Seismological Society of America Claims Fracking Reactivated Ohio Fault 168
eldavojohn writes There have been suspicions that fracking has caused minor earthquakes in Ohio but last year seismic data recorded by the Earthscope Transportable Array was analyzed by the Seismological Society of America using template matching and has resulted in a new publication and press release making the statement that Hilcorp Energy's fracking in Poland Township in March of 2014 "did not create a new fault, rather it activated one that we didn't know about prior to the seismic activity." The earthquakes occurred in the Precambrian basement and lead the researchers to posit that further unknown faults may be activated by fracking. The press release ends with urging for "close cooperation among government, industry and the scientific community as hydraulic fracturing operations expand in areas where there's the potential for unknown pre-existing faults."
Good luck with that. (Score:5, Insightful)
Despite there being no published science about its safety, and despite evidence that it is actually polluting wells and ground water ... it will keep happening.
Because government officials are all paid heavily by the oil and gas industry to make damned sure they can do anything they want to, right up to tearing up private property because they want to.
These short sighted clowns only care about profits, and don't give a damn about anything else.
I can't imagine government is going to start reigning in corporations any time soon ... which means all laws and policy will continue to be so skewed in favor of corporations as to be laughable.
America is nothing but an oligarchy these days.
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Er, yeah, right http://www.desmogblog.com/2013... [desmogblog.com]. Perhaps not so clear cut after all but typical lawyer and corrupt judge shenanigans.
Seriously what part did you miss with regard to turning the ground into a massive soda fountain and unknown fault lines. Fault lines by the way a big old cracks in the earth, not tiny little ones but great bloody big ones, that run for many kilometres and are very deep. So boob, what happens when you crack a pressure vessel and put it under pressure, well, surprise, surpr
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To be clear, none of what you're talking about is really related to the pollution of the ground water.
The pollution of groundwater is from the actual chemicals used in some fracking and isn't tied to the whole "burning sink water" thing. Quantifying burning sink water as being tied to fracking will not happen, but quantifying what's in the water and when? That has occurred.
Likewise, quantifying increased seismic activity to fracking has occurred.
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That was my first thought. If there was a fault line that is being activated, then they're effectively settling the tectonic mass before it can buckle any further, effectively giving us a few small harmless quakes now instead of a big highly destructive one later.
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The big question is how "small" are the quakes now and how long would the large one have taken had they not started fracking in that area?
If the small quakes cause property damage and the big quake would have taken place a couple thousand years from now, then I doubt that this would be considered a good trade-off.
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Re:Good luck with that. (Score:5, Insightful)
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In the industry paid-for response TruthLand they admit that it was due to fracking, but claim that the particular well in question was not properly protected with a concrete barrier. They claim that it should not happen elsewhere if the wells are constructed properly and steps are taken to avoid contamination.
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In the industry paid-for response TruthLand they admit that it was due to fracking, but claim that the particular well in question was not properly protected with a concrete barrier. They claim that it should not happen elsewhere if the wells are constructed properly and steps are taken to avoid contamination.
Fortunately, that doesn't cost anything. And even if it did, the nice people in the fossil fuel industry are always willing to pay extra for public health.
Re:Good luck with that. (Score:4, Insightful)
"America is nothing but an oligarchy these days."
When was it not? The few people in power have always controlled everything, not just in America, but everywhere. And it will always be like that.
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And the best part is that the taxpayer is now heavily subsidizing an industry that isn't profitable anymore.
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I dont consider allowing people to keep their own money, giving them money. only in "we need more money!!!" politics does that count
I don't consider allowing people to shit on our environment permissible. It's not their money, it's our money. They are legal fictions and without government protection someone would come along and stop them from doing what they are doing, by force if necessary. This is one of the things Carlin really had nailed down. The rich have all of the money and pay none of the taxes, at least per centum. The middle class has almost none of the money, and pays all of the taxes. The poor are just kept around to scare
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The rich pay none of the taxes except for the 70+ percent of all income taxes paid in the US. And according to some libtard on public radio today, only the top 40% percent buy petro products so only the top 40%, according to this particular libtard, pay any transportation taxes or the taxes on natural gas and heating oil. She then went on to claim that only the upper and high end of the middle class are not renting so only the super rich pay any property tax... So exactly what taxes are the non-rich paying
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The rich have all of the money and pay none of the taxes, at least per centum
The rich pay none of the taxes except for the 70+ percent of all income taxes paid in the US.
