New research offers an improved understanding of earthquakes in West Texas
By Angelica Ruzanova
Elizabeth Horne, researcher at the Center for Injection and Seismic Research at UT Austin, explains structural interpretation results from the new study to a crowd at the Jackson School of Geosciences graduate research fair on Feb. 14, 2025. Horne’s analysis revealed a turning point in Permian Basin earthquake activity beginning in 2017. Angelica Ruzanova/J 362F.
In August 1981, Catherine Allen’s parents moved to Midland, Texas, following a minister’s prophecy. Nearly half a century later, their daughter debates leasing her property’s mineral rights to a developer drilling beneath her neighborhood, fearing another earthquake triggered by ongoing operations.
West Texas residents continue to experience earthquakes and injection well leaks in an area responsible for more than half of the country’s energy production. A December study from the University of Texas at Austin’s Center for Injection and Seismic Research found that recorded earthquakes in West Texas escalated, reaching a record-breaking 2,601 events in 2022, with deep-well injections identified as a primary factor.
“The challenge in the Permian Basin is just the sheer volume of water that’s produced with oil and gas,” said Katie Smye, principal investigator at the industry-sponsored research center.
Elizabeth Horne, researcher working under Peter Hennings at the Center for Injection and Seismic Research at UT Austin, poses in front of her presentation board at the Jackson School of Geosciences graduate research fair on Feb. 14, 2025. Horne has contributed seven years worth of data analysis to the newly published study. Angelica Ruzanova/J 362F.
The petroleum industry in the Permian Basin handles an estimated 15 million barrels of wastewater per day, enough to fill nearly 1,000 Olympic-sized swimming pools. This byproduct of oil and gas extraction is typically disposed of by injecting it into underground reservoirs. However, research has shown these injections increase pressure on existing faults, triggering earthquakes.
“Dealing with the aftermath of these enormous volumes of wastewater is really a generational challenge,” said Peter Hennings, study co-author with a background in the petroleum industry. “But there are no economically viable methods right now that can be used at scale to deal with this water other than just injecting it back into the ground.”
Allen, an artist who reconstructs photo collages of local landscapes, witnessed the consequences firsthand. After experiencing two earthquakes at her home last year, she grew doubtful about her future in the neighborhood. “You're just kind of waiting for something really bad to happen that forces you to leave,” she said.
In 2012, she and her husband moved to Gardendale, just outside Midland, to escape rising rents caused by fracking. Soon after, the industry followed. Their home sat about a quarter mile from a wastewater pit, with floating pieces of trash, oil specks and metal pipes practically “in the front yard” of a neighbor.
“The company in charge sent a representative out, and they told us not to worry because the poison in the water wouldn’t reach the groundwater for another 50 years,” Allen said.
Waller Creek Wastewater Treatment Plant standing near Austin, Texas, on Feb. 8, 2025. The dome-shaped structures processed contaminated water for reuse in the field. Angelica Ruzanova/ J362F.
Beyond seismic risks, wastewater injection threatens water quality and infrastructure. Old wells, abandoned but still connected to underground reservoirs, risk leakage as some companies have shifted disposal from deep to shallow reservoirs. The filed Texas House Bill 1808 aims to grant the Railroad Commission of Texas (RCT) authority to oversee recycling efforts, issue discharge permits and establish water quality standards.
Melianna Ulfah, an undergraduate researcher at UT Austin’s Center for Injection and Seismicity Research, reviews her presentation poster to an attendee at the Jackson School of Geosciences graduate research fair. Her work focused on pressure limits to prevent well blowouts, surface deformation and induced earthquakes in the Permian Basin. Angelica Ruzanova/ J362F.
Sarah Stogner, a district attorney for Ward, Reeves and Loving counties, once ran for RCT commissioner. At one point, she violated a no-fly zone to capture drone footage of a problematic site, using social media to expose leaking abandoned wells and wastewater hazards.
“I was willing to risk a complaint to the Bar Association for that behavior,” Stogner said. “It was important enough to me, I knew I needed to get that evidence and that information.”
Meanwhile, a federal policy shift may curb certain efforts. President Trump’s administration declared a national energy emergency in an inaugural executive order to meet the demands of an “inadequate energy supply and infrastructure.”
Additionally, about 19.3% of Midland’s population works in the oil and gas industry, according to public city data, making economic dependency on drilling difficult to ignore.
Water transportation truck near the Waller Creek Wastewater Treatment Plant in Austin, Texas, on Feb. 8, 2025. Angelica Ruzanova/ J362F.
“It’s a question not only of what the impact will be, but how content people are to absorb that kind of impact, to allow that type of operation to continue,” Smye said.
Allen remains among the few in her neighborhood who refused to lease their mineral rights, even as developers pushed forward. Some of her neighbors, accepting payouts in the thousands, gave in. But Allen watched as the same developers targeted a local community college where she is auditing a printmaking class.
Along the roads leading to the drilling sites, the landscape tells a familiar story: caliche pads, power lines and wastewater pits stretching toward the production sites. “So many of the people that move here are transient,” Allen said. “It’s hard to care about a place when you’re only here for six months.”
As scientific, economic and social threads of the industry intertwine, Allen reflected on the prophecy that once drew her family to Midland. “It will be a center of power beyond its size,” the prophecy read. “It is, as it were, a fort in a wilderness between forts.”
