So this morning marked the 16th earthquake this month

[helosailor]

[Couver]

I just hate every summer we get water restrictions while the frackers don't seem to have any limits on their water use.

Oh and anything under a 5 meh. I grew up on the west coast (no hippie) earthquakes don't bother me much.

[Trip McNeely]

Are there any cost comparisons that the companies out there have done prior to making the recycling program a part of their procedure? I know there was a time when it was never done.

Also, any environmental surveys that justify it?

It actually saves money as well as appeases the environmental requirements. I don't know the science behind it, but basically you blend the brine/frac water with freshwater. You recover a small amount, but as much as you use it's a lot. It's also 0% discharge at most facilities. There are a few places where you can discharge it in a river after dilution. PA is highly regulated so it's been done here awhile. Like I said in Texas it will be coming to be mandated, but for now I think a small percentage already do it because of lack of water.

Nitrogen, Propane, and CO2 are also popular to frac with, but more expensive.

[Denny]

Thanks again, guys for the conversation on this. I've been trying to understand all aspects of the industry. It's harder to do when I'm not a part of it on a daily basis.

[Denny]

Recycle the Frac water. We do it up here in PA and have for years. Texas will be forced to do it soon when the aquifers dry up and the TRRC forced to mandate it.

Are there any cost comparisons that the companies out there have done prior to making the recycling program a part of their procedure? I know there was a time when it was never done.

Also, any environmental surveys that justify it?

[Denny]

3.0 isn't squat. A 3.6? Hotels usually charge $1 in quarters to give you that kind of action when you're in bed.

Did you read some of the higher incidents? Basically my thinking is that a plate shift causing what would be a ~3 shaker, would make it a greater one from an area with fracing activity.

I'm not against fracing, just making my opinion from observation like the next guy. My problem are these asses getting on the news, screaming that this fracing activity is what is causing all these quakes and will continue to escalate.

[Trip McNeely]

FWIW, I'm not going hippy on this one and I do realize there is no real better alternative.

Recycle the Frac water. We do it up here in PA and have for years. Texas will be forced to do it soon when the aquifers dry up and the TRRC forced to mandate it.

[Sgt Beavis]

3.0 isn't squat. A 3.6? Hotels usually charge $1 in quarters to give you that kind of action when you're in bed.

[Strychnine]

FWIW, I'm not going hippy on this one and I do realize there is no real better alternative.

[Strychnine]

Now are they causing the seismic activity, or are they magnifying the already existing activity?

Yes, there has to be an existing fault to make shit happen. Yes, that fault, at some point in the Earth's history will move or will have moved. So, to be pedantic about it we are merely magnifying, but we shouldn't be focusing on geologic time scales.

In the end does it matter if we cause a shift from <2 (nearly undetectable) to >3 or from 0 to >3? The result is the same.



As a quick aside, here is an account of seismic activity during a well frac. These would be the <2 stuff - there's a shitload - but the fluids are removed from the formation reducing the pressures in <24 hours. Quite the opposite of waste water storage wells.

hydrofracturing to intentionally create permeability rarely creates unwanted induced seismicity that is large enough to be detected on the surface—even with very sensitive sensors

The study authors analyzed the Youngstown earthquakes, finding that their onset, cessation, and even temporary dips in activity were all tied to the activity at the Northstar 1 well. The first earthquake recorded in the city occurred 13 days after pumping began, and the tremors ceased shortly after the Ohio Department of Natural Resources shut down the well in December 2011.

Dips in earthquake activity correlated with Memorial Day, the Fourth of July, Labor Day, and Thanksgiving, as well as other periods when the injection at the well was temporarily stopped.

http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2013/08/130819102714.htm

Earthquakes with magnitude (M) ≥ 3 in the U.S. midcontinent, 1967–2012. After decades of a steady earthquake rate (average of 21 events/year), activity increased starting in 2001 and peaked at 188 earthquakes in 2011. Human-induced earthquakes are suspected to be partially responsible for the increase.

https://www.sciencemag.org/content/341/6142/1225942.abstract

The mechanism responsible for inducing these events appears to be the well-understood process of weakening a preexisting fault by elevating the fluid pressure. However, only a small fraction of the more than 30,000 wastewater disposal wells appears to be problematic—typically those that dispose of very large volumes of water and/or communicate pressure perturbations directly into basement faults.

http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2013/08/130819102714.htm

Induced Seismicity Primer from the US DoE

Figure 2, which shows an example of induced seismicity being caused by water injection, is a cross section of the earth showing the location of earthquakes (green dots), as well as the locations of injection wells (thick blue lines) and production wells (thin lines, these wells extract fluid). Note the large number of events associated with the injection wells.



Figure 2. Example of injection related seismicity; note the close correlation between water injection wells and the location of the seismicity.

[cobrajet69]

War of the Worlds!

Be ware of the silent electrical storms, Azle!


David

[Denny]

But it should also be noted that fracing is not being directly linked to the seismic activity. The volume of water used in those operations is not enough to cause what they're seeing... it's the waste waster disposal wells that are getting the attention.

Now are they causing the seismic activity, or are they magnifying the already existing activity?

[Tyrone Biggums]

Any day, what you think is solid earth can jump up and spread out to the North and South. That what plates are about.

[46Tbird]

Get back to that conference call. lmao

[71chevellejohn]

^^^^ I hope you just dropped a mic and walked out of the room.