Did I use too many big words for you there?
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No, you made the statement that the rich pay far less than their "share" of the taxes. I pointed out that the top 10% of income earners pay over 70% of the income taxes. The top 10% don't come close to representing the middle class. I then pointed out how other liberal assholes make shit up.
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I don't consider allowing people to shit on our environment permissible. It's not their money, it's our money
Correct. It is OUR money. NOT the governments.
Re:After the other subsidies. (Score:4, Interesting)
The Iraq war was basically a subsidy for the oil and gas industry. No, you don't get to phrase the argument so that only your position can win by claiming it has to be a direct subsidy, while indirect don't count.
No, it wasn't.
The Iraq war was basically to prevent Iraq setting up a Euro-baed petroleum exchange, thereby undermining the commodity-baed dollar and turning it back into a fiat currency, which would have been disastrous to the U.S., since the price of the dollar is pinned to the price of oil by the fact that almost all oil sales of any note are done in dollars.
It was also a bailout for Europe, which gets most of their oil from the Middle East. What oil the U.S. gets from the Middle East does not end up shipped to the U.S., it's used by the U.S. military overseas, which, given active operations, consumes bout 24% of the total of all U.S. petroleum consumption. The U.S. gets almost all its oil from local or hemisphere local sources.
The variability in U.S. pump prices has everything to do with the futures market, and self-restraint on refining by the petroleum companies in order to control the supply of refined oil, and almost nothing to do with the availability of top sweet crude.
It's about economics, not resources.
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The "lead" crude oil contract is a US-based product [cmegroup.com], but the European runner-up [theice.com] is still traded in USD and not EUR. If Iraq tried to force trading in a different currency by setting up their own exchange, they would still have to draw enough trading interest to unseat the other two contracts.
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but Bush was so stupid that he was smart enough to take control of less than what, 3%, of known oil reserves and totally control the world market. Right, he was so stupid he couldn't do anything but then he was so smart he engineered all kinds of conspiracies.
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and in the sense you are talking so is every other form of government ever but much more so.
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Known costs vs. unknown costs (Score:1)
As a society, we need to know the true costs of using our technology. This means we need to know under what conditions, if any, hydrolic fracturing causes earthquakes.
Fracking also provides many benefits. First and foremost it's given us energy near-independence decades sooner than other methods would have. This has potential spillover effects in foreign policy, particularly when it comes to dealing with other oil-rich nations. For example, if there had been a revolution in Saudi Arabia that threatened
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Fracking is almost 100 years old. Saying it's an unknown is a lie.
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Physics is almost 14 billion years old, but parts of it are still unknown. Just because we've been doing something for 100 years doesn't mean we understand it completely.
Scientists are government officials too (Score:2, Flamebait)
For somebody claiming existence of evidence, you are citing remarkably little of it... (No, I will not do the googling for you — you make the claim, you provide citations.)
While the taxpayer-funded scientists would never attempt to inflate their own importance to direct more grant-monies in their direction... Especially now that the hysteria of "global warmi
You're the Worst (Score:1)
While the taxpayer-funded scientists would never attempt to inflate their own importance to direct more grant-monies in their direction... Especially now that the hysteria of "global warming" is settling down — and a new boogeyman, which, conveniently, can be neither measured nor confirmed nor denied with any certainty, is needed.
One makes the laws that allow them to be bribed during campaign years without anyone knowing where or who that money came from and accept positions at the very companies they benefit after they "retire." And the other, well the other publishes peer reviewed research that is open for everyone. They then host a forum for the community to comment on it. And I should mention that the SSA is a an international community and a non-profit organization [seismosoc.org]. But, go ahead and attack the scientists or whatever Murdoc
Re:Scientists are government officials too (Score:5, Interesting)
Citing "Australia right now" in support of "Global Warming" (also known as "Climate Change") is ridiculous
Maybe, unless you have insight into the trends and Australia Now is consistent with those trends. Extremes that would have happened about 2% of the time in the 30 years prior to the 80's were happening about 6% of the time in the 30 years prior to 2010. In the last 15 years they have occurred about 10% of the time: http://www.bom.gov.au/state-of... [bom.gov.au] . This trend of increasing extremes is what we would expect in a warming country: http://www.bom.gov.au/state-of... [bom.gov.au]
The picture becomes even more cohesive if you look at the temperature trend in the context of radiative physics and what we know about the atmospheric CO2 trend.
