by Jane Califf, Green Party of Essex and Passaic Counties

Earthquakes in New Jersey? Yes! According to the NJ Department of Environmental Protection there have been 164 recorded earthquakes since 1783, usually minor, that have had their epicenter in our state with a magnitude of 0.4 – 5.3. The two most recent ones that occurred on Feb. 5 and 7, 2010, were centered in Far Hills in Somerset County. They were minor, and no damage done, but residents reported hearing explosions that were actually rocks breaking close to the surface. 1/

In comparison, the tragic earthquake in Haiti was 7.0 in magnitude.

In places like California, minor quakes are not felt because they occur deep in the earth. However, here in New Jersey they occur at shallow levels, so people can actually hear them and often confuse them with explosions, according to Alec Gates, Chairman of the Rutgers/ Newark Department of Earth and Environmental Sciences.

Professor Gates says that there was an estimated magnitude 5.5 quake with its center in Jamaica Bay off Long Island in 1884. This one caused widespread building damage across eastern New Jersey. He says that an earthquake of this size occurs about every 115 – 120 years, so we are due for another one. 2/

A study in 2008 by a group of prominent seismologists found that a pattern of “subtle but active faults makes the risk of earthquakes in the New York City area substantially greater than formerly believed.” A co-author of the report, Leonardo Seeber, says, “We need to step backward from the simple old model, where you worry about one large, obvious fault, like they do in California…The problem here comes from many subtle faults. We now see there is earthquake activity on them. Each one is small, but when you add them up, they are probably more dangerous than we thought. We need to take a very close look.” 3/

Art Lerner-Lam, associate director of the Lamont-Doherty Earth Observatory of Columbia University for seismology, geology and tectonophysics comments on this report: “This is a landmark study in many ways…It gives us the best possible evidence that we have an earthquake hazard that should be a factor in any planning decision.” 4/

These types of earthquakes are natural events dictated by forces within the earth over which humans have no control – except to make sure that buildings and infrastructure like tunnels and bridges are reinforced to minimize earthquake damage.

Danger of Induced Earthquakes

Beyond the threat of naturally-occurring earthquakes, there is a situation New Jersey and New York City may be facing in the near future called “induced earthquakes.” This could come about if a high technology coal plant called PurGen is built in Linden using a method of processing waste carbon dioxide called “carbon capture and storage” (CCS) to create electricity. Instead of the carbon dioxide (C02) waste going into the atmosphere from the plant’s stacks, 90% of it would be captured, highly pressurized into a liquid, and forced into pipes that take it out to sea. Then it would be buried a mile and a half beneath the ocean floor in a sandstone formation, off the Jersey coast about 70 miles from Atlantic City.

The drilling and pressurized injection of C02 used by PurGen could cause earthquakes which would not be a natural event, but human-caused.

Jack Century, a Canadian geologist with 50 years experience, believes that injecting any gas or liquid into the ground without very carefully studying the geology could become a hazard. “’If you’re not careful, you can inject it higher than the natural pressures in the reservoir you’re injecting into,’ he said, noting that if the reservoir is over a fault line or very close to one, it could cause an earthquake. ‘It isn’t just earthquakes that are a problem, but it’s when you start injecting fluids into the earth and you don’t know what you’re doing, you can start small seismic events…and they can cause fractures, and the fractures themselves can interfere with the reservoir and violate the integrity of the reservoir and cause leakage…and you don’t know where they’re going to go.’” 5/

A report entitled “State of Texas Hazards Analysis” states that “…some human activities are known to cause or trigger earthquakes. These include the injection of fluids into the earth for waste disposal or petroleum production, and the filling of deep lakes or reservoirs.” 6/

In 1987, a magnitude 3.8 earthquake and multiple aftershocks of 3.0 or less hit Ashtabula Township, Ohio, located on Lake Erie. This happened after millions of gallons of hazardous fluids were forced under high pressure into a 1.8 kilometer-deep well. This waste was injected from 1986 – 1993. Then in 2001, a stronger 4.5 quake damaged 50 homes and businesses: ceiling tiles fell, plaster cracked, and gas lines broke causing people to evacuate.

Prior to injecting waste into this well, this town had no recorded earthquakes. Geologists and seismologists believe that this human activity caused the quakes: that the highly pressurized waste lubricated an ancient unknown earthquake fault line which gave it the necessary lubrication to slip, thereby shaking the earth. 7/

A CCS Plant Like PurGen Has Never Been Built Before

What we need to keep in mind is that CCS is a new technology that has never been implemented on this scale. The PurGen plant would be huge – 750 megawatts (MW). We must ask ourselves this: if an earthquake hit, couldn’t pipes rupture and/or the plant’s buildings crack or explode, releasing C02 – which is deadly in large amounts to fish, other wildlife and to humans? Could the 138 mile long pipeline out to sea be made earthquake-proof? Couldn’t C02 that would be “buried” off the coast of New Jersey be released from the ocean floor if the tremor was strong enough? Millions of people living in North Jersey, along the Jersey coast and in New York City could be very badly affected by such an event.

Some geologists are investigating what they say are vast amounts of basalt rock under the ocean floor near Sandy Hook that they say is porous enough to absorb a billion tons of C02. They say the liquid C02 that would be pumped into it would change into limestone or chalk, thus becoming solid so it would never escape. (This is not the targeted rock formation in PurGen’s proposal.)

However, it has been estimated to take hundreds of years for this chemical change to take place. 8/ Suppose there is an earthquake in the meantime that leads to a dangerous release of C02 ?

To avoid such a catastrophe, thirty (and counting) New Jersey organizations – fishing associations, environmental, and community groups – have come together to oppose the building of this plant.

Resources for this article:

1/ “Minor earthquakes hit Somerset” by Stephen Stirling (Star Ledger, 2/11/10)
2/ Personal correspondence with Prof. Alec Gates, Chair of the Rutgers/Newark Dept. of Earth and Environmental Sciences.
3/ “Earthquakes may endanger New York more than thought, says study,” Press Release, 8/21/08, The Earth Institute at Columbia University, Palisades, N.Y.
4/ Ibid.
5/ “Carbon Capture and Storage ‘being oversold as a panacea’” by Bea Vongdouangchanh, The Hill Times, Canada’s Politics and Government Newsweekly, 4/13/09.
6/ “State of Texas Hazards Analysis,” Chapter 12, by the Governor’s Division of Emergency Management, Department of Public Safety, Austin, Texas, 1998.
7/ “Triggering quakes with waste” by Christina Reed (Geotimes, March 2002, www.geotimes.org)
8/ “Turning C02 into Stone,” video, National Public Radio, “Science Friday”, July 18, 2008.

Other resources:

National Geographic News, Jan. 4, 2010; Rebecca Kerins-Tattoli, Energy Expert;
Peter Montague, Environmental Research Foundation.