6 ms·

Worth adding some context to this study. We've known about subsidence in our area for many many years. The Houston-Galveston subsidence district was created alm

by chomp 4y ago

Worth adding some context to this study. We've known about subsidence in our area for many many years. The Houston-Galveston subsidence district was created almost 50 years ago by the Texas legislature to regulate groundwater withdrawal and manage subsidence. https://hgsubsidence.org/ https://hgsubsidence.org/ It's worth noting that this regulation has drastically slowed subsidence, but not completely halted due to the groundwater problem, and an exploding population. One of the top priorities of the subsidence district is getting the area onto surface water. That is, 60% reduction of groundwater usage by 2025, and 80% reduction by 2035. There's quite a few huge projects underway at the moment, including a multi-billion dollar expansion of our surface water treatment: https://www.nhcrwa.com/projects/northeast-water-purification-plant-expansion-project/ https://www.nhcrwa.com/projects/northeast-water-purification... USGS has a network of sensors that you use to see subsidence here: https://www.arcgis.com/home/webmap/viewer.html?webmap=e5c75a9acb9148058d287386c218b1bb&extent=-97.5279,28.5865,-93.0153,30.8075 https://www.arcgis.com/home/webmap/viewer.html?webmap=e5c75a... Of note is Katy's subsidence, which I believe is from hydrocarbon withdrawals. I believe what this study does that's new is analyze Sentinel-1A data and correlate it to hotspots in the Houston area, which is actually super cool.

airstrike 4y ago
> hydrocarbon withdrawals
- collegeburner 4y ago
  i don't understand what you're trying to say?
  - r00fus 4y ago
    It's Texas, where oil industry runs everything.
    - collegeburner 4y ago
      meh only sorta. like, yeah oil is obviously a big deal because it's a valuable resource. but like if something is a huge part of the state's economy and a ton of jobs is working to keep that industry healthy/growing really "being run by it" or is it just good policy? the good thing is we're stealing all those nice cali tech jobs so it won't be true forever ;)
      - Bud 4y ago
        galangalalgol 4y ago
        Vouching for this, because while the wording was confrontational, the points being expressed are valid. Apart from the water kinda. West Texas where they depend on groundwater for irrigation is screwed, but the rest is really well planned and run reservoir systems that catch several states worth of watershed. Agree with the politics or not. TX isn't going to grab talent from states with strongly pro-choice workforces at nearly the rate it used to. And the climatic extremes are bad and seemingly getting worse, anthropogenic or not. This summer was brutal, the last was as well, and both winters were fairly horrific as well. Partially because, as pointed out, the power grid isn't up to the current load. I love TX, but it is because of the friendly people, the power infrastructure and climate situations are atrocious, and TX abortion laws are absolutely going to affect the influx of knowledge workers.
        newaccount2021 4y ago
        "I had a great job offer in TX but didn't go because of abortion" people only say things like this online, not in real life do you see a baggage train of abortion refugees leaving Austin? people will be upset about this, very few will change their life plans over it
        galangalalgol 4y ago
        Vouching for this too, because it is a reasonable and possibly correct observation. I think people are less likely to leave than they are to weigh it as a factor when deciding to go to Austin vs stay where they are. Why can't we have conversations about this stuff without voting each other into oblivion?
    - dang 4y ago
      Please don't post unsubstantive comments and particularly please don't take HN threads into flamewar hell. https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html
  - irrational 4y ago
    It’s a blatant euphemism that anyone not invested in the oil industry wouldn’t use.
    - arcbyte 4y ago
      nah, its just thay saying "oil" is too narrow because a huge amount of the extraction is also natural gas. Hydrocarbon is both very clear and accurately specific.
      - chiefalchemist 4y ago
        Oil and gas would be clearer and less ambiguous. Using jargon / euphemism is poor communication.
  - joeblubaugh 4y ago
    Oil
mc32 4y ago
San Jose CA also suffers from subsidence as a result of water withdrawal[1]. There is also a seasonal aspect to it. [1]http://explore.museumca.org/creeks/z-subsidence.html http://explore.museumca.org/creeks/z-subsidence.html
quarterdime 4y ago
Thanks for the arcgis link. It is interesting to compare to the Sentinel 1A data from the study[0]. For example there is one existing (ground based) measurement East of Mont Belvieu (P050), but most of the displacement in the satellite data appears just to the West, centered on Mont Belvieu. This is by eye only, so I may be mistaken in comparing the locations. The ground based measurement for sensor P050 reports up-down displacement of -0.07 cm per year between 2017 and 2020. It is difficult to determine the exact value from a shaded image, but the satellite data show that just to the West of this ground based measurement (about centered on Mont Belvieu), displacement was -1.91 to -0.85 cm per year between 2016 and 2020 (see figure 3b). The arcgis site has useful data that could be used better compare trends for the same dates [1]. I did not look at every year, but it looks like 50+ ground based measurements per year. The study's methods are a bit beyond me, but section 3 describes processing a total of 89 Single Look Complex (SLC) images from 2016 to 2020. I could not find any mention of exact dates. [0] https://www.mdpi.com/2072-4292/14/15/3831# https://www.mdpi.com/2072-4292/14/15/3831# [1] https://hgsubsidence.org/GPS/2021/P050_HRF20_neu_cm.col https://hgsubsidence.org/GPS/2021/P050_HRF20_neu_cm.col
victor106 4y ago
Thanks for the info. One of the reasons I like to read comments first before the article

