The Allegheny Front: MORE OHIOANS WANT SOME SAY IN SITING DRILLING WASTE INJECTION WELLS. Each well drilled using hydraulic fracturing, or fracking, for oil and gas production creates tens of millions of gallons of wastewater, called produced water or brine. In Ohio, much of that wastewater is disposed of in underground injection wells, including waste from Pennsylvania and West Virginia. As the number of injection wells grows in Ohio, local communities want some control over where these wells are located.
Tag: injection wells
Study: Injection wells can induce earthquakes miles away from the well
This article discusses a study that shows that fracking injection wells can induce earthquakes miles away from the well. Study finds injecting fluid into sedimentary rock can produce bigger, more distant earthquakes than injecting into the underlying basement rock. A study of earthquakes induced by injecting fluids deep underground has revealed surprising patterns, suggesting that current recommendations for hydraulic fracturing, wastewater disposal, and geothermal wells may need to be revised.
Journal Reference: Thomas H. W. Goebel, Emily E. Brodsky. The spatial footprint of injection wells in a global compilation of induced earthquake sequences. Science, 2018; 361 (6405): 899 DOI: 10.1126/science.aat5449
Study: Radar images show large swath of West Texas oil patch is heaving and sinking at alarming rates
This article discusses how Texas is rapidly becoming more susceptible to earthquakes and sink holes because of fracking.
Analysis indicates decades of oil production activity have destabilized localities in an area of about 4,000 square miles populated by small towns, roadways and a vast network of oil and gas pipelines and storage tanks
Two giant sinkholes near Wink, Texas, may just be the tip of the iceberg, according to a new study that found alarming rates of new ground movement extending far beyond the infamous sinkholes.
That’s the finding of a geophysical team from Southern Methodist University, Dallas that previously reported the rapid rate at which the sinkholes are expanding and new ones forming.
Now the team has discovered that various locations in large portions of four Texas counties are also sinking and uplifting.
Radar satellite images show significant movement of the ground across localities in a 4000-square-mile area — in one place as much as 40 inches over the past two-and-a-half years, say the geophysicists.
“The ground movement we’re seeing is not normal. The ground doesn’t typically do this without some cause,” said geophysicist Zhong Lu, a professor in the Roy M. Huffington Department of Earth Sciences at SMU and a global expert in satellite radar imagery analysis.
Study: Oklahoma’s earthquakes related to wastewater injection depth
Human-made earthquakes in Oklahoma are strongly linked to the depth at which wastewater from the oil and gas industry are injected into the ground, according to a new study, led by researchers from the university of Bristol. There has been an approximately 800-fold increase in the annual number of earthquakes in Oklahoma since 2011. Here’s a quote from the article:
“The team found that the joint effects of depth and volume are critical, and that injection volume becomes more influential — and more likely to cause earthquakes — at depths where layered sedimentary rocks meet crystalline basement rocks. This is because deeper wells allow easier access for fluids into fractured basement rocks that are much more prone to earthquakes.”
Lawsuit by O&G Industry Results in Fines to Environmental Lawyers
This article discusses one of many lawsuits, won by the O&G industry, against activists who try to stop the fossil fuel industry. The lawyers attempted to defend a rural Pennsylvania township’s ban on underground injections of frack waste. It seems that the O&G industry is beginning to start suing opposition to keep them from hindering their drilling efforts.
Illinois: A Slippery Tale of Oil Spills and Secrecy
This story from the Food and Water Watch people should help readers understand just how bad fracking is, both for those who live nearby, and those far away. In 2017, a company applied for the first fracking license in Illinois, and received it, over near unanimous local opposition. In May, Woolsey Operating Company LLC submitted and was granted (after 4 rewrites, 10,000 signatures in opposition, and over 4,000 public comments of concern) the first High Volume Horizontal Hydraulic Fracturing well permit in Illinois.
Study-Modeling the effects of wastewater injection
This article discusses the link between earthquakes and injection wells. In work that offers insight into the magnitude of the hazards posed by earthquake faults in general, seismologists have developed a model to determine the size of an earthquake that could be triggered by the underground injection of fluids produced as a by-product of hydraulic fracturing.
Drilling in Texas leads to uptick in earthquakes, as sleeping faults reawaken
In the US since 2008, an unprecedented surge in the amount of earthquakes has hit several states. Most scientists now agree the surge is being triggered by fracking, or wastewater injections being shot into deep wells for oil and gas production.
Former OU researcher, state seismologist felt pressured to suppress fracking research
A former OU researcher and state seismologist testified under oath he was pressured by members of the OU administration to suppress research on the connection between wastewater injection and recent earthquakes in Oklahoma.
Fracking: 13 Nov 2017
To ask Her Majesty’s Government, further to the Written Answer by Baroness Neville-Rolfe on 8 November 2016 stating that the re-injection of waste and produced waters will not be permitted from shale gas wells in the UK, what steps they are taking to inform the public about the possible risks associated with fracking, including those related to water injection.
https://www.theyworkforyou.com/wrans/?id=2017-11-06.HL2920.h&p=13493