Estimating the Consumptive Use Costs of Shale Natural Gas Extraction on Pennsylvania Roadways
Publication: Journal of Infrastructure Systems
Volume 20, Issue 3
Abstract
The development of natural gas resources in the Marcellus Shale formation has progressed rapidly in the last several years, particularly in the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania. These activities require many heavy truck trips for equipment and materials, which can damage state and local roads that were not designed for high volumes of heavy truck traffic. For state transportation agencies, one measure of costs of shale gas development is the potential degradation of roadways resulting from shale gas development. This technical note, provides a first-order an estimate of roadway consumptive use costs of additional heavy truck traffic on Pennsylvania state-maintained roadways from Marcellus Shale natural gas development in 201, estimated at 1 about $13,000–$23,000 per well for all state roadway types, or $5,000–$10,000 per well if state roads with the lowest traffic volumes are excluded. This initial estimate of costs, is based on data on the distribution of well activity and roadway type in Pennsylvania, estimates for the number of heavy truck trips to construct and operate a single well, the corresponding equivalent single-axle loadings, and estimates of roadway life and reconstruction costs by roadway maintenance class in Pennsylvania.
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Acknowledgments
This research was funded by the RAND Corporation’s Investment in People and Ideas program. Support for this program is provided, in part, by the generosity of RAND’s donors and by the fees earned on client-funded research. We thank Pennsylvania Department of Transportation (PennDOT) staff and the Pennsylvania Department of Environmental Protection (PA DEP) for providing data and helpful comments, and the anonymous peer-reviewers whose comments have substantially improved this manuscript.
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Information & Authors
Information
Published In
Journal of Infrastructure Systems
Volume 20 • Issue 3 • September 2014
Copyright
© 2014 American Society of Civil Engineers.
History
Received: Mar 1, 2013
Accepted: Nov 20, 2013
Published online: Feb 18, 2014
Discussion open until: Jul 18, 2014
Published in print: Sep 1, 2014
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