The number of earthquakes in Oklahoma has outpaced the number of quakes in California for the first few months in 2014, and there have been 2,500+ tremors in Oklahoma since 2012 (Watch 2500+ Oklah <\/span>oma Earthquakes Since 2012 Video<\/a>).\u00a0 In addition, the USGS reports that \u201cthe number of quakes magnitude 3 and stronger jumped by 50 percent in the past eight months in Oklahoma.\u00a0 Some 183 earthquakes of magnitude 3 or greater struck between October 2013 and April 2014.\u00a0 The state\u2019s long-term average from 1978 to 2008 was only two earthquakes of magnitude 3.0 or larger per year.\u201d<\/p>\n Wastewater injection has been linked to earthquake activity since the 1960s, when it caused a series of earthquakes around the Denver, Colorado, area.\u00a0 In the process of oil extraction, wastewater is typically forced up as well.\u00a0 Oil companies often pump the wastewater back into the wells where it then fills the porous spaces in the rocks and acts as a lubricant, which can cause slippage and seismic activity.<\/p>\n Scientists originally believed that the earthquakes produced by wastewater injection would be fairly benign, mostly in the magnitude 3-to-4 range.\u00a0 However, after the November 2011 5.6-quake in central Oklahoma, they now realize these types of man-made earthquakes can get much larger.\u00a0 But just how much larger is yet to be known.<\/p>\n Katie Keranen, a geophysicist at Cornell University and former seismologist at Oklahoma University, says \u201cWe don\u2019t know what the maximum size of earthquakes<\/a> could be that we could trigger from disposal.\u201d<\/p>\n Keranen released a paper recently which showed how four high-volume wastewater injection wells in Oklahoma triggered a rash of small earthquakes over 9 miles away.<\/p>\n \u201cOur results, using seismology and hydrogeology, show a strong link between a small number of wells and earthquakes migrating up to 50 kilometers (31 miles) away,\u201d said Keranen in a press release<\/a>.\u00a0 Reason enough, one would think, not to continue this practice!<\/p>\n![\"\"](\"https:\/\/barbadamslive.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/05\/OklahomaEarthquakes2014-473x360.jpg\")
In November 2011, a 5.6-magnitude quake<\/a> centered near Prague, Oklahoma, destroyed 14 homes and injured at least two people.\u00a0 That quake was linked directly to the injection of wastewater from oil extraction into the ground.\u00a0 According to a study published in the journal \u201cGeology,\u201d the 5.6-magnitude central Oklahoma quake was \u201c\u2026the largest wastewater-induced earthquake ever recorded.\u201d<\/p>\n