AIBU or is the risk of earthquakes from fracking just too high?

[IABURQO]

I've always felt slightly concerned, but just seen about the earthquake. Fair play that even tiny earthquakes are being picked up so this can be both monitored and controlled. Overall though, if just 11 days can lead to an earthquake then surely this proves that fracking just isn't safe in our densely populated country and shouldn't be allowed?
www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-lancashire-45976219

You know OP, I was watching the news, about how the coastline is eroding into the sea. It started me thinking about the damage fracking would cause to a country as small as the United Kingdom.

I’ve experience two earth quakes. The first I mistook gods strong wind and the other for my alarm (woke up from it). Most earth quakes are quite minor. What kind of magnitude are we talking?

It shouldn't be allowed anywhere. But you're right, this earthquake seems concerning. And do soon. It's banned here in Ireland. We don't get a lot right but at least we did that.

*So soon.

They had 0.5 earlier in the week and 0.8 today. While tiny on the scale and not noticeable above ground, they do fall into the red zone meaning they have to suspend works until it is back under control. Yes it is very worrying that these are happending within a week of them starting to drill and I can only see them going up. I think they reached 2.1 when they had to suspend altogether in 2011.

I am against fracking and wish the UK would ban it completely like most other sensible countries.

@Racecardriver - as above, they're tiny, I don't wish to sensationalise because I doubt most people would even have felt them. My main concern I suppose is that this is very quick for problems to start, so my internal risk radar would tell me it could get very serious if it goes on.

I just saw this story too! All those local democratic decisions that were overturned, and then right after they start an activity they keep telling us is perfectly safe, we get another earthquake. Which is why it was stopped in the first place. I quite agree op, it should never have been allowed to go ahead and at the least it should be banned now.

I agree too. It should be banned. But unlikely to be tbh

Fracking is a bad idea for lots of reasons - global warming, water table pollution and the massive use of freshwater being the most important I can think of.

Earthquakes, though? Nothing to worry about.

Clicky link! www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-lancashire-45976219
(I asked for other thread to be deleted).

To my mind it's less about the earthquakes and far more about:

1. Pumping chemical mixes underground where they can potentially enter the water table, or end up god knows where.

1. Continuing to destroy the planet piece by piece in our desperate attempts to gouge out every morsel of fossil fuel possible, and continuing to contribute to global warming when the money spent on fracking could easily have been spent on any other renewable resource

The trampling of democracy itself and imprisonment of protesters is just the absolutely fucking insane cherry on this cake. What the fuck happened to "Respect the will of the people"? Apparently not when the fracking companies directly pay thousands of pounds to our MPs and their departments.

Cuadrilla chief executive Francis Egan said people should not be concerned.

Well he would, wouldn't he. Sorry Francis, you bet I'm concerned.

Thanks for the link @BlatheringWuther, not sure what I did there.

Ok, but then there are stronger natural earthquakes that happen in the UK without incident so what exactly is the concern?

@Racecardriver - my issue is that if it's taken 11 days to get to this, then how bad will it get in 111 days and longer. The previous attempts were stopped because earthquakes got much stronger; they're now just pushing for looser limits like the rest of the EU.
Actually my main concern is that I can't understand how any of it is remotely safe; the water table issues mentioned above and other processes. I don't understand most of them well enough to question coherently, but causing earthquakes is measurable actual damage. Note they haven't for a moment denied it was them, they know they cause frequent earthquakes yet I'm sure in applying for permission they said it was very rare.

I’m not sure you could really class such itty bitty earth quakes as damage. I’m also not seeing the logic in it happens so quickly etc. There is a lot to be concerned about with fracking but earthquakes is something for frackers to worry about. They wouldn’t even get anywhere near causing a proper earthquake before finding the hens elves with no option but to shut down operations. Tiny earthquakes are simply not dangerous.

I think the hens elves can be trusted to know exactly what they are doing.

For those not in the know, it's the hens elves who have the job of moving the continental plates around. They've been doing this important work for 34 billion years so if anyone knows what's what, they do.

I meant to add -

Sleep easy in your beds. The hens elves are all around and underneath you, quietly ( unless one has a birthday ending with an 0 ) getting on with their jobs.

So interesting that some feel the need to mock. Or are paid to?

