Rebecca Anguiano

Brenda Santistevan
Math 1210-Pipeline Project
12/3/15
To the CEO,
In regards to your request for finding the least amount of pipe and shortest distance it would
require to run a line of pipe across private grounds, I am glad to say I have made those
calculations and found the solution for five of the following scenarios, for which only one can be
the optimal way to run pipeline across private grounds with minimal cost. Below you will find a
report of the calculated steps on how I solved for each of the five options.
To begin with, we now know the costs for the materials needed, including labor, fees, and
additional studies to perform the pipeline project. Below is a list of the following.
Costs:
Pipeline across BLM ground- $475,000 per mile * X (being miles)
Pipeline across Mountains- $4,600,000 + (normal cost) $475,000 per mile * X
Environmental Impact Study- $500,000 + 6 months * $115,000 = $1,119,000
Pipeline across Private ground- $350,000 per mile * X + (normal cost) $475,000 per mile * X
Knowing this, we can now determine the cost of running the pipeline strictly on BLM ground
with the first two cases.
Option 1: Having pipeline run west, south, then east to the Refinery.

The first thing I did was add each of

those pathways and multiplied the
resulted miles by the normal cost of
running pipeline across BLM ground.
BLM=

$475,000

(61miles)

BLM= $28,975,000
This is how much it will cost to run
pipeline through this path.

Option 2: Having pipeline run across the mountain east then south to the Refinery.
At this point, we know that building pipeline across the mountain will cost $4,600,000.
Although, this process would have to add several other fees. Such as, the original fee for building
pipeline multiplied by the total miles going through this specific pathway; the amount of money

it would take to perform an environmental study, and the extra $690,000 because of the extra six
months it would take to do that. The total distance from the factory across the mountain to the
refinery can be determined by subtracting the total 38 miles by the extra 9 miles going west,
giving us 29 miles.
BLM= $4,600,000 + $500,000 +
6($115,000) +

$475.000

(43 miles)

Miles cancel out with Miles giving us:

BLM= $4,600,000 + $500,000 +
$690,000 +$20,425,000
BLM= $26,215,000
This would be the total amount of
money it would take to run pipeline
across the mountain to the Refinery.

Option 3: Building pipeline across private grounds cutting through one direction (The shortest
distance to the Refinery).
Because we want to know how much it will cost to run pipeline straight from the factory
to the refinery, it would be impossible to determine without knowing the total distance of that
pathway. Without the extra 9 miles going west, we know the distance going straight south is 14
miles, and the distance going west is 29 miles. We can use this to solve our distance C.
C= 142 + 292 = 1037 miles
Knowing this, we can find the total cost for
running pipeline through this path.
Multiplying the the resulted miles we just
solved for by the cost for building through
private ground and the original fee.
Cost for Private grounds (Cpg)=
(1037 miles)(
(1037 miles)(

$350,000

$825,000

$475,000

)=

Miles cancels out with Miles giving us:

Cpg=$26,567,049.61
The total cost for building the pipeline through this path.

Option 4: Running Pipeline directy south from the factory then east to the refinery.
Using the same diagram from above, like mentioned before, we have are known
distances. Our 14 miles going south would have to be mulipied by the cost it would take to build
through private grounds (since it is cutting through private ground) and the original BLM fee.
Our 29 miles would just have to be multiplied by the orginal BLM fee.
Cost of Private ground/ BLM grond
(Cpg/blm)=
$350,000

$475,000

$475,000

14miles(
14miles(

)+ 29miles(

)+

Miles cancels out with miles leaving us with:

Cpg/blm= $4,900,000 + $13,775,000 +
$6,650,000
Cpg/blm= $25,325,000
The total cost for building pipeline south from
the factory then east to the refinery.
From the above calculations for each option, we can easily say that each time weve
solved the total costs, the amount of pipeline being used has decreased while still having a very
expensive cost to build. Although Option 4 turned out to be the cheapest option by far, we still
have to figure out if there may be a better and cheaper option. Which is why we have a scenario
involving running the pipeline through private ground at some angle intersecting with BLM
ground to the south and then running east to the refinery.
Option 5:
Looking at the diagram we can say that
the extra piece of distance heading east
to the refinery is going to be a certain
distance X, meaning our distance of 29
miles is now 29-X. Our next job is to
find the total cost of running pipeline
down this path without having knowns,
which we have to solve for.

