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Oil Recovery May Have Triggered Texas Tremors
ananyo writes "First came reports of earthquakes caused by hydraulic fracturing and the reinjection of water during oil and gas operations. Now U.S. scientists are reporting tremors may have been caused by the injection of carbon dioxide during oil production. The evidence centers on a sudden burst of seismic activity around an old oil field in the Permian Basin in northwest Texas. From 2006 to 2011, after more than two decades without any earthquakes, seismometers in the region registered 38 tremors, including 18 larger quakes ranging from magnitude 3 to 4.4, scientists report in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences. The tremors began just two years after injections of significant volumes of CO2 began at the site, in an effort to boost oil production. 'Although you can never prove that correlation is equal to causation, certainly the most plausible explanation is that [the tremors] are related to the gas injection,' says Cliff Frohlich, a seismologist at the University of Texas Institute for Geophysics in Austin, who co-authored the study."
Graboids!
captcha: "bedrock".. Lol.
Had profit.
"When information is power, privacy is freedom" - Jah-Wren Ryel
I know it's a philosophy of science tangent, but this quote caught my attention. I mean in a strict sense, nothing is "proven" in science, so it's technically true. However, to the extent to which concepts can be "scientifically proven", the difference between correlation and causation comes down to one factor: controls. In experimental science, we control for variables by limiting the systems in play directly. In observational science, that's done with statistical controls on other known (and possible) factors. With enough data, that can be done in a manner that is robust enough to be called science.
I don't think it's fair to take a benign assertion like "correlation is not causation" and extend it to an absolutist position.
Although you can never prove that correlation is equal to causation... we're going to run with it because it works for us.
Got it.
When Fascism comes to America, it will call itself Anti-Fascism, and tell you to give up your guns.
He meant as opposed to "outvironment" which is all that environment that's outdoors like birds and trees and shit. The "invironment" means his living room, and trust me, the natural gas leaks in there are no joke, especially with all the cheeto-based fracking.
One thing I wonder as people talk about this. Now, I am no geologist but, my understanding of fault lines is that there are areas where tectonic plates cross, with one moving over the top of the other, pushing one down and one up. So far so good right?
So the model I have understood is, the fault compresses over time as the plates move, and then an earth quake happens when the stress is suddenly released, allowing the plates to slip some amount, relieving the stress and starting the process over again from its new position.
So now if this is an accurate enough description of the process, it seems to me like more frequent, smaller quakes are likely preferable to less frequent larger ones. So could this triggering of earth quakes actually be a....good thing? Is that question even being asked?
"I opened my eyes, and everything went dark again"
Or that rocks will break and fracture in ways that aren't necessarily predictable.
It can be the cause in one well, and still not have caused the same problem in another well just simply by the local rocks and what's already happened to them.
I don't think anybody is suggesting "inject CO2, cause earthquake" ... but that the rocks might fracture (or whatever) in ways you don't really have a way to predict very well.
If it was pumping in the high pressure stuff that lead to unexpected mechanical failure of rock structures, you're never going to get a 100% result on something like that.
But I do think it highly likely there's more complexity going on than they're capable of knowing or controlling.
Lost at C:>. Found at C.
megacorps never listen.everything from cigarettes to global warming and fracking have all seemed to have this pattern:
1. new technology or idea proposed with limited research. it gets pushed hard by megacorps who want cash.
2. problems arise such as seismic disturbance, gas in the water supply, etc.
3. industry reacts immediately and violently to the concerns of regular citizens. everything classified as an 'isolated event' and media is threatened with advertising boycott if they report too much about it.
4. mounting evidence suggests new technology is dangerous and has negative consequences.
5. industry responds insisting everything is OK.
6. more evidence mounts, legislation gets proposed to curtail the technology and enact regulation
7. industry pushes back with FUD and insists the effects are 'controversial' and 'unknown' with relation to the technology but that regulation is not the answer because jobs..
8. deaths, major accidents, and environmental impacts are being seen.
9. Industry starts gladhanding senators and congressmen to ensure interests are seen to. senators, as usual, are familiar with ignoring constituents with less than a million dollars.
10. industry no longer formally responds to complaints. evidence consists solely of legislation they crafted and enacted to support their industry.
11. industry pulls out after investment potential is exhausted or litigation expenses become annoying. pack up, move out, and assign a 'vacant trust' to the property to ensure superfund only kicks taxpayers in the beanbag.
Good people go to bed earlier.
It awoke the Balrog. CO2, they hates it.
captcha: penance
Given that fracking is a permanent change to the environment that can't be undone, EVER, I'd want to see some pretty compelling evidence that it absolutely can't cause harm, EVER, before being used widely across a bunch of different geologies.
