Exploring seismic hazard in the Groningen gas field using adaptive kernel smoothing and inhomogeneous summary statistics

TL;DR

This paper analyzes seismic hazards in Groningen caused by gas extraction, developing adaptive kernel smoothing and inhomogeneous statistics to improve hazard estimation and proposing a modified rate-and-state model that incorporates production data.

Contribution

It introduces a novel non-parametric adaptive kernel smoothing method for spatio-temporal hazard mapping and enhances seismic hazard models by integrating gas production effects.

Findings

Seismic hazard varies spatially and temporally with gas production.

Standard rate-and-state models fail to account for inter-event interactions.

Modified models incorporating production data improve hazard prediction.

Abstract

The discovery of gas in Groningen in 1959 has been a massive boon to the Dutch economy. From the 1990s onwards though, gas production has led to induced seismicity. In this paper, we carry out a comprehensive exploratory analysis of the spatio-temporal earthquake catalogue. We develop a non-parametric adaptive kernel smoothing technique to estimate the spatio-temporal hazard map and to interpolate monthly well-based gas production statistics. Second- and higher-order inhomogeneous summary statistics are used to show that the state of the art rate-and-state models for the prediction of seismic hazard fail to capture inter-event interaction in the earthquake catalogue. Based on these findings, we suggest a modified rate-and-state model that also takes into account changes in gas production volumes and uncertainty in the pore pressure field.