Disposal well operations reduced following earthquake

State officials on Friday ordered the operators of 23 wells to shut-in or limit the amount of oil and gas wastewater disposed of in them following a series of earthquakes in Lincoln County early Thursday. The Oklahoma Corporation Commission’s Oil and Gas Conservation Division order affects disposal wells within 10 miles of a 4.0-magnitude earthquake, which occurred just before 4 a.m. Thursday near Carney, followed by a series of nearby smaller quakes. The 23 disposal wells inject wastewater into the Arbuckle formation, the state’s deepest rock formation. Arbuckle disposal wells...