Abstract
Gas extraction from the Groningen gas field resulted in significant induced seismicity. We analyze the magnitude-frequency distribution of these earthquakes in space, time and in view of stress changes calculated based on gas production and reservoir properties. Previous studies suggested variations related to reservoir geometry and stress. While we confirm the spatial variations, we do not detect a clear sensitivity of b-value to Coulomb stress changes. However, we find that b-value correlates positively with the rate of Coulomb stress changes. This correlation is statistically significant and robust to uncertainties related to stress change calculation. This study thus points to a possible influence of stress change rate on the probability of the magnitude of induced earthquakes.
| Original language | English |
|---|---|
| Article number | e2024GL110139 |
| Pages (from-to) | 1-10 |
| Number of pages | 10 |
| Journal | Geophysical Research Letters |
| Volume | 51 |
| Issue number | 20 |
| Early online date | 15 Oct 2024 |
| Publication status | Published (in print/issue) - 28 Oct 2024 |
Bibliographical note
Publisher Copyright:© 2024. The Author(s).
Data Access Statement
The data and codes necessary for this paper's analyses are available online at Tamama et al. (2024).Keywords
- b-value
- induced seismicity
- coulomb stress and stress rate
