Groundwater extraction-induced seismicity around Delhi region, India

Deepak K Tiwari,Naresh K Vissa,Vineet K Gahalaut,Birendra Jha,Bhaskar Kundu

doi:10.1038/s41598-021-89527-3

Abstract

The non-tectonic deformation, either of natural or anthropogenic origin, may influence the earthquake occurrence process and seismicity rate along the plate-boundary or ‘stable’ plate-interiors domains. The low magnitude but moderate seismicity rate of Delhi region on the stable plate-interiors domains of India, exhibits significant variation both in short-term at annual seasonal scale and in long-term at decadal scale. It correlates with the anthropogenic groundwater pumping for the extensive irrigation, urban activities, and seasonally controlled hydrological loading cycle of Indo-Ganga Basin hosted freshwater aquifers. Our coupled hydro-mechanical simulation and poro-mechanical analysis of basement fault stability suggest that the combined aquifer contraction and basement rock expansion act together to modulate the effective stress regime and anthropogenic seismicity on the basement faults in Delhi region.

Highlights

Human-induced earthquakes are increasingly becoming a matter of focal point of socio-political and scientific concern in the past few decades[1,2,3,4,5,6,7])
Using continuous modern seismicity records around Delhi surrounding region, combined Gravity Recovery and Climate Experiment (GRACE) data, hydrological and coupled hydromechanical simulation and associated poromechanical analysis of fault stability, we suggest that the seismicity around the Delhi region, which is linked with the Aravalli Delhi fold belt, is possibly influenced by the non-tectonic deformation process including anthropogenic groundwater pumping for the extensive irrigation and urban activities, along with seasonally controlled hydrological loading cycle in the Northern India
In order to quantify groundwater extraction rate in the north-western India and Delhi surrounding region, we have explored 156 months of Gravity Recovery and Earth Climate Experiment (GRACE) data and Global Land Data Assimilation System (GLDAS), from January 2003 to December 2015 to quantify the rate of decrease in total water storage and groundwater changes

Summary

Introduction

Human-induced earthquakes are increasingly becoming a matter of focal point of socio-political and scientific concern in the past few decades[1,2,3,4,5,6,7]). Worldwide several anthropogenic activities have been documented to link with seismicity and based on that an updated database, HiQuake has been created for documenting Human-induced earthquake[4,5]. Such anthropogenic activities modify the subsurface stress regime of the critically stressed fault system, inducing earthquakes, altering the seismicity rate in the surrounding region, and making the region more susceptible to dynamic triggering by remote distant e arthquakes[4,5]. Despite variation in the focal mechanisms 18–21, the resulting stress direction inverted from the available focal mechanism solutions is largely consistent with a stress regime in which the maximum principal stress is in the NNE-SSW direction with a moderate p lunge[17] which is similar to that in the neighboring Garhwal Kumaun region[22]

Methods

Results

Conclusion