The first unknown we should be solving for is our distance F. Like we did before in
option 4, we use both of our known sides to solve for it. Leaving us with:
F= 142 + (29 )2
When multiplying out the inside of the square root we get:
F= 196 + ( 2 + 58 + 841)
We can now use our newly solved distance (also known as the first unknown, F), and set up a
function of cost in terms of X, C(X). this will help us determine our second unknown, X. We
can now find the minimal cost it would take to make the pipeline, by optimizing the amount of
pipeline used. The next step we take is using our known distance and multiply it by the cost of
running pipeline through private grounds, and adding that to the original BLM fee for our
function set up.
$825,000

$475,000

C(X)= (

) (196 + 2 58 + 841) + (

In a more simplified way:

C(X)= ($825,000)*( 2 58 + 1037) + $475,000
replacing the radical by raising the distance (F) by one half, we have:
C(X)= (825,000)( 2 58 + 1037)1/2 + 475,000
Now that we have this, we can derrive it. Using the derivative of the cost function we can find
the critical points, which represent the minimum and the maximum distances in the C(X)
function.
825,000

C(X)= 2
Simplified:

412,500(258)

C(X)= 2

( 2 58 + 1037)2 (2 58) + 475,000

58+1037

+ 475,000

Setting this equal to zero would give us one of the potential points or distances (also known as
our second unknown, X). But we can also graph our original function of cost C(X) to find the
minimal cost or X-value by using a graphing simulator. As shown in the diagram below.
412,500(2 58)
2 58 + 1037

+ 475,000 = 0

Judging from the graph, we can say that 19.141 is one of our distances for optimizing the
amount of pipeline being built. But what if that isnt the one and only potential X-value?
Possibly, there may be other critical points. When finding other points you have to be able to
determine where the derivative of the function will be undefined. Lets say we set the
denominator of our derived function C(X) equal to zero and solve it, the solutions would tell us
where the cost function will be undefined, note that this works because anything divided by zero
is undefined.
But what about potential negative points or X-Values?
Since the denominator is a square root, answers that result in a negative answer are impossible,
which is why we solve for anything that results as a zero.
Lets figure out if that could be possible by setting the denominator equal to zero:
( 2 58 + 1037)2 = (0)2
Squaring boths sides will get rid of the radicals.
2 58 + 1037 = 0
At this point we would have to use the quadratic formula and solve:
58 582 4(1)(1037)
2(1)
58 3,364 4,148
2
58 784
2
From here we would have to stop solving and realize that this would be impossible to
solve for, because you cant take the square root of a negative number without going into
imaginary numbers. That would be too far from the goal we were trying to reach. This tells us
that C(X) is defined in all locations in the real plane. Additionally, the potential points of
negative numbers would not be considered as optimal values, because having negative distance
just wouldnt make sense. This leads us back to our first potential point X=19.141. To further
prove this was our only optimal distance, I graphed the derived function C(X) using a graphing
simulator. As seen below:
This graph shows the function
only crosses at one point on the Xaxis, with the X-value being what
we graphically solved for, 19.141.

Now that we know our distance, all thats left is to use our founded X-value and plug it
into our original function C(X). This way we can find the exact total amount of money we would
need to run pipeline through the specific path mentioned in the beginning of Option 5.
Plugging into original function:
C(19.141) = 825,00019.1412 58(19.141) + 1037 + 475,000(19.141)
C(19.141)= $23,218,516.30
This cost would be the total amount of money needed to perform our Option 5. Which concludes
that the final option is by far the cheapest way for running pipeline from the well at some angle
() intersecting BLM ground heading to the refinery.
This leads us to the last thing we need to know, which is the exact angle we would need
to have for Option 5 to be successful. Because we know that our uknown value X is 19.141 we
can plug that into the green highlighted expressions in the diagram below.
We can use the resulted values to
perform an inverse tangent to solve
for our unknown angle ().
= tan1(

9.859
14

= 35.153

In conclusion the best option to go with would be option 5. Using this path would take
much less time and money to build, but using a lot more pipeline overall . We now know that our
solved angle from the well will help guide where pipeline should be built accurately, having the
most cost affective and better turn out from the rest of the options.