Hydroselsmicity: A Hypothesis for The Role of Water in the Generation of Intraplate Seismicity

Abstract

Abstract A new hypothesis termed Hydroseismicity that has hydrologic (diffusion of pore pressure transients from recharge areas of groundwater basins), geologic (rifted, fractured crust), and chemical (solubility of minerals) elements is proposed to explain the role of water in the generation of intraplate seismicity. Its basis is a spatial correlation in the southeastern U. S. between 1) seismogenic crustal volumes of high seismicity, 2) large gravity-driven river basins that can provide an adequate supply of water to the upper- and mid-crust, and 3) a permeable crust that is tectonically stressed close to failure. It is suggested that in crustal volumes with a combination of connected fractures and adequate groundwater, natural transient increases in hydraulic head in recharge areas of groundwater basins can be transmitted to depths of 10–20 km, and thereby trigger earthquakes, via a flow-path geometry that resembles except for scale the model familiar to groundwater hydrologists for near-surface flow. Possible trigger mechanisms for Hydroseismicity include small increases in fluid pressure at hypocentral depths caused by such transient increases, and hydrolytic weakening of minerals that leads to structural weakening. Implicit in the model is a diffuse distribution of epicenters (as is observed in the region) rather than concentrations along discrete geologie (faults) or geomorphic (rivers) elements. Open fractures imply fracture roughness, i.e., asperities under a higher stress that keep fractures open even in an ambient tectonic stress field. Intraplate earthquakes in a fractured crust prestressed to near-failure are thus postulated to be triggered by small transient increases in fluid pressure transmitted along preexisting fractures in a rock fabric weakened by stress corrosion of asperities. Abundant petrologic evidence is available to justify an assumption of fracture permeability to depths of 20 km near passive rifted margins. All four principal seismogenic volumes in the southeastern U. S. are within gravity-driven groundwater basins that can provide an abundant supply of water to the ernst, and that intersect known or suspected Eocambrian or Mesozoic rifted crust. The host basins have the largest surface recharge areas and contain rivers with the highest average stream gradients as measured from their headwaters to the Fall Line. Seismicity in the region is characterized by steeply dipping focal mechanism nodal planes and diffuse alignments and/or clusters of epicenters. These characteristics are compatible with a steep to vertical fracture fabric currently being reactivated by porc pressure diffusion from surface recharge of groundwater basins.