Oklahoma Earthquake Banning

Nighttime had already settled in, and the clock was ticking closer to twelve a.m. It would have probably seemed like any other peaceful night. Suddenly, walls began to tremble. The floor started shaking. Loud booms rang out. The quivering began to intensify, causing belongings to fall in residents’ homes. It was the beginning of the 5.7-magnitude Oklahoma earthquake, which struck on November 6, 2011 and resulted in significant structural damage (“Oklahoma’s Largest Quake in Decades Buckles Highway; Rattles Residents,” CNN). A journalistic study—published in the journal Geology—conducted in 2013 showed that the 2011 earthquake was actually caused by fracking, a practice in which water is injected into the Earth’s ground (“Wastewater Injection

It involves high-pressure injections of water and chemicals into rock formations, which in turn release natural gas (Thompson, “Hydraulic Fracturing Should Be Banned”). However, fracking can result in many negative outcomes. For instance, scientists who conducted the earthquake study for Geology discovered that not only did fracking cause the biggest earthquake in Oklahoma, but it also caused more earthquakes in states that hardly experienced any seismic activity (“Wastewater Injection Spurred Biggest Earthquake Yet, Says Study,” The Earth Institute Columbia University). In fact, quakes have hit so frequently in Oklahoma, that state and oil regulators decided to shut down five disposal wells due to the increasing number of earthquakes in a city named Cushing (“Oil Regulators Shut Down Two Disposal Wells After Earthquakes Near Cushing”, State Impact: NPR). If fracking is capable of causing temblors as powerful as a 5.7-magnitude, it may be capable of inducing other massive earthquakes in the future. Tremblors with a higher magnitude could cause extensive damage to affected areas, such as what happened to Oklahoma (“Oklahoma’s Largest Quake in Decades Buckles Highway; Rattles Residents,” CNN). Furthermore, areas that are usually not affected by seismic activity are becoming prone to temblors. It may be a possibility that these areas could see a bigger earthquake in the near future too.

Nicolas D. Loris, who is an economist at the Heritage Foundation, claims fracking helps create new jobs “for geologists, engineers, rig workers, truck drivers, and pipe welders”—such as a plant located in Pennsylvania that will generate about 10,000 new jobs—and also helps create more business for hotels and restaurants (“Fracking is not a Public Health Risk,” Chemicals). Using this method of wastewater injections, says Loris, also generates over “600 trillion cubic feet of natural gas… [which] is enough heat to 15 million homes for one year” (“Fracking is not a Public Health Risk, Chemicals). He continues his argument by saying that, with the creation of new jobs, hydraulic fracking increases the U.S. economy and makes natural gas available for vital things such as food processing, pharmaceuticals, and fertilizers (“Fracking is not a Public Health Risk,”