The thing these articles (and evidently scientists) don’t bother to consider is that any earthquake activity is a function of stresses in the tectonic plates. These stresses will be relieved one way or another since they do continue to build up, and rock is only so strong. Eventually something has to give.
By intervening via frakking or putting in repositories underground, we’re actually stopping the stress build up early yielding a minor quake instead of the eventual major one.
I mean this shouldn’t be rocket science. Energy is energy. It can pop off in small bits, or add up to one really big hit.
A very good friend of mine, an oil company executive and an extremely successful petroleum geologist, agrees. In fact, he suggests that if fracking is causing the small quakes, then Oklahoman's owe the oil company a debt of gratitude.
Of course, as a resident of Oklahoma, I am beginning to be concerned either way. Fracking or ordinary plate tectonics, the earth is definitely moving around here and it could get worse. Those of us who thought we were "born to laugh at tornados" have a new and potentially larger problem.
They’re a bunch of little bitty micro quakes that are hardly detectable.