>In an aquifer that’s permanently collapsed, artificial recharge—pumping water forcibly back underground—is the only option, according to Shirzaei. That’s expensive and carries the risk of triggering earthquakes.

I have spent most of my life in the San Joaquin Valley and what I have been wondering about over the past few years is what is the effect removing all that water from the faults. Specifically, does this water removal cause the stresses along the faults to build making the resulting earthquakes larger?

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stevenwoo 3 hours ago | parent | next [-]

Toward the end it briefly discusses a possible solution - expensive injection of water into aquifers that might have the side effect of triggering earthquakes like fracking for petroleum or some types of geothermal - there’s no winning.

	▲	Aquitard 2 hours ago \| parent [-]
		It has more possible side effects than just earthquakes (not my expertise in a geological stable country). One such side effect of mixing two types of groundwater is the potential to release minerals in the geological medium that can be above beneficial use criteria (and ultimately contaminate the groundwater). There is a USGS program called PHREEQC that is used for this specific type of modelling.

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JumpCrisscross 2 hours ago | parent | prev [-]

> does this water removal cause the stresses along the faults to build making the resulting earthquakes larger?

Water lubricates fault zones [1]. Putting it into an inactive fault makes it active. Taking it out of an active fault makes the quakes less frequent and more powerful.

[1] https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S00137...