Relationship Between Oil and Gas Energy Developments and Pavement Conditions in Texas

In recent years, the state of Texas has experienced a significant increase in oil and gas well developments thanks to advancements in drilling technology. While the private sector has enhanced Texas’ economy, the new unconventional drilling methods tend to generate high volumes of truck traffic. Many of the affected roads were never designed to carry high truck volumes and heavy wheel loads. The result has been accelerated pavement deterioration, degradation of roadside infrastructure, and increases in congestion, crashes and air emissions. In an effort to gain a better understanding of the transportation system and be able to effectively respond to existing and future transportation needs, the Texas Legislature asked for the documentation of locations and trends of oil and gas well developments throughout the state and the investigation of the relationship between energy developments and pavement conditions. Addressing these objectives required the analysis of several datasets including oil and gas well locations, drilling permit attribute data, oil and gas production data, injection well data, pavement condition scores, and maintenance expenditures. The analysis showed that pavement conditions worsened in most areas where oil and gas well developments were particularly active, even though the roadway maintenance expenditures had substantially increased by more than 100%. The results can be used to update current policies and adjust funding allocation formulas. Some of the findings can be used as the basis to develop forecasting tools, which may be useful in situations where certain factors remain reasonably stable and there is a need for high-level predictions.

• Supplemental Notes:
  • This paper was sponsored by TRB committee AHD20 Standing Committee on Pavement Maintenance.
• Corporate Authors:

  Transportation Research Board

  500 Fifth Street, NW
  Washington, DC  United States  20001
• Authors:
  • Holik, William
  • Tsapakis, Ioannis
  • Quiroga, Cesar
• Conference:
  • Transportation Research Board 96th Annual Meeting
  • Location: Washington DC, United States
  • Date: 2017-1-8 to 2017-1-12
• Date: 2017

Language

• English

Media Info

• Media Type: Digital/other
• Features: Figures; Maps; References; Tables;
• Pagination: 16p
• Monograph Title: TRB 96th Annual Meeting Compendium of Papers

Subject/Index Terms

• TRT Terms: Deterioration; Development; Expenditures; Gas industry; Location; Mathematical prediction; Oil well drilling; Pavement maintenance; Pavements; Truck traffic
• Uncontrolled Terms: Fund allocations; Oil industry
• Geographic Terms: Texas
• Subject Areas: Finance; Highways; Maintenance and Preservation; Pavements;

Filing Info

• Accession Number: 01625886
• Record Type: Publication
• Report/Paper Numbers: 17-05508
• Files: TRIS, TRB, ATRI
• Created Date: Feb 13 2017 5:19PM