Oklahoma takes action on fracking-related earthquakes — but too late, critics say

[KamaAina]

http://www.latimes.com/nation/la-na-sej-oklahoma-quakes-fracking-20160302-story.html

They feel them in the little city of Cushing, where a web of pipelines and giant oil storage tanks makes the area a crucial international hub — and vulnerable. They feel them in the time-capsule town of Guthrie, where plaster is cracking in storefronts built in the 19th century. And they feel them in rural Fairview, where cows get loud when pastures move beneath them....

More than five years after Oklahoma first saw a startling spike in earthquakes linked to the disposal of huge volumes of wastewater created by hydraulic fracturing for oil, the state continues to shake at an unprecedented rate and the number of strong quakes is increasing. In 2009, there were 20 quakes of magnitude 3.0 or higher, according to the United States Geological Survey. Last year, there were 890. In 2009, no quake measured 4.0 or greater. Last year, 30 did.

Yet even as many anxious Oklahomans now track seismic data on their smartphones and struggle to sleep through the long, rumbling nights, there has been one notable location where people rarely seemed rattled. That is here, in the state capital, where the oil industry holds so much sway that for decades drill rigs have extracted crude from directly beneath the Capitol building.

As one Democratic state lawmaker, Cory Williams, put it in an interview: "They own the place."

[gratuitous]

1. Sure, the oil companies own the place

But when it collapses into a massive sinkhole, you're going to find out that the oil companies have no intention of paying for it. I hope the elected officials don't have the cheek to act surprised or angry when it happens.

[Wednesdays]

2. On my phone app, I count 23 registered quakes in the last 2 days

within a 100-mile radius of Oklahoma City. Granted, most of those were quite small, but there was one at 3.5 magnitude on Wendesday, near Fairview. And quakes of 3.5 to 4.5 are not uncommon.

[Zorra]

3. I've been posting this for 12 years, hoping someday, someone in

government will actually comprehend it, and do something about it. I know Bernie gets it, hopefully he will become our next POTUS and stop the destruction.

[yortsed snacilbuper]

4. liz cheney will straighten things out in wyoming,

when she wins the election to the House!

link
http://www.cnn.com/2016/01/30/politics/liz-cheney-congress-wyoming-dick-cheney/index.html

[Behind the Aegis]

5. Sadly, this says it all...

"...drill rigs have extracted crude from directly beneath the Capitol building. "