<P> New techniques to avoid the saturation problem and to measure magnitudes rapidly for very large earthquakes are being developed . One of these is based on the long period P - wave; the other is based on a recently discovered channel wave . </P> <P> The energy release of an earthquake, which closely correlates to its destructive power, scales with the ​ ⁄ power of the shaking amplitude . Thus, a difference in magnitude of 1.0 is equivalent to a factor of 31.6 (= (10 1.0) (3 / 2) (\ displaystyle = ((10 ^ (1.0))) ^ ((3 / 2)))) in the energy released; a difference in magnitude of 2.0 is equivalent to a factor of 1000 (= (10 2.0) (3 / 2) (\ displaystyle = ((10 ^ (2.0))) ^ ((3 / 2)))) in the energy released . The elastic energy radiated is best derived from an integration of the radiated spectrum, but an estimate can be based on m b (\ displaystyle m_ (\ text (b))) because most energy is carried by the high frequency waves . </P> <P> The Richter magnitude of an earthquake is determined from the logarithm of the amplitude of waves recorded by seismographs (adjustments are included to compensate for the variation in the distance between the various seismographs and the epicenter of the earthquake). The original formula is: </P> <Dl> <Dd> M L = log 10 ⁡ A − log 10 ⁡ A 0 (δ) = log 10 ⁡ (A / A 0 (δ)), (\ displaystyle M_ (\ mathrm (L)) = \ log _ (10) A - \ log _ (10) A_ (\ mathrm (0)) (\ delta) = \ log _ (10) (A / A_ (\ mathrm (0)) (\ delta)), \) </Dd> </Dl>

How is magnitude measured using the richter scale