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science being run by government officials and scientists alike with an enormous conflict of interest — can not be trusted either.
Oh lord. It always devolves into some conspiracy theory. Somehow skeptics Roy Spencer and Jon Christy must be in on it as well because they have a satellite temperature reconstruction that corroborates the land based temperature reconstructions: http://woodfortrees.org/plot/u... [woodfortrees.org]
when it is cold in North America, well, that's a fluke. But when it is hot in Australia — that's evidence of Global Warming.
It's the trend(, stupid).
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Not the natural gas we do not...
Prudence [princeton.edu] is a virtue and is always in order. However, what that maxim has to do with fracking (or global warming) in particular, escapes me.
Huh?
Goes both ways (Score:2, Insightful)
Despite there being no published science about its safety
At this point there is enough evidence to know it's generally safe. Even in the case of this unknown fault, the worst earthquake was 3.0 - and it was only one well corresponding to activation of the fault, the other nearby wells were fine (read the link).
despite evidence that it is actually polluting wells and ground water
What "evidence"? To date all claims have been proved false.
I can't imagine government is going to start reigning in corporations
Re:Good luck with that. (Score:4, Funny)
New York State had put a stop to Fracking. And NY is about the most political state out there.
However we need unbiased science on the effect. In the meantime, if they want to Frack, fine... However if something goes wrong, they will be responsible and will need to pay to clean it up, for the next hundred years. The Fracking companies should happily agree to these terms because their method is so clean and safe. That there should be no risk in giving the citizens the extra protection.
Re:Good luck with that. (Score:5, Insightful)
They (the owners of the company, not the pseudo-person company itself) would happily agree to those terms, knowing that they are protected by investor and bankruptcy laws, and eventually their own deaths and inheritance laws. Those terms are thus meaningless. Long-term environmental protection must be done through preventative regulation, not through post-damage punishment, as the time scales ensure those responsible cannot be adequately punished.
I'm not making any claim as to whether fracking causes long-term environmental damage (though I'm happy it's not happening under my house), just pointing out that if it did, reactive punishment wouldn't stop it.
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Mandatory insurance. If you want to do something that can potentially cause very expensive problems you need to insure your actions.
Unfortunately, I doubt any insurance company would be willing to take on that kind of liability.
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However we need unbiased science on the effect. In the meantime, if they want to Frack, fine... However if something goes wrong, they will be responsible and will need to pay to clean it up, for the next hundred years.
The problem is, it's actually literally impossible to clean it up with our level of technology. We cannot even survey the extent of the damage. So no, it's not fine; the cost to clean up the damage is effectively infinite.
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"Sanitizing food" are you intentionally being deceptive or just being dumb. What is sanitized is the equipment used in the processing of food. Just because I clean the kitchen bench with bleach doesn't mean you should wash your apple with it, for fuck sake.
And sure some of those chemicals are benign, which is surely what you would expect if you aren't a complete moron. Obviously the industry is going to list all the benign stuff.
"Don't install a basement" (Score:1)
I told the Precambrian family not to install a basement. But did they listen? Noooooo.
Re:"Don't install a basement" (Score:5, Funny)
I told the Precambrian family not to install a basement. But did they listen? Noooooo.
Well then... this is obviously their fault.
Less chance of dangerous quake now (Score:1)
Re:Less chance of dangerous quake now (Score:4, Informative)
Don't the mini quakes release energy from the faults more safely?
mini quakes along active fault lines release pent-up energy that protects against "the big one" -- but a dormant fault is like a healed over fracture in your bone -- if nothing disturbs it, it will continue to heal over. Now that it is active again, this will cause a chain reaction of stresses that will likely have continental and possibly global consequences, as it changes the way the other faults interact with each other.
Basically, it made all the related fracture lines that much less predictable.
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Except around extremely large interplate faults, earthquakes are time independent; the chance of there being an earthquake tomorrow depends very little on whether the last earthquake was yesterday or 100 years ago.
