Abstract
Nowcasting is a new method of statistically classifying seismicity and seismic risk (Rundle et al. 2016). In this paper, the method is applied to the induced seismicity at the Geysers geothermal region in California and the induced seismicity due to fluid injection in Oklahoma. Nowcasting utilizes the catalogs of seismicity in these regions. Two earthquake magnitudes are selected, one large say \(M_{\lambda } \ge 4\), and one small say \(M_{\sigma } \ge 2\). The method utilizes the number of small earthquakes that occurs between pairs of large earthquakes. The cumulative probability distribution of these values is obtained. The earthquake potential score (EPS) is defined by the number of small earthquakes that has occurred since the last large earthquake, the point where this number falls on the cumulative probability distribution of interevent counts defines the EPS. A major advantage of nowcasting is that it utilizes “natural time”, earthquake counts, between events rather than clock time. Thus, it is not necessary to decluster aftershocks and the results are applicable if the level of induced seismicity varies in time. The application of natural time to the accumulation of the seismic hazard depends on the applicability of Gutenberg–Richter (GR) scaling. The increasing number of small earthquakes that occur after a large earthquake can be scaled to give the risk of a large earthquake occurring. To illustrate our approach, we utilize the number of \(M_{\sigma } \ge 2.75\) earthquakes in Oklahoma to nowcast the number of \(M_{\lambda } \ge 4.0\) earthquakes in Oklahoma. The applicability of the scaling is illustrated during the rapid build-up of injection-induced seismicity between 2012 and 2016, and the subsequent reduction in seismicity associated with a reduction in fluid injections. The same method is applied to the geothermal-induced seismicity at the Geysers, California, for comparison.
Similar content being viewed by others
References
Benz, H. M., McMahon, N. D., Aster, R. C., McNamara, D. E., & Harris, D. B. (2015). Hundreds of earthquakes per day: the 2014 Guthrie, Oklahoma. Earthquake Sequence. Seismological Research Letters, 86(5), 1318–1325.
Edwards, B., & Douglas, J. (2014). Magnitude scaling of induced earthquakes. Geothermics, 52, 132–139.
Field, E. H., Arrowsmith, R. J., Biasi, G. P., Bird, P., Dawson, T. E., Felzer, K. R., et al. (2014). Uniform California earthquake rupture forecast, version 3 (UCERF3)—the time-independent model. Bulletin of the Seismological Society of America, 104(3), 1122–1180.
Giannone, D., Reichlin, L., & Small, D. (2008). Nowcasting: the real-time informational content of macroeconomic data. Journal of Monetary Economics, 55(4), 665–676.
Guilhem, A., Hutchings, L., Dreger, D. S., & Johnson, L. R. (2014). Moment tensor inversions of M ~ 3 earthquakes in the Geysers geothermal fields, California. Journal of Geophysical Research: Solid Earth, 119(3), 2121–2137.
Hawkins, A., Turcotte, D. L., Yikilmaz, M. B., Kellogg, L. H., & Rundle, J. B. (2017). Statistical studies of induced and triggered seismicity at The Geysers. California: Pure and Applied Geophysics. doi:10.1007/s00024-017-1569-z.
Hough, S. E., & Page, M. (2015). A century of induced earthquakes in Oklahoma? Bulletin of the Seismological Society of America, 105(6), 2863–2870.
Keranen, K. M., Savage, H. M., Abers, G. A., & Cochran, E. S. (2013). Potentially induced earthquakes in Oklahoma, USA: links between wastewater injection and the 2011 Mw 5.7 earthquake sequence. Geology, 41(6), 699–702.
Keranen, K. M., Weingarten, M., Abers, G. A., Bekins, B. A., & Ge, S. (2014). Sharp increase in central Oklahoma seismicity since 2008 induced by massive wastewater injection. Science, 345(6195), 448–451.
Langenbruch, C., & Zoback, M. D. (2016). How will induced seismicity in Oklahoma respond to decreased saltwater injection rates? Science Advances, 2(11), e1601542.
Majer, E. L., Baria, R., Stark, M., Oates, S., Bommer, J., Smith, B., et al. (2007). Induced seismicity associated with enhanced geothermal systems. Geothermics, 36(3), 185–222.
Rundle, J. B., Turcotte, D. L., Donnellan, A., Grant-Ludwig, L., Luginbuhl, M., & Gong, G. (2016). Nowcasting earthquakes. Earth and Space Science, 3(11), 480–486.
Shcherbakov, R., Yakovlev, G., Turcotte, D. L., & Rundle, J. B. (2005). Model for the distribution of aftershock interoccurrence times. Physical Review Letters, 95(21), 218501.
Sumy, D. F., Cochran, E. S., Keranen, K. M., Wei, M., & Abers, G. A. (2014). Observations of static Coulomb stress triggering of the November 2011 M5. 7 Oklahoma earthquake sequence. Journal of Geophysical Research: Solid Earth, 119(3), 1904–1923.
van der Baan M, Calixto F J (2017) Human induced seismicity and large scale hydrocarbon production in the USA and Canada. Geochemistry, Geophysics, Geosystems 18. doi:10.1002/2017GC006915
Varotsos, P. A., Sarlis, N. V., & Skordas, E. S. (2002). Long-range correlations in the electric signals that precede rupture. Physical Review E, 66(1), 011902.
Varotsos, P. A., Sarlis, N. V., & Skordas, E. S. (2011). Natural time analysis: the new view of time. Germany: Springer.
Varotsos, P. A., Sarlis, N. V., Tanaka, H. K., & Skordas, E. S. (2005). Some properties of the entropy in natural time. Physical Review E, 71(3), 032102.
Walsh, F. R., & Zoback, M. D. (2015). Oklahoma’s recent earthquakes and saltwater disposal. Science Advances, 1(5), 1500195.
Weingarten, M., Ge, S., Godt, J. W., Bekins, B. A., & Rubinstein, J. L. (2015). High-rate injection is associated with the increase in US mid-continent seismicity. Science, 348(6241), 1336–1340.
Acknowledgements
Research by JBR was supported under National Aeronautics and Space administration (NASA) grant NNX12AM22G to the University of California, Davis, research by ML was supported under Department of Energy (DOE) Grant DE-SC0017324 to the University of California, Davis. Data for the Geysers analysis was obtained from the ANSS global composite catalog, available at http://www.quake.geo.berkeley.edu/anss/catalog-search.html, and from the California Department of Conservation, Geothermal Resources, available at http://www.conservation.ca.gov/dog/geothermal/Pages/Index.aspx. Data for the Oklahoma analysis was obtained from the Oklahoma Geological Survey earthquake catalog, available at http://www.ou.edu/content/ogs/research/earthquakes/catalogs.html, and from the Oklahoma Corporation Commision, Oil and Gas Division, available at http://www.occeweb.com/og/ogdatafiles2.htm. We would like to thank Bruce Malamud for help in downloading and processing the data from Oklahoma. We also would like to acknowledge reviews by William Newman, Mirko van der Baan, and an anonymous reviewer which helped us to significantly improve our paper.
Author information
Authors and Affiliations
Corresponding author
Rights and permissions
About this article
Cite this article
Luginbuhl, M., Rundle, J.B., Hawkins, A. et al. Nowcasting Earthquakes: A Comparison of Induced Earthquakes in Oklahoma and at the Geysers, California. Pure Appl. Geophys. 175, 49–65 (2018). https://doi.org/10.1007/s00024-017-1678-8
Received:
Revised:
Accepted:
Published:
Issue Date:
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s00024-017-1678-8