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Wastewater Disposal and the Earthquake Sequences During 2016 Near Fairview, Pawnee, and Cushing, Oklahoma
Author(s) -
McGarr A.,
Barbour Andrew J.
Publication year - 2017
Publication title -
geophysical research letters
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 2.007
H-Index - 273
eISSN - 1944-8007
pISSN - 0094-8276
DOI - 10.1002/2017gl075258
Subject(s) - aftershock , foreshock , seismology , wastewater , sequence (biology) , moment (physics) , geology , moment magnitude scale , shock (circulatory) , environmental science , physics , biology , medicine , mathematics , environmental engineering , geometry , classical mechanics , scaling , genetics
Each of the three earthquake sequences in Oklahoma in 2016—Fairview, Pawnee, and Cushing—appears to have been induced by high‐volume wastewater disposal within 10 km. The Fairview M 5.1 main shock was part of a 2 year sequence of more than 150 events of M 3, or greater; the main shock accounted for about half of the total moment. The foreshocks and aftershocks of the M 5.8 Pawnee earthquake were too small and too few to contribute significantly to the cumulative moment; instead, nearly all of the moment induced by wastewater injection was focused on the main shock. The M 5.0 Cushing event is part of a sequence that includes 48 earthquakes of M 3, or greater, that are mostly foreshocks. The cumulative moment for each of the three sequences during 2016, as well as that for the 2011 Prague, Oklahoma, and nine other sequences representing a broad range of injected volume, are all limited by the total volumes of wastewater injected locally.