Work

Revisiting the Seismicity in the Eagle Ford Shale: The Overlooked Role of Wastewater Disposal

Year: 2025

Type: article

Abstract: The seismicity in the Eagle Ford play has increased dramatically over the last decade. Past studies identified hydraulic fracturing (HF) as the only driving force in this area. We conclude that although HF is the dominant causal factor, wastewater disposal (SWD) was also a triggering mechanism in certain zones. Notably, in the center of the shale, there is a small area where both causal factors overlap. Furthermore, a cluster of earthquakes on the Mexican side of the national border is almost certainly triggered by SWD within Texas. To our knowledge, this is the first such documented case globally. Next, our analysis investigated the causal factors of the 2011 Mw 4.8 Fashing earthquake and of two recent Mw 3.9 events, while also confirming that HF was the key driving force behind the 2018 Mw 4.0 rupture. We employed new earthquake catalogs, established physics-based principles, and a robust hypothesis testing framework.

Source: The Seismic Record

DOI: 10.1785/0320250010

Authors: Iason Grigoratos, Alexandros Savvaidis, Stefan Wiemer

Institutions: ETH Zurich, Swiss Seismological Service, The University of Texas at Austin

Language: English

Topic: Hydraulic Fracturing and Reservoir Analysis

Subfield: Mechanical Engineering

Field: Engineering

Domain: Physical Sciences

Open Access status: diamond

Funder: U.S. Geological Survey

Award: G6495692084