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Room: Key Ballroom 12

Date: 4/15/2025

Session Time: 10:30 AM to 11:45 AM (local time)

From Physics to Forecasts: Advancements and Future Directions of Induced Seismicity Research

Induced seismicity has been associated with many anthropogenic activities involving fluid mobilization in subsurface formations such as hydraulic fracturing, waste-water injection, geothermal exploitation, and carbon sequestration. Research on this topic has matured over recent decades, and dominant controls of induced seismicity have been identified. The spatio-temporal evolution of these earthquakes is mostly modulated by the fluid volumes, flow rates, hydromechanical properties of the subsurface, regional geological conditions, and proximity and orientation of existing fault structures. However, it is often hard to reconstruct the complex interplay between these factors that led to the earthquakes.

New technologies and multi-disciplinary approaches to subsurface modeling advance our knowledge of the underlying physics of these events and quantify the remaining stochastic variability. Ongoing induced seismicity research addresses such questions as: How can the likelihood of future large seismic events be reduced during these anthropogenic activities? How can the physics of induced earthquakes guide hazard assessment over short and long timescales? Do we have better success at forecasting earthquake hazards in induced vs tectonic settings – and how should the public and/or regulatory agencies utilize these forecasts?

We invite contributions that present new modeling technologies, resulting datasets, that update, or present new, models of the processes leading to induced seismicity. We particularly welcome multi- and interdisciplinary studies, and we encourage contributions across a broad range of geo-scientific disciplines including, but not limited to Earth imaging, numerical modeling, seismicity, and earthquake source processes. We also welcome challenging case studies where the induced seismicity is difficult to model, the model results propagate to time-dependent seismic hazard assessment and forecasting, and recommendations for future directions for this field. 

Conveners 

Stanislav Glubokovskikh, Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory (sglubokovskikh@lbl.gov)
Jeremy Gosselin, Natural Resources Canada, Geological Survey of Canada – Pacific (jeremy.gosselin@nrcanrncan.gc.ca)
Ian Main, The University of Edinburgh (Ian.Main@ed.ac.uk)
Alexandros Savvaidis, The University of Texas at Austin (alexandros.savvaidis@beg.utexas.edu)
Jake Walter, Oklahoma Geological Survey, University of Oklahoma (jwalter@ou.edu)

Oral Presentations