There's a lot of people in this thread who see "North Korea" and "nuclear test" and get fired up but would otherwise shrug if it were instead, say, "Oklahoma" and "fracking".
The supplemental information is available and says:
> Our earthquake catalog consists primarily of small events with magnitudes of < 2.0
and there were 1399 of them.
The cited Ren&al says:
> The magnitudes of these seismic events primarily range from 1.5 to 2.5
and that there were 647 of them.
USGS (<a href="https://www.usgs.gov/media/images/earthquake-and-energy-comparisons-updated-2025" rel="nofollow">https://www.usgs.gov/media/images/earthquake-and-energy-comp...) says that a magnitude 2.0 earthquake is the equivalent energy of 56kg of explosives, which is more than I'd want to be around but I think for people who actually use the stuff it's not a lot.
This threw me into a rabbit hole for a bit. Apparently there is good evidence that a lot of historical earthquakes in california were due in part at least to the oil industry, which early on would not replace pumped out oil with water.
Now a days they claim they replace the oil with water and all is well. However, as anyone who has owned an ancient used car and has switched from conventional to synthetic motor oil would tell you, there's no way that would work. The assumption is that these voids the oil are in are these hermetically sealed vaults such that one can simply pump in more volume of liquid and balance out pressures. That seems like a big assumption to me. Water is obviously not nearly so viscous as crude oil. It will seep in situations where crude will not. It's probably leaking out like a sieve if its really choss all the way down in California. The oil as it is isn't even very well contained given how common tar seeps are.
Agriculture probably also plays a role. Central valley has sunken what is it 20-25 feet now from historic ground levels? Same issue as a void generated by an atomic test or oil extraction, one would imagine. Mining probably also plays a decent role. Really anything involving removal or non like for like replacement of structural substrate from the ground is probably liable to be associated with seismic activity.
Kind of depressing a realization if this is the case, like we've screwed ourselves with not just the air but the ground we stand on too. You can't really get that stability back without all this new potential energy leaving the system in the form of stuff falling down and new quakes and plates breaking loose and budging a bit more.
>like we've screwed ourselves with not just the air but the ground we stand on too
I'm reminded of something Margaret Atwood once said which boiled down to the fact that there is no starting civilization over, ever again, if we fall back into the Dark Ages. the metals for copper tools and iron-making are in forms that require a lot of technology to even re-smelt, and all the easily accessible mines that don't require heavy machinery and engineering are long mined out
we either get it right this time around or it's over for us
> I'm reminded of something Margaret Atwood once said which boiled down to the fact that there is no starting civilization over, ever again, if we fall back into the Dark Ages. the metals for copper tools and iron-making are in forms that require a lot of technology to even re-smelt, and all the easily accessible mines that don't require heavy machinery and engineering are long mined out
> we either get it right this time around or it's over for us
The materials just in the frame of a typical big box store would be sufficient for any basic blacksmith to make millions of spades (and shovels!) using nothing but basic charcoal and a blower.
And you can make several thousand human operated blowers, forges, and small utility buildings also with the materials in a typical big box store’s frame.
The biggest issue would
be food and day to day energy requirements and fertilizer. A lot of our economy is highly dependent on refined hydrocarbons and derived products like ammonia/nitrates that aren’t locally producible right now.
Nah. Smiths literally came along with travelling war parties all the time.
In Europe, nearly every village had one (it was pretty required), and they operated even during active wartime. Because they had too.
All you really need is a skilled blacksmith, a forge, an anvil, and some hand tools. Well, and some fuel and iron.
All that can be transported by cart with a small team of people. In a village, even in wartime, you don’t need to move it, so it’s really just fuel and a few folks + metal feedstock, which is likely even more available from scavenged weapons and the like.
BigTTYGothGF · · focus · HN ↗
The supplemental information is available and says: > Our earthquake catalog consists primarily of small events with magnitudes of < 2.0 and there were 1399 of them.
The cited Ren&al says: > The magnitudes of these seismic events primarily range from 1.5 to 2.5 and that there were 647 of them.
USGS (<a href="https://www.usgs.gov/media/images/earthquake-and-energy-comparisons-updated-2025" rel="nofollow">https://www.usgs.gov/media/images/earthquake-and-energy-comp...) says that a magnitude 2.0 earthquake is the equivalent energy of 56kg of explosives, which is more than I'd want to be around but I think for people who actually use the stuff it's not a lot.
asdff · · focus · HN ↗
Now a days they claim they replace the oil with water and all is well. However, as anyone who has owned an ancient used car and has switched from conventional to synthetic motor oil would tell you, there's no way that would work. The assumption is that these voids the oil are in are these hermetically sealed vaults such that one can simply pump in more volume of liquid and balance out pressures. That seems like a big assumption to me. Water is obviously not nearly so viscous as crude oil. It will seep in situations where crude will not. It's probably leaking out like a sieve if its really choss all the way down in California. The oil as it is isn't even very well contained given how common tar seeps are.
Agriculture probably also plays a role. Central valley has sunken what is it 20-25 feet now from historic ground levels? Same issue as a void generated by an atomic test or oil extraction, one would imagine. Mining probably also plays a decent role. Really anything involving removal or non like for like replacement of structural substrate from the ground is probably liable to be associated with seismic activity.
Kind of depressing a realization if this is the case, like we've screwed ourselves with not just the air but the ground we stand on too. You can't really get that stability back without all this new potential energy leaving the system in the form of stuff falling down and new quakes and plates breaking loose and budging a bit more.
paimapi · · focus · HN ↗
I'm reminded of something Margaret Atwood once said which boiled down to the fact that there is no starting civilization over, ever again, if we fall back into the Dark Ages. the metals for copper tools and iron-making are in forms that require a lot of technology to even re-smelt, and all the easily accessible mines that don't require heavy machinery and engineering are long mined out
we either get it right this time around or it's over for us
x______________ · · focus · HN ↗
> we either get it right this time around or it's over for us
Space, the final frontier.. *cue intro music
paimapi · · focus · HN ↗
lazide · · focus · HN ↗
And you can make several thousand human operated blowers, forges, and small utility buildings also with the materials in a typical big box store’s frame.
The biggest issue would be food and day to day energy requirements and fertilizer. A lot of our economy is highly dependent on refined hydrocarbons and derived products like ammonia/nitrates that aren’t locally producible right now.
AlecSchueler · · focus · HN ↗
lazide · · focus · HN ↗
In Europe, nearly every village had one (it was pretty required), and they operated even during active wartime. Because they had too.
All you really need is a skilled blacksmith, a forge, an anvil, and some hand tools. Well, and some fuel and iron.
All that can be transported by cart with a small team of people. In a village, even in wartime, you don’t need to move it, so it’s really just fuel and a few folks + metal feedstock, which is likely even more available from scavenged weapons and the like.