New Study On Hydraulic Fracturing and Earthquakes: Ealge Ford Shale

Wall Street reported this morning that according to the study done by The Journal Earth and Planetary Science small earthquakes that accrued in Texas are could be caused by fracking activities in South Texas Eagle Ford Shale. The study explains that “ taking oil and water out of the ground allows surrounding rock and sand to settle, triggering small tremors that are typically too weak to be noticed on the surface” The environmentalist and community groups has long voiced their concerns that hydraulic fracturing might be exposing surrounding regions to more earthquakes. The new study has no direct evidence that the process of hydraulic fracturing by itself is in direct correlation to earthquakes all by itself, the study points out that “The connection is more indirect, the study found: New wells are extracting nearly 600,000 barrels of oil a day and a considerable amount of water as well. Given the scale at which oil is now being removed, enough liquids are being disturbed that rocks are settling and faults slipping, causing the small earthquakes.” One of the study's author, Cliff Frohlich an associate director at the University of Texas at Austin's Institute for Geophysics similar situation occurred in Long Beach, Calif where “Oil production and groundwater wells caused much of the area to sink nearly 30 feet over many years” And at the same time he states that his expectations were “to find a tie between earthquakes and injection wells in the Eagle Ford study as well. That didn't turn out to be the case. "Science is seldom that simple," Mr. Frohlich further explains that one of the possible explanations for the causes for Eagle Ford and Barnett tremors is due to regions long history of oil and gas production. And small earthquakes have been noticed there in 1970 near the tiny town of Fashing, Texas.