In recent years, Julia Coyle-Wheeler has been woken up by earthquakes rattling her house in Noble County more than once. She notes it was “alarming” when the shaking struck in the middle of the night, causing books and other belongings to fall off her bookcase and nightstand.  

According to the Ohio Department of Natural Resources’s seismic database, the magnitude of many of these earthquakes usually fell below 2.0 on a scale ranging from 1.0 to 8.0. However, these quakes were still concerning enough for Coyle-Wheeler to seek information and assistance, leading her to contact her insurance company.  

“The first thing a lot of us did, especially with big farms and animals, was call our insurance agent,” Coyle-Wheeler says. “I don’t know if anything’s covered, like cracks in your foundation or your house or your barn … there were a lot of calls about that.” 

Residents in Noble County have felt an uptick in earthquakes. According to the ODNR, 69 earthquakes were reported in the first half of 2025.  

“Yes, I felt it, I thought my house would cave in.” 

“It was definitely affiliated with Encino,” Coyle-Wheeler says, referring to the energy company Encino Acquisition Partners, acquired by EOG Resources. “…I think it’s connected to the shallow-well drilling.” 

In 2018, EOG took over some drilling and completion operations on a massive Utica Shale position it acquired from Chesapeake Energy Corp. The Utica Shale is an organic-rich, hydrocarbon-bearing formation buried thousands of feet deep in the Appalachian basin and the primary source for natural gas and oil operations in Southeast Ohio, according to the U.S. Energy Information Administration.  

In 2026, 16 wells have already been drilled in this basin, which is expected to yield higher production volumes, according to Oil Gas Leads, an industry source which provides intelligence for the energy sector. 

Celia Hawk, a Save Ohio Parks volunteer and a senior at Ohio University studying environmental studies, is keeping a close eye on Ohio’s fracking operations. She says Ohio parks are “being sold for fracking and to the oil and gas industry.” 

Over the summer with Save Ohio Parks, she studied mapping software, including ODNR’s interactive seismic map, to help document the increase in earthquakes in Ohio and how fracking may be linked. 

“Initially, researchers thought that injection wells were the only aspects of fracking that [are] linked to earthquakes because injection wells shoot fracking fluid into the ground and then that lubricates the plate boundaries and can lead to earthquakes,” Hawk says. “But recently, researchers have discovered that other fracking wells do the same thing because ODNR’s disturbing the boundaries underground.” 

In May 2025, ODNR halted operations at a Noble County well pad operated by EOG. This well pad was used to dispose of wastewater from oil and gas extraction. 

However, this has not stopped minor earthquakes from occurring altogether. Earthquakes that people cannot feel, below a magnitude of 3.0, can still pose risks, according to Hawk.  

These risks, according to Science Advances, a peer-reviewed scientific journal, include impacts on tectonic tremor synchronization.  

This means earthquake activity that may not fall on a fault line can still influence how large a fault breaks into segments. For human health, the risks have not yet been studied. 

“What’s most concerning to me about that is that truly, there hasn’t been a ton of research done exploring the long-term impact of large quantities of earthquakes,” Hawk says. “We don’t quite know what the long-term impacts of a ton of low-magnitude earthquakes really are on Ohio land.” 

Concern about long-term effects has not reached all areas of Ohio’s government yet. Ohio Republican Sen. Brian Chavez, representing Ohio’s 30th district, previously served as the CEO of Deeprock Energy and Deeprock Disposal Solutions, which owns various injection wells located in Noble County.  

According to Hawk, Chavez has received substantial political contributions from the oil and gas industry.  

“The thing is, they know that fracking causes earthquakes,” Hawk says. “They’re just willing to make the sacrifice.” 

Chavez has been appointed to serve on Ohio’s Oil & Gas Commission but faces an ethics complaint by a local advocacy group, Washington County for Safe Drinking Water, over his undisclosed ties to the aforementioned Deeprock companies.  

The complaint states in part that he has significant power over energy-related legislation, including Senate Bill 219, which would revise laws governing oil and gas wells and introduce more drilling in the region. 

In the meantime, Noble County residents continue to manage their lives around earthquake effects.  

Residents like Kimberly Smith commented on an Ohio Weather Network Facebook post about 2025 earthquakes with “Woke me up and shook the whole house,” and Christina Blattner Todd wrote, “Yes, I felt it, I thought my house would cave in.”  

People like Todd, Smith and Coyle-Wheeler are directly dealing with, or have dealt with, the fracking decisions made by Ohio’s oil and gas industry. 

“The thing is, they know that fracking causes earthquakes,” Hawk says. “They’re just willing to make the sacrifice.”