It can be hard to picture why brine dumping would cause earthquakes. The term dumping implies getting rid of waste by, well, dumping it. It does not paint an accurate picture of how the brine is forced back into the ground under the same kind of high pressure used to extract the natural gas during the hydraulic fracturing drilling process. That pressure forced into unstable ground, according to geologists studying the problem, is causing earthquakes.
Recent history has found earthquakes increasing near fracking brine injection sites in Arkansas, West Virginia, Colorado and Texas. This past weekend, scientists announced that Ohio has joined the party - so to speak - with its 11th earthquake in the past 8 months. The earthquake this weekend was a 4.0 magnitude in the Youngstown/West Akron area and was felt as far away as Michigan, Ontario, Pennsylvania, and New York.
Before the onset of fracking brine dumping into injection wells in this community, earthquakes were extremely rare.
"James Zehringer, director of the Ohio Department of Natural Resources, announced the closing of two injection wells in Youngstown Township owned by Northstar Disposal Services LLC and operated by D&L Energy Inc." (Ohio.com)
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