As an example, Time-independent and Time-dependent Seismic Hazard Assessment for the State of California: Uniform California Earthquake Rupture Forecast Model 1.0 [usgs.gov]
what if (Score:5, Insightful)
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also quite possible. Im no seismic expert by any means. im only going on the limited knowledge I do have that show smaller earthquakes tend to keep bigger ones away
You have no such knowledge. If you did, you could cite it. But you don't. You only have a superstitious idea that it could be true. But in fact, the whole idea is a lot of cockery [usgs.gov]. Yet, someone brings this bullshit idea up every time we discuss fracking on slashdot, like someone pulled their goddamn cord. Then their mouth flaps and they squawk, but nothing of value is uttered. If you actually wanted to know the truth, you would have googled for it.
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Re:what if (Score:5, Informative)
This is basic high school physics. Energy cannot be created or destroyed, it is conserved. If the amount of energy the fracking put into the ground was less than the amount of energy released from the earthquake, then clearly there was another source of that excess energy. Mainly, tectonic movements had built up stresses into the ground, which would have eventually been released as a natural earthquake if there had been no fracking.
Active fault lines are good. It means tectonic stresses are being regularly released. Inactive fault lines can be good or bad. If there are no more tectonic stresses being built up, then the fault can't cause an earthquake, and it's good. But if there are tectonic stresses being built up, then it's bad because it means that energy isn't being released at regular intervals. We just think it's inactive when it's really not, and it's going to cause a big doozy of an earthquake in the future.
Since the fracking triggered an earthquake, clearly there were stresses in the "inactive" fault, and the fault was of the latter type and thus not truly inactive, and the fracking merely relieved the stress. Basically, if a fault line can be "reactivated", then it was never really an inactive fault line in the first place.
There are some macro (continental-scale) arguments that can be made about plate movements and whether the overall rate at which the plates move (and thus build up stresses in the rocks) can be affected by deliberately relieving some of those stresses (e.g. fracking). And thus fracking could be bad because it increases the rate at which the plates move, and thus increase the rate at which stress builds up and earthquakes happen. But on the local level, the basic jist of the argument that fracking merely triggers earthquakes which were going to eventually happen anyway is correct. Anybody who understands high school level physics can see that.
You pathetic tool (Score:2)
This is basic high school physics.
Hey, let's see what the experts with more than a high school physics education have to say [usgs.gov], which might be more informative than J. Random Dillhole on Slashdot. Hmm, just like the magic 8-Ball, my sources say you're full of shit.
Re:what if (Score:4, Informative)
You forgot one thing though. The stresses could have been otherwise relieved along active fault lines. Tectonic stress isn't a point stress. It's not like a volcano that blows when enough stress builds up under it. There's no local buildup that then eventually causes an earthquake after long enough. It's more like a circuit, a whole system where stress is electricity that takes the path of least resistance. How large the system is depends on the geology of the particular area. Irrespective, the system absorbs the stress as a whole; stress propogates through the entire system, and the point of release is the weakest location in that system. If it's easier to release at an active fault (which it usually is), then it would be released there. Maybe in the active fault, it would be released there after a longer period of buildup, and/or it might be released over a larger area.
But now, all of a sudden, they opened up inactive faults. Inactive faults happen for multiple reasons some of which you've stated. If the inactive fault is inactive despite stresses building up under it, that means it stopped being the weakest point. If fracking is activating it, it means fracking is causing a strong configuration to turn into a weak one. It is weakening what's holding the fault in place. And in addition, the reactivated fault line causes all sorts of other unpredictable behavior in the area. Related fault lines that were once thought to be dormant could suddenly become active. Unrelated fault lines that were just strong enough not to be the weak point could suddenly become just weak enough to become the weak point. Fault lines we didn't know about previously could suddenly appear. Hell, this could trigger (however unlikely), an eventual plate split like what's happening in East Africa.
