with nearly all traced to the underground injection of wastewater left over from oil and gas production
Awe, what’s an earthquake or two and polluted ground water? It’s a small price to pay for our energy needs! Fuck yeah!
OK, where state energy policy with regards to the environment, is practically non-existent. Is anyone surprised? Will this be their wake-up call of deciding profits over people is destroying the state? Probably not.
As a native Californian, we don’t pay temblors much mind 'til they reach a 6.0 or so. This has got to be scaring the hell out of Oklahomans (and midwesterners in general). And they live in Tornado Alley fer cris’sake!
At least companies in CA aren’t–I assume–aren’t doing things to dramatically increase the changes of earthquakes.
The fact that one of the largest tank farms in the world is at the epicenter shouldn’t alarm anyone. Nor should it alarm anyone that there are thousands and thousands of capped and abandoned wells as well as ones lined with newer technology that have been hit as badly as these buildings, and that cracks and leaks in well linings are what can contaminate drinking water.
My facebook lit up with this one btw.
I believe the policy has been, “Fracking has nothing to do with these earthquakes that are destroying your homes and businesses.”
This is Oklahoma Energy policy with regards to the environment…
I’m reminded of a Colombia Basin farmer who years ago took former Idaho Governor and Secretary of the Interior Cecil Andrus to task for wanting to remove dams on the Columbia River to restore salmon runs and, generally, make the river healthy again.
The farmer, who relied on irrigation water from the river, astutely pointed out to Cecil: “If I want a God damned salmon I’ll go to the damn store and buy one.”
I suspect the correlation here is that many Oklahomans would argue that ground water pollution is not an issue because “If I want a God damned glass of water I’ll turn on the damn tap.”
Btw, when Oklahoma has more earthquakes than California above 3.0 you know there’s something wrong with this picture.
http://19pqj6kvhd93gajtmkij9kda.wpengine.netdna-cdn.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/08/Fracking.jpg
Nothing there was built with this kind of sustained seismic activity in mind.