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Summary Oil and gas drillers wastewater disposed of underground, may have caused geologic faults to slip.
The number of earthquakes in the central United States rose spectacularly near where oil and gas drillers disposed of wastewater underground, a process that may have caused geologic faults to slip, US government geologists report.The average number of earthquakes of magnitude 3 or greater in the US midcontinent - an area that includes Arkansas, Colorado, Oklahoma, New Mexico and Texas - increased to six times the 20th century average last year, scientists at the US Geological Survey said in an abstract of their research.
