Authors
Fabiana Fuentes Arias (CIRES), Anne Sheehan (CIRES), Shemin Ge (UNIVERSITY OF COLORADO BOULDER - GEOLOGICAL SCIENCES ), Manuel M. Mendoza (CIRES)

Abstract

The Raton Basin of southern Colorado and northern New Mexico experienced induced seismicity since 2001, resulting from wastewater injection related to coalbed methane production that began in 1994. To better understand the mechanisms of induced seismicity, particularly how earlier seismic events affect stress changes on nearby faults, we investigate the spatial evolution of Coulomb static stress change (ΔCSS) associated with seismic events of Mw > 4.0 that occurred prior to the Mw 5.3, in 2011. Coulomb stress changes on a fault are indicative of whether the fault moves closer to or further away from failure. Wastewater injection in the basin have raised pore pressures in nearby fault zones, increasing ΔCSS and the likelihood of inducing slip or triggering earthquakes on critically stressed faults. Three models were implemented to calculate ΔCSS: 1) the constant apparent friction model, 2) the isotropic model, and 3) the diffusion model. Each model employs a different approach to incorporating pore pressure and significant differences in the distribution of ΔCSS were observed. The isotropic and diffusion models elucidate with greater clarity that pore pressure plays an important role in ΔCSS. Therefore, pore pressure should be carefully incorporated when computing ΔCSS to enhance understanding of earthquake triggering mechanisms and improve aftershock forecasting since is critical for understanding the hazard posed by continued wastewater injection operations in the Raton Basin and similar settings elsewhere.