The still-yet-to-be proved culprit in the Youngstown earthquakes is a well in which D&L Energy injected about 5,000 barrels of waste water a day, most of it from out of state. The briny water comes from controversial oil and gas extraction processes known as "fracking."
Worried that the brine injection may be somehow linked to Youngstown's rash of earthquakes, D&L Energy shut down the Northstar No1 well after a 4.0 quake on New Year's Eve. Ohio Governor John Kasich said the state would also limit the depth of brine injection wells to 8,000 feet. The Northstar No 1 well is 9300 feet deep.
At Tuesday's hearing, Marietta College Geologist Bob Chase, said he was working with the Ohio Dept of Natural Resources to monitor recent quake activity in Southeastern Ohio's Washington County. There have been four minor earthquakes there over the last year.
Bob Chase: We are putting a seismometer on campus...It'll give the geological survey a point for monitoring seismic activity in that area. I know they are looking to put a couple more in the state in the southeastern part because there are injection wells down there.
Chase said there is no scientific proof linking Washington County's earthquakes to brine injection wells.
State records show that between July and Sept of 2011, Ohio injected about 3.4 million barrels of brine. That's up 40 percent from the amount Ohio wells absorbed six months earlier. And over half of all the brine coming into Ohio is from drilling activity in other states.