According to ADOT, the use of the devices help with the distribution of oil by giving greater control in applying the oil during pavement preservation projects along Arizona’s highways. This allows crews to use less oil by limiting overspray onto the ground and landscaping next to the highway, protecting the environment.
A team of ADOT employees from different areas within the agency came together to develop the spray-guard device. According to ADOT, the team had not come across anything used elsewhere in the country to address the problem of over-spraying oil during pavement projects.
Other benefits of the spray guard include a reduction in the amount of time needed to clean the trucks after use on a highway project. What used to take two employees between four and eight hours to accomplish now takes one employee about an hour.
Along with the spray guard, the team also designed and built catch basins as a better way to contain and dispose of the oil washed off the trucks. The oil residue is washed off the truck into the catch basin where it is then pumped into 55-gallon drums for proper disposal.
The catch basins can be deployed at ADOT maintenance yards across the state which allow for more places to wash the oil trucks after use. The basins cost a fraction of the more industrial oil-water separators that are located at some of the district offices around the state.
ADOT officials hope that the savings produced as a result of the spray guard and the catch basin can help direct taxpayer money to other areas of need within the agency, allowing those dollars to go further toward a well-maintained highway system.