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Do earthquakes
release most, or just a
small fraction of the
strain energy that is
stored in the crust?
Earthquake energy balance: Griffith criteria
Earthquake energy balance: dynamic shear crack
where 1 and 2 are initial and final stresses, respectively, and the
minus sign indicates a decrease in elastic strain energy.
Earthquake energy balance: frictional dissipation and surface
energy
The frictional dissipation:
U F (t) = F (t)Vdt,
U S = 2A,
where is the energy per unit area required to break the atomic
bonds, and A is the rapture dimensions. Experimental studies
show that is verysmall,
and thus surface energy is very small
compared to the radiated energy (but not everyone agrees with
this argument).
Earthquake energy balance: the simplest model
Byerlee, 1978
Earthquake energy balance: seismic efficiency
Using:
So, the radiated energy makes only a small fraction of the energy
that is available for faulting.
A section perpendicular
to the SAF plane: