You may think of sand as part of your beach vacation, but
it's used for more than just sand castles. It's a commodity
like oil and copper and gold.
If you look around you, everything is made of sand.
It's a pretty crucial commodity. And even though
sand can be found in nearly every single country on Earth,
we could soon face a sand shortage. Turns out, sand is
only second to water as the most consumed raw material
worldwide. Sand mining is the largest mining industry in the
world. And yet, it flies under the radar, largely unregulated
and unknown.
All of society is basically built on sand and how come
there's no monitoring on that? And how come people are ready
to kill someone else for sand in some regions?
It's used in construction, like critical infrastructure,
and President Biden is diverting a lot of his
attention to America's infrastructure. Sand is also
used in chemical production, water filtration, fracking,
and of course, glass. So, all of your windows, computers and
cell phones.
You know, it's literally everywhere we're driving on
it. We're sitting in it. We're looking through it. It's
absolutely extraordinary. I'm really starting to be
concerned about what happens if we don't have this anymore.
Sand use around the world has tripled in the last 20 years.
That's far greater than the rate that sand is being
replenished.
One of the biggest sustainability challenges of
the 21st century simply because of the scale of the
problem. The more I learned about it, the more alarmed I
became.
So, the world is facing a sand crisis. And that's a problem.
I know what you're thinking: Yes, sand is everywhere. How
can there be a shortage?
Actually, in some places, the world was running out, and
it's such a hard concept to get your head around because
you think of coastlines and expansive deserts and just see
so much of it, that to think of it not being there is very,
very challenging.
It's a classic example of the tragedy of the commons. An
economic concept where everyone is incentivized to
keep consuming a natural resource, even if it ends in
overconsumption, and ultimately, the total
depletion of that resource,
So is it a crisis or not? And that's one of the hard things
with this topic, that it's a problem that manifests in very
different ways in very different places. So, I bet
you if you were in a community where sand mining is going on
like this is not a surprise to you at all.
I grew up in Bangalore in South India. As I grew up, I
constantly read reports about rivers being decimated because
of sand mining. And at the same time, I saw hundreds and
hundreds of sand filled trucks flying up and down the road in
the city of Bangalore. That was when the city was being
transformed to the Silicon Valley of India basically. A
construction boom happening all over and all that sand was
coming from precious places.
Construction has caused a steep increase in demand for
sand. And, a lot of sand is being extracted from oceans
and rivers.
It's not just shortage in the market at shortage in the
natural environment that has to be talked about. The
concern is that there's literally not enough sand on
coastlines in a context of rising sea levels and
increased storms.
Sand crafted by water is more valuable than desert sand
eroded by wind. That makes desert sand to smooth it
doesn't bind together as well as other types of sand. Sand
is sourced and extracted from seabeds, coastlines, quarries,
or rivers is more angular, so it locks together. And, that's
important because this kind of sand is a key ingredient in
cement and concrete.
And concrete is made up of 65 to 75%, sand and gravel.
Then there's glass, sand, gravel and rock crushed
together or melted down to make the glass used in every
window computer screen and smartphone
Glass is about 70% silica sand. So, there are very
specific types of sand that are required for specific
uses. And these places are limited.
Even the production of silicon computer chips uses sand, but
extracting sand can damage the environment.
Extractions of marine sand, coastal sand, beach... beach
is the worst. And rivers is something that is leading to
tremendous environmental impact
For oceans... Well, imagine you scrape sand off the bottom
of the ocean. That's going to affect the microorganisms that
live in the ocean floor. That's going to affect the
fish that eat the microorganisms, and then the
fish that eat those fish. Basically, the sand removal of
affects entire ecosystem. Sand is the most extracted resource
in the world by volume, surpassing even fossil fuels.
Actually, even extracting oil and gas uses a lot of sand,
like in fracking. And yet sand has been easy to ignore.
Essentially, it's invisible in our minds and in the way that
we manage the resource. We don't think about it like a
strategic resource. And yet it is everywhere in our societies
and our economies.
And as a result, we're wasting these resources. And in 2019,
we produced this report, which was submitted to the United
Nations Environmental Assembly, and it was used for
making a new resolution on a global mineral governance, and
it was adopted by all countries. And it was first
time that countries recognize that we have a problem with
sand.
This concept of panicking, it reminds me a little bit of
Great Thunberg talking about I want you to panic
I want you to panic.
When she was talking to the World Economic Forum, and it
didn't quite go that far.
Panicking will never be a solution. We will need sand
forever. It's something that we need a lot. So, we need to
be much wiser on the way we use the resource.
Right now, it's not really possible to monitor global
sand use.
