Water demand has increased exponentially since 2007 in western North Dakota. This increase can largely be traced to the advancement of technology in hydraulic fracturing (fracking) which has led to one of the largest oil booms in the country. Along with the recent oil boom, water depots have expanded and played a significant role in providing water for fracking. Using decentralized agent-based modeling (ABM) to model water allocation among water depots, a scenario analysis obtains results for four scenarios. Policy suggestions, based on the scenario analysis, include allowing greater access to LSMR water sources and restricting SW and GW use for the oil industry to reduce water scarcity in the Bakken. These results support allowing greater access to LSMR water sources for the oil industry as desired by the North Dakota State Water Commission (SWC), and other elected officials in the past decade.
| Identifer | oai:union.ndltd.org:ndsu.edu/oai:library.ndsu.edu:10365/28273 |
| Date | January 2016 |
| Creators | Borders, Michael Tyler |
| Publisher | North Dakota State University |
| Source Sets | North Dakota State University |
| Detected Language | English |
| Type | text/thesis |
| Format | application/pdf |
| Rights | NDSU policy 190.6.2, https://www.ndsu.edu/fileadmin/policy/190.pdf |
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