All this in and of itself isn't bad, at least not on human timescales. Continental earthquakes do happen, and they are usually fairly weak. But it does mean the location of where big earthquakes will happen become less predictable. And that's where the problem lies. Most of Cali is built to withstand upwards of a certain magnitude, say 6.0 (as an example; I'm pulling the number out of my ass). It's expected that Cali will be hit with a 6.0 periodically. People prepare for that sort of thing. Most of the midwest (or Ohio in this case) is not built to withstand a 6.0. It's not expected to experience a 6.0 earthquake. By reactivating an inactive fault line (via weakening), now Ohio or maybe some other part of the midwest can expect a 6.0 earthquake. Why? Because as you say, while that reactivated fault line is moving, it's great. But when it suddenly stops again, and for a long time, then the pressure begins to build. And since the previously inactive fault is now the weakest point in the system, that could very well be where the built-up pressure will be released, this time not so gently..
That's the cost of reactivating inactive fault lines.
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Let me guess. You think there is a giant geode full of diamonds down there taking up the pressure ('cause you saw that in a movie once)?
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Use the bone analogy. A fractured bone is a fault. After it heals, if you leave it alone, do you ever worry that the pent-up pressure will fracture it again on its own? And yet, if someone drilled into your (healed) bone fracture and injected it with high-pressure water, might it fracture again and then start moving?
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But ... but ... gas is below 2 bucks man! (Score:3, Insightful)
We seem to have done a piss poor job of explaining the benefits of clean air and clean water to our fellow citizens.
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Re:But ... but ... gas is below 2 bucks man! (Score:5, Insightful)
The middle east producers are most certainly NOT dropping prices.
The prices are dropping because there's a lot of it around, and because whatever vagaries in the market say the price goes down.
What the middle east producers are doing is refusing to cut outputs in the face of dropping prices, because they have tons of cash and don't care if it puts American producers out of business.
OPEC doesn't set the price, just output levels.
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OPEC doesn't set the price, just output levels.
For a long time, it has been unclear that OPEC can actually "set output levels". Cartels are notoriously hard to keep together when every member can do better for themselves by cheating.
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No. They've done this (pump like crazy and drive the price down) every time prices got high. Classic price squeeze to protect a market.
This time it won't work.
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Chinese and Indian demand.
The Saudis are pumping all they can and still the price is stuck at $60/barrel. Which isn't enough to scare off capital from oil tar projects. IIRC they say they are fine unless the price goes below $40.
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Of course the day after I post this the price drops to $50 as more petro-economies make up for losing money on every barrel with volume. Sunk costs are a bitch.
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I'm kind of wondering if the Saudis are attempting themselves to hurt Russia, or if they're playing-ball with the rest of the world in attempts to isolate Russia.
My pet theory is that the US government made a deal with them- The US will deal with ISIS so the Saudi's don't have to get their hands dirty. The US will make sure that Saudi Arabia doesn't get too many refugees dumped on their border- a phenomenon which is quite concerning given that Lebanon's population is now around 20-25% refugees. In return for this help, Saudi Arabia helps put the squeeze on Russia.
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The Saudis couldn't care less about Russia, they just want to destroy Iran's economy. Iran is their neighbor and biggest rival / enemy by far, and is vulnerable due to sanctions and an oil-dependent economy.
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Russians have bills to pay, hence they don't have a choice.
Sucks to be a pure energy economy.
Re:But ... but ... but (Score:3)
I was under the impression there is a relationship between supply and demand; now you say maintaining supply in the face of falling demand has no effect on price?
Or are you simply playing with words? "Set the price" being a function of "set the supply," I think even that argument fails.
Re:But ... but ... but (Score:4, Informative)
There's a relationship, but like all commodities it's more complicated than that. But the futures markets and all sorts of stuff completely unrelated to supply and demand also are huge factors.
It is long past the point where these things happen in isolation.
I seriously doubt even this [economist.com] comes close to explaining it:
I'm not playing with words at all. I'm saying that modern economics is FAR more complex than "when demand goes up price goes up". Modern economics is full of vagaries, speculation, collusion, and other bullshit.
Despite claims to the contrary, economists don't know much more about how the economy works than you or I ... because economics is at least 50% ideology.
You look for, and see, the outcomes you believe in.
What economics is not, is an objective natural law. It's a series of observations which may or may not extend as far as people who use it claims, and whose premises may or may not be reliable.
Economics is NOT a real science. There's a lot more voodoo in it that people admit.
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There's a relationship, but like all commodities it's more complicated than that. But the futures markets and all sorts of stuff completely unrelated to supply and demand also are huge factors.