Until you figure out why CO2 injection causes problems at one oilfield, and not its neighbors, even though all of them have had similar amounts of CO2 injected, it seems rather more likely than not that the CO2 injection had nothing to do with the tremors.
And it couldn't be the Texas drought for the past three years... I mean what would drought have to do with land settling?
Obliterates?
So this magically deals with all the pollution burning that stuff causes?
Tell us more.
Graboids could have migrated to Texas.
But that can't be! Kevin Bacon killed them all in the end...oh, wait...
"I love animals! Some are cute, others are tasty, what's not to like?" - Betsy Schroeder, Jeopardy contestant
Back in the 1960's this was brought up with wastewater wells.
Geologists are not sure if the small quakes prevented a larger one, or lead up to a larger one.
On a somewhat related note, if you want to see why wastewater wells near fault lines are bad, ask Oklahoma with 300+ earthquakes in just a few years.
http://www.usgs.gov/blogs/features/usgs_top_story/man-made-earthquakes/
Don't let science get in the way of your ideology. I guess you're right, I'm a fan of clean air, clean water, and leaving things better than I found them, especially when it could affect a bunch of other people. I guess responsible energy production that thinks of more than just immediate need that makes me a dirty hippy.
Oil Recovery May Have Triggered Texas Tremors
Makes it sound like the oil was always ours and the Earth stole it.
systemd is Roko's Basilisk.
Sort of.
They're not saying that the simple presence of CO2 causes earthquakes. They're saying the mechanical stresses involved may well have dislodged things.
But you apparently didn't read TFA.
Lost at C:>. Found at C.
No, I was trying to point out that current economic forces are externalizing some costs and therefore the market cannot act correctly.
Until you can figure out why cigarettes causes lung cancer in on person, and not his neighbors who smoked similar amounts, it seems rather more likely that it wasn't the cigarettes that had anything to do with the cancer.
Frankly, I am not informed enough to have an opinion in this matter. However, even someone as ignorant in the matter as myself can see that your fact does not prove your conclusion. It doesn't prove that there is no link; it only proves that it isn't an absolute direct causation. It could mean that it affects probability and that different results were the luck of the draw. It could mean that there are other contributing factors (that we don't understand).
Until you can figure out why cigarettes causes lung cancer in on person, and not his neighbors who smoked similar amounts, it seems rather more likely that it wasn't the cigarettes that had anything to do with the cancer.
Yes, that's absolutely correct. And then studies were done that showed significant statistical correlations between smoking and lung cancer. If it turns out that 80% of the areas where this was done have sudden increases in seismic activity, then there is probably a connection. A single data point is not enough to draw conclusions.
Until you can figure out why cigarettes causes lung cancer in on person, and not his neighbors who smoked similar amounts, it seems rather more likely that it wasn't the cigarettes that had anything to do with the cancer.
Yes, that's absolutely correct. And then studies were done that showed significant statistical correlations between smoking and lung cancer. If it turns out that 80% of the areas where this was done have sudden increases in seismic activity, then there is probably a connection. A single data point is not enough to draw conclusions.
I would bet every penny I own that such a study would prove at least probable causation. I grew up in Oklahoma (bordering Texas) and for 30 years I never experienced an earthquake there, until 2009 when they started happening on a very regular basis. Coincidentally, most of the epicenters happened to be located near drilling operations.
The pressures that they use to fracture rock are in the THOUSANDS of pounds, the pressures they're injecting CO2 at are in the HUNDREDS.
The CO2 isn't fracturing the rock.
Depends on how the rocks are sited and where the CO2 is injected. A pressure of "hundreds of pounds" doesn't guarantee that no rock crushing forces are generated. Bad luck could result in rocks being configured in such a way that when you injected the CO2, it pushed them together in such a way that unexpected movement occured.
If you inject 100psi of well contained CO2 under a large 50ft by 50ft slab of rock it's going to generate about 36 million pounds force on that slab. In comparison, a 50ft cube of granite weighs around 21 million pounds
As a matter of fact, Dick Cheney and his hand-picked cronies made damn sure that they are indeed exempt.
It seems to me that you arent grasping his point, nor are you grasping basic forces.
its not just "hundreds of pounds". its hundred of pounds.....per square inch.
we arent talking about simple hundred of pounds of force.
we're talking about hundred of pounds of pressure per some unit area.
the bigger the area, the greater the net force applied by that pressure.
as the man said, even on a not particularly large rock cavity of say 50x50 feet of bearing area, that mere "hundred" pounds of pressure eqautes to 30E6 pounds of net force being applied to that surface. depending on that rock's configuration, its internal stresses, support from surrounding rock, etc, that force can be redirected and concentrated (stress concentration), such that it leads to failures in the internal structural integrity of said rock or nearby rocks.
The guy who said the election was rigged won the presidency with the second-most votes.