to a Fukushima..... or worse.
A lot of microquakes cannot lead to a Fukishima, because a microquake simply cannot generate the energy to cause the tsunami that followed. I get the NWS quake/tsunami warning messages, and there are a LOT of small quakes going on all the time that don't trigger anything close to Fukishima sized events, or "worse".
Nor will a microquake cause buildings to fall down and people to die. A thousand microquakes may cause incremental damage, but that can be fixed in between quakes and the final effect will be ... yawn.
It's PR you're listening to, IMHO.
No, it's common sense and an understanding that the effects of many small events can be much less than the sum total all at once. Want to loan me an iPhone for a demonstration?
Re:While... (Score:4, Insightful)
br.Go the USA!!!
Re:Oh - FRACKING (Score:5, Insightful)
Can you think of other causes for unusually strong earthquakes happening to cluster around fracking sites?
One possibility (and this is knowing very little about fracking, so I don't know if this actually makes sense) would be that necessary traits of good fracking sites are themselves indicative of higher natural earthquake likelihood. In other words, fracking tends to be easier - and therefore done more often - in places where more earthquakes happen.
Re:While... (Score:2, Insightful)
Same thing is going on with fracking. The fracking itself isn't creating the earthquakes. It injects nowhere near enough energy to actually create an earthquake (indeed if it were injecting that much energy, it would defeat the whole purpose of fracking since they're trying to extract energy in the form of oil and gas). The earthquake energy is coming from natural tectonic forces within the earth. The fracking just triggers an already-pending earthquake while it's still small.
So the earthquakes clustered around fracking sites is actually a good thing. We should be doing more fracking - especially in earthquake-prone areas like the U.S. West coast. It's only considered bad due to our perverted legal culture where people are penalized for blame, but not rewarded for prevention. If you leave everything alone and there's a huge earthquake/avalanche, it's a natural event and nobody is to blame. But if someone tries to mitigate the earthquake/avalanche by deliberately triggering it before it can become massive, they are to blame and legally liable for all resulting damage.
The same problem (legal liability for earthquakes) killed deep well geothermal, which was probably our best bet for 100% renewable and 100% clean energy. It angered me at first, but I decided if we as a species are not mature enough to see why there shouldn't be legal liability for these earthquakes, then we as a species do not deserve 100% renewable and clean energy. We deserve to breathe in, eat, and die in the crap we produce from other energy sources.
Re: A car analogy... (Score:5, Insightful)
One thing nobody seems to be realizing is that it may very well be ok to decide that this is a risk that's worthwhile.
Occasional small earthquakes vs. massively cheaper natural gas with a thousand year supply and 30% lower emissions than coal? Sign Earth up, peeze.