Energy production has increased over the last decade in the Bakken region of North Dakota with the use of new technology. This has resulted in an increase in traffic on unpaved roads in working rangeland landscapes. While sections of unpaved roads near rural residences and communities are treated with dust-reducing suppressants, little is done for range and farmlands. Our objective was to identify potential effects of fugitive road dust by determining: 1) the area of impact for dust deposition, 2) concentrations of dust particle sizes of concern for animal and human health, 3) patterns between environmental conditions, traffic counts and dust deposition, and 4) effects of dust on plant performance. Marble-pan passive sampler arrays were installed to collect fugitive dust in crop fields along transects perpendicular to roads. Particulate matter analyzers were used to collect concentrations of PM-10 and PM-2.5 at distances from roads. Wheat and corn fields were chosen for their regional prevalence and stand homogeneity. Deployed simultaneously, traffic counters and weather stations gathering temperature, relative humidity, wind direction, wind speed, and precipitation were installed at each site to contextualize dust deposition. We measured various plant physiological parameters including: photosynthetic activity, chlorophyll content, stomatal conductance, and leaf reflectance along transects perpendicular to the road. As energy production increases traffic in other working rangeland landscapes, our data connecting traffic and plant impacts from fugitive road dust are applicable to areas experiencing similar growth.
Oral presentation and poster titles, abstracts, and authors from the Society for Range Management (SRM) Annual Meetings and Tradeshows, from 2013 forward.