5.2 magnitude earthquake hits Texas: Here's why people might be to blame

A 5.2 magnitude earthquake shook western Texas early Wednesday morning, according to the U.S. Geological Survey, one of a growing number of quakes to shake the state as oil and gas drilling increases.

The earthquake happened around 4:27 a.m. local time nearly 24 miles southwest of Mentone, Texas, a town near the Texas-New Mexico border, about 57 miles southwest of Carlsbad, New Mexico, and 200 miles east of El Paso, Texas. The area known as the Delaware Basin is center of oil extraction in Texas, and it has seen hundreds of small quakes since 2017 according to Texas state records.

No damage or injuries have been immediately reported. Last November, a 5.4 magnitude earthquake shook the same area. Experts say the quakes are connected to fracking, but not necessarily caused directly by it.

According to the USGS, the earthquake hit at a depth of 7.4 kilometers and some strong shaking could be felt in the immediate area. The National Weather Service office in El Paso said workers felt the earthquake in Santa Teresa, New Mexico, which is about 215 miles west of Mentone.

The quake was previously reported by USGS as a 5.3 magnitude earthquake.

Are earthquakes in Texas increasing?

Earthquakes in Texas have been increasing for years because oil and gas drilling and extraction has been increasing. Last year, there were more magnitude 2.5-plus quakes in Texas than in California, according to Texas officials.

So far this year, there have been 591 magnitude 2.5-plus quakes in Texas, compared to 207 in all of 2019. State officials in 2017 ramped up quake monitoring.

A 2022 report by the University of Texas at Austin concluded that 68% of Texas quakes above magnitude 1.5 were "highly associated" with oil and gas production.

Can humans cause earthquakes?

Yes. Multiple scientific studies have found that there's a strong connection between quakes and underground activity by humans. One extremely well-studied area is the Paradox Valley in Colorado, where officials have long pumped saltwater under high pressure deep into the ground, causing repeated quakes. The naturally occurring saltwater was being pumped underground to keep it out of the Colorado River and improve the quality of the irrigation water used by farmers downstream.

Oklahoma in 2015 and 2016 suffered thousands of small quakes that officials there connected to oil and gas drilling. Officials ultimately ordered industry changes that have helped minimize the risk.

Experts have previously told USA TODAY that injecting water and other fluids into deep wells under high pressure essentially "lubricates" existing fault lines, causing them to slip and cause quakes. Those are known as "induced" earthquakes.

Did fracking cause the Texas earthquake?

It's important to remember that quakes can be caused by oil and gas production but not necessarily by fracking itself. And while quakes are a byproduct of oil and gas drilling, the economy also depends heavily on gasoline, jet fuel, diesel, heating oil and other petroleum products, and the industry employs millions of Americans directly and indirectly.

When workers drill a new well, they typically hydraulically fracture ‒ frack ‒ the underground rock formations containing the oil and natural gas by pumping in high-pressure water and other chemicals. That injection can cause quakes, but they're typically so small no one feels them, according to federal scientists. Fracking makes wells more productive than they would be naturally.

People are much more likely to feel quakes caused by injection wells, which are often particularly deep wells into which drilling byproducts and wastewater are injected after being extracted from underground elsewhere. On average, oil wells nationally generate 9 barrels worth of water for every barrel of oil extracted.

"Wastewater injection can raise pressure levels in the rock formation over much longer periods of time and over larger areas than hydraulic fracturing does," federal scientists have concluded. "Hence, wastewater injection is much more likely to induce earthquakes than hydraulic fracturing."

This article originally appeared on USA TODAY: Texas earthquake: 5.2 magnitude quake shakes 200 miles from El Paso