We're talking about man-made earthquakes. Not an accidental spillage of a drop of milk. Earthquakes, deliberately caused so that some rich people can get even more rich. Forced on local people, against their clearly and democratically spoken wishes, who actually live there, by people who don't.

The small size now is immaterial. Just how big are they going to get, and when are those of us who live on the earth affected allowed to be concerned in your world?

@Racecardriver and @BMW6 - what size of earthquake is it ok to worry about, is it 2? 3? 4?

I was interested in this a few years ago, with a relatively anti-fossil-fuel, environmental mindset. I came across the research summarised in the links below.

How many man-made earthquakes pre-fracking?

What size of earthquakes can be caused by fracking?

Apparently there are about 30-40 earthquakes above 1.5M every year in the UK. Not that 1.5 is a scary level (generally not felt at the surface), but is the level the BGS seismometer thingies pick up on a regular basis (the ones near blackpool are obviously especially sensitive to allow for the traffic lights for fracking to be monitored). The BGS website lists one last week north of the Shetland isles of 4.3M, and the week before in Wales at 2.4M.

About 20% of those are manmade – mostly due to coal mining. The biggest earthquake globally caused by fracking was 3.8 (in Canada), which was felt, but didn’t cause any surface damage. Much bigger earthquakes are caused by reservoir impoundment, injection of wastewater from oil and gas extraction into formations that it wasn’t taken out of (not what is happening here) and from geothermal works.

As I understand from speaking to a seismologist, fracking is meant to cause these little mini-seismic “quakes”, and they can be used by the industry to monitor where the fractures are in the rock and so on. They generally stay below 0.5M – but it isn’t unusual for them to go up to more than that – though the ones in Blackpool in 2011 were unusually high on a global scale. Its very unusual for them to be big enough to be felt by at the surface, as in 2011. The fact the limit the red traffic light is set so low in the UK now (triggered by the 0.5M and 0.8M last week) is precisely to stop anything larger happening. The fact it is being picked up by the media (even at magnitudes of less than 0 – which has to be the lowest “earthquake” ever reported!) is because of people’s (understandable) concerns over the process – not because anything has gone wrong, and in fact it seems to indicate that the system is working.

As it happens, my earlier research turned me from being generally suspicious of the process, to being cautiously supportive (or at least accepting). I realise that’s not a fashionable opinion but it is shared by most of my friends working in science-y, environmental fields – though not “paid by the industry” as has been implied. I still want to see a reduction in gas use, but while we continue to use gas, I’d rather it was produced from the UK rather than being shipped in as we do at present, as north sea gas can’t meet all our needs. And everything I’ve seen of how the process works in the UK convinces me that the issues in other countries aren’t relevant here. I am interested to see how this turns out though, as I’ll be the first to admit I’m wrong if my tap catches fire .

YANBU OP. I get the distinct impression that if the people running these operations did not have deep pockets and friends in high places that fracking would never have started in this country as for me it’s very clearly a bad idea

@IABURQO well earthquakes under 5 don’t really cause damage do worry about them is like worrying about a strong wind as if it will spontaneously become a hurricane.

@notanactualsheep thank you. That was both informative and interesting. You raise an excellent point re imports. IF fracking is safe I would much rather use British Gas than gas from a place like Russia for instance.

I agree that reducing our exposure to Russia is very important, (although I’m also nervous of the fracking process). Fracking in the US has made an enormous difference to the global balance of power.

@racecardriver I agree. I think we don't get that much gas from Russia at the moment (though Russia is increasing gas supplies to continental Europe, and we do get gas by pipe from there, and will presumably continue to Brexit permitting ).

However, I would much rather UK gas was used than imported LNG from Qatar, which is where about 25% of our imports come from. It seems bonkers to me that gas is extracted, liquified, shipped for massive distances using mega-tankers, and turned back to gas in the UK, when there may (or may not) be the same gas under our feet - with the associated jobs/ tax etc benefitting our communities and making some UK businesses some profit rather than costing us money to import it. The carbon cost of that must be huge.

Also, I'm not an expert on environmental regulations or human rights in the middle east, but I'm willing to bet we are a bit stronger at the former and more liberal with the latter. Not sure gas extraction in Qatar wouldn't be slowed down because of a 0.5M earthquake, or protest outside gas sites preventing suppliers from delivering would be acceptable, as in the UK.