by chomp 4y ago

airstrike 4y ago

> hydrocarbon withdrawals

collegeburner 4y ago
i don't understand what you're trying to say?
- r00fus 4y ago
  It's Texas, where oil industry runs everything.
  - collegeburner 4y ago
    meh only sorta. like, yeah oil is obviously a big deal because it's a valuable resource. but like if something is a huge part of the state's economy and a ton of jobs is working to keep that industry healthy/growing really "being run by it" or is it just good policy? the good thing is we're stealing all those nice cali tech jobs so it won't be true forever ;)
    - Bud 4y ago
      - galangalalgol 4y ago
        Vouching for this, because while the wording was confrontational, the points being expressed are valid. Apart from the water kinda. West Texas where they depend on groundwater for irrigation is screwed, but the rest is really well planned and run reservoir systems that catch several states worth of watershed. Agree with the politics or not. TX isn't going to grab talent from states with strongly pro-choice workforces at nearly the rate it used to. And the climatic extremes are bad and seemingly getting worse, anthropogenic or not. This summer was brutal, the last was as well, and both winters were fairly horrific as well. Partially because, as pointed out, the power grid isn't up to the current load. I love TX, but it is because of the friendly people, the power infrastructure and climate situations are atrocious, and TX abortion laws are absolutely going to affect the influx of knowledge workers.
        newaccount2021 4y ago
        "I had a great job offer in TX but didn't go because of abortion" people only say things like this online, not in real life do you see a baggage train of abortion refugees leaving Austin? people will be upset about this, very few will change their life plans over it
        galangalalgol 4y ago
        Vouching for this too, because it is a reasonable and possibly correct observation. I think people are less likely to leave than they are to weigh it as a factor when deciding to go to Austin vs stay where they are. Why can't we have conversations about this stuff without voting each other into oblivion?
  - dang 4y ago
    Please don't post unsubstantive comments and particularly please don't take HN threads into flamewar hell. https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html
- irrational 4y ago
  It’s a blatant euphemism that anyone not invested in the oil industry wouldn’t use.
  - arcbyte 4y ago
    nah, its just thay saying "oil" is too narrow because a huge amount of the extraction is also natural gas. Hydrocarbon is both very clear and accurately specific.
    - chiefalchemist 4y ago
      Oil and gas would be clearer and less ambiguous. Using jargon / euphemism is poor communication.
- joeblubaugh 4y ago
  Oil

mc32 4y ago

San Jose CA also suffers from subsidence as a result of water withdrawal[1]. There is also a seasonal aspect to it. [1]http://explore.museumca.org/creeks/z-subsidence.html http://explore.museumca.org/creeks/z-subsidence.html

quarterdime 4y ago

Thanks for the arcgis link. It is interesting to compare to the Sentinel 1A data from the study[0]. For example there is one existing (ground based) measurement East of Mont Belvieu (P050), but most of the displacement in the satellite data appears just to the West, centered on Mont Belvieu. This is by eye only, so I may be mistaken in comparing the locations. The ground based measurement for sensor P050 reports up-down displacement of -0.07 cm per year between 2017 and 2020. It is difficult to determine the exact value from a shaded image, but the satellite data show that just to the West of this ground based measurement (about centered on Mont Belvieu), displacement was -1.91 to -0.85 cm per year between 2016 and 2020 (see figure 3b). The arcgis site has useful data that could be used better compare trends for the same dates [1]. I did not look at every year, but it looks like 50+ ground based measurements per year. The study's methods are a bit beyond me, but section 3 describes processing a total of 89 Single Look Complex (SLC) images from 2016 to 2020. I could not find any mention of exact dates. [0] https://www.mdpi.com/2072-4292/14/15/3831# https://www.mdpi.com/2072-4292/14/15/3831# [1] https://hgsubsidence.org/GPS/2021/P050_HRF20_neu_cm.col https://hgsubsidence.org/GPS/2021/P050_HRF20_neu_cm.col

victor106 4y ago

Thanks for the info. One of the reasons I like to read comments first before the article