Potential influence of overpressurized gas on the induced seismicity in the St. Gallen deep geothermal project (Switzerland)

Zbinden, Dominik; Rinaldi, Antonio Pio; Diehl, Tobias; Wiemer, Stefan

doi:https://doi.org/10.5194/se-11-909-2020

Articles | Volume 11, issue 3

https://doi.org/10.5194/se-11-909-2020

© Author(s) 2020. This work is distributed under
the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 License.

https://doi.org/10.5194/se-11-909-2020

© Author(s) 2020. This work is distributed under
the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 License.

Articles | Volume 11, issue 3

Research article

|

20 May 2020

Research article |

| 20 May 2020

Potential influence of overpressurized gas on the induced seismicity in the St. Gallen deep geothermal project (Switzerland)

Dominik Zbinden, Antonio Pio Rinaldi, Tobias Diehl, and Stefan Wiemer

Data sets

Modeling output data used in publication "Potential influence of overpressurized gas on the induced seismicity in the St. Gallen deep geothermal project (Switzerland)" D. Zbinden https://doi.org/10.3929/ethz-b-000369225

The induced earthquake sequence related to the St. Gallen deep geothermal project (Switzerland): Fault reactivation and fluid interactions imaged by microseismicity T. Diehl, T. Kraft, E. Kissling, and S. Wiemer https://doi.org/10.1002/2017JB014473

Short summary

The deep geothermal project in St. Gallen, Switzerland, aimed at generating electricity and heat. The fluid pumped into the underground caused hundreds of small earthquakes and one larger one felt by the local population. Here we use computer simulations to study the physical processes that led to the earthquakes. We find that gas present in the subsurface could have intensified the seismicity, which may have implications for future geothermal projects conducted in similar geological conditions.