Mathematical and Computational Explorations of the Induced Earthquake Nucleation Process (Internship) King Abdullah University of Science and Technology (KAUST)

Overview

Induced seismicity is a central issue in the development of subsurface energy technologies in the United States and around the world. It is basically the earthquakes caused by human activities that involve extracting or injecting fluids into the subsurface and modifying subsurface stresses around pre-existing faults. 

Examples include subsurface wastewater injection, reservoir impoundment in the vicinity of large dams, development of mining, geothermal or hydrocarbon resources, and in geologic carbon sequestration.

Key Facts

The basic mechanism for induced fault slip is widely understood in terms of the Coulomb failure criterion. When fluid is injected into or withdrawn out of a reservoir, the associated pore pressure perturbations and poroelastic stress changes increase the ratio of shear to effective normal stress on a fault and cause it to slip. This criterion, however, does not address the evolution of the rupture, and whether a fault slips seismically or aseismically. 

A different criterion, derived from theoretical analyses of frictional slip between two elastic media, differentiates from seismic and aseismic slip. It states that fault slips seismically if the spatial scale for the slipping zone is larger than a critical nucleation length inversely proportional to the effective normal stress, and slips aseismically otherwise. This criterion, however, assumes spatially and temporally uniform effective normal stress and does not take into account the dependence of friction on fluid presence. Find out more with this  Mathematical and Computational Explorations of the Induced Earthquake Nucleation Process (Internship) project from King Abdullah University of Science and Technology (KAUST) .

Recommended Student Background

• Mathematics and Computational Science

• Mechanical Engineering

• Geophysics

• Physics