Isn't the futures market just a set of predictions on future supply/demand? So it's not completely unrelated, but perhaps prone to large errors. (since predicting the future is a risky business)
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You are partially correct,
that the Middle East doesn't set prices, but Saudi Arabia has increased output:
http://www.businessweek.com/ar... [businessweek.com]
and many analysts believe the increase in production is to make the price of other extraction technologies unprofitable. They may become profitable again, but when fuel prices are this cheap, it makes it difficult.
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That won't work, because it's much easier to mothball existing equipment, then bring it back online, than it is to invent, design, and build that equipment in the first place. Saudi Arabia would have to hold the price low indefinitely (increasing supply to keep up with increasing demand) or the price would creep back up until fracking is profitable again. And the cost for fracking will go down when you can recommission old equipment instead of buying new. (I doubt you can buy used equipment today because
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What we have right now is a perfect storm of multiple factors.
1. US aggressive foreign policy against Russia, Venezuela and now IS. This is seen in situation in Georgia, Ukraine et al against Russia and with Cuba against Venezuela and is an extremely important tool. Timing of fracking's peak in US is a little too perfect to have been intentionally arranged, but it's certainly helpful to the extreme and is receiving significant political support from military wing of governing forces in the country.
2. Gulf s
Fracking doesn't PUT stress on faults (Score:3)
At worst, it can release stress that is already there. So they can "cause" an earthquake. But it's the big motions of the ground that we have no influence over that really puts stress in the ground.
Isn't it true that stress that builds up over time would get released anyway, SOMETIME? (Unless the forces that caused the stress in the first place reversed so as to release it....)
I mean, the release of chemicals, water pollution and consumption, and greenhouse gas emissions are all reasonable charges to make against fracking, but as far as earthquakes, weren't they inevitable anyway?
Also, wouldn't triggering an earthquake cause a quake of less magnitude than would occur if allowed to build up and release naturally?
--PeterM
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We want to transfer load to weaker faults as they break under less load creating more small earthquakes instead of a few large ones. Bad loading scenarios certainly can occur, but they seem to be less probable than scenarios where fracking is reducing system load and thus reducing risk to lives and structures.
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It's not conjecture. It's the First Law of Thermodynamics - energy cannot be created or destroyed, it is conserved. If fracking were the source of the energy released in these quakes, then the fracking process must have put as much energy into the ground as was released in the quake. Clearly the fracking
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Isn't it better to cause several smaller controlled crashes, releasing the energy and thus slowing a car, than one huge one where the energy is released in one go, especially if the crash was inevitable? After all the energy is already built up in the momentum of the car, crashing it gently doesn't PUT that energy there. Obviously, not all cars will crash but if we release the energy in cars with small controlled crashes, where's the harm?......hmmm.....could
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There is however a law of physics that says 'an object must deform _instantly_ when there is a force acting on it.'
There are no materials with infinite modulus of elasticity. Everything strains when stressed.
potential for unknown pre-existing faults (Score:2)
Unpossible! (Score:2)
It's on the internet [davisvanguard.org] so it must be true [townhall.com].
Given the price of oil has now fallen... (Score:3)
Given that the price of oil is now around threepence ha'penny a barrel, isn't this all rather academic? Surely fracking is no longer economically viable?
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But once you have the infrastructure setup you can be in the situation where you lose less money if you keep on producing - when you have fixed costs that still have to paid even if you produce nothing.
Has this something to do with dropping oil prices? (Score:2)
The worst that could happen (Score:3)
Break up solid rocks deep in the ground, suck out the oil, and then fill the hole with a water slurry. What could go wrong?
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Your order of things that happen in hydraulic fracturing is hilariously wrong.
Well it has bee nice knowing you guys (Score:3, Insightful)
because as soon as fracking triggers the yellowstone caldera we are all done.
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It's not going to. At least not likely. Yellowstone is a hotspot caused by the subducting Farallon plate. If anything's going to cause Yellowstone to blow big, it's probably an increase in the rate the remnants of the Farallon plate subduct, namely Juan de Fuca, Explorer, and Gorda plates. Or if the Pacific plate starts subducting under the North America plate.
Fracking (to our knowledge) lubricates old fault lines, weakening or outright breaking the structures that keep them from being active. That won't ca
Need a movie about this (Score:2)
Be careful... (Score:2)
Maybe the Seismological society didn't know... (Score:3)