Post 5: Network Analysis

Goals and Objectives
Frac sand mining has created booming industries. Increased production for supplies as well as means of transpiration have been implemented for production, processing and distribution processes. Roughly five days a week large trucks travel over the rural roads, transporting approximately 40 million tons of sand a year from Wisconsin.

The transportation of frac sand results in great impacts on the local roads going from the mines to railroad terminals. By using network analysis, the sand from the mines to the nearest railroad terminal will be routed. The number of tips that the trucks take will then be estimated along with the cost created from the traffic on the local roads. The mines will be selected based on the following criteria:

• Must be active
• Must not have a rail loading station on-site
• Must not be within 1.5 km of a rail line

Methods
A script was completed using the criteria that was previously listed above. After the mines were selected, network analysis was used to route te sand from these mines to te rail terminals. Then the impact on the roads can be calculated. ModelBuilder is an application used to create, edit, and manage models. It shows the workflow of geoprocessing tools used. Figure 1 shows the workflow for this study. The model was used as part of the processing in selected the impacted roads. Looking at specifically the counties in Wisconsin, the route length were determined per county. That allowed for the miles to be calculated as well as the costs per year.

Figure 1. Model used to create the workflow using tools.

Results and Discussion 
With trucks transporting to and from frac sand mines, 21 counties were affected in the state of Wisconsin. The mines selected for this study do not have a rail road attached to its property. Figure 2 highlights the impacted counties as well as heavily used streets during the transportation process.

Figure 2. Map of all the mines that do not have a rail attached to property and streets affected by transportation.

Figure 3 also looks at how the routes could be used to potentially be transported to rail terminals.To reduce the impact of trucks driving on particular roads, these trucks could be bringing the resources to a rail terminal for the rest of the transportation process. In many cases, the routes from the mines linked to rail terminals.

Figure 3. Map of mines and routes in respect to rail terminals and railroads.

After assessing which counties were impacted by transportation, routes were selected by which were the most prominent. The length of the route was then determined by county. Table 1 shows the hypothetical costs that could be associated with each county for potential upkeep and repairs to the county roads. It was assumed that each sand mine 50 truck trips per year to the rail terminal. The truck has to return to the sand mine, so that number needs to be doubled to account for there and back. The hypothetical cost was estimated to be 2.2 cents per mile. Looking again at Table 1, Chippewa County will have the most estimated costs for roads at $726.30 per year.  Barron, Wood and Trempealeau County are next in line for the high expenses in Wisconsin.

Table 1. Table of hypothetical costs and number of trips taken on routes.

To break down the costs even more, Figure 4 shows a linear model of the transportation costs. The equation of the slope is defined as y = 2.2x + 0.000004. Many of the counties have predicted costs on the lower end. Chippewa County is the high outlier, with higher costs, Barron County in the middle of the trend line, and Wood and Trempealeau following behind it.

Figure 4. Chart of transportation costs.

Conclusions
Many of the frac sand mines in are located in a specific area in Wisconsin. With an industry that is still growing, the need for transportation of the resources accelerates with production. This will leave damages on the roads. It was shown that there was a relationship between roads and rail terminals. In other words, these trucks could be transporting the resources to rail terminals for the rest of the transportation process. However, this leads the county and cities within them to fix the damages of the roads. Since West Central Wisconsin is known for their sand mining, places like Chippewa, Barron, and Trempealeau county are left with a great deal of expenses.

References
ESRI street map USA
ESRI. 2016. "What is ModelBuilder?" ArcMap. Accessed April 24, 2017.    http://desktop.arcgis.com/en/arcmap/latest/analyze/modelbuilder/what-is-modelbuilder.htm.
Hart, Maria V., Teresa Adams, and Andrew Schwartz. 2013. "Transportation Impacts of Frac Sand  Mining in the MAFC Region: Chippewa County Case Study." White Paper Series.