Assessment of the Gold Creek and Kakwa Seismic Clusters in Relation to Disposal Activities in the Leduc Formation

Water disposal into the Leduc Formation has been associated with seismic activity south of Grande Prairie, Alberta. In this assessment, we examine two main seismic clusters: (1) Gold Creek and (2) Kakwa. In both cases, events larger than magnitude ML>4 have been observed, including the ML=4.03 event in early October 2024 (Kakwa) and the ML=4.50 event in late October 2024 (Gold Creek). No damage has been registered from these events, although nuisance from nearby population centers has been reported. Given these significant events, we conduct a re-assessment of these cases in terms of event relocation, causation, and current seismic hazard trends. In both cases, we found an increase in the seismic hazard, peaking in 2023 for Gold Creek and in 2024 for Kakwa. A similar trend of increasing frequency of earthquakes is found, peaking in the year 2024 for both clusters. This increase in seismic hazard correlates with increasing disposal activities in the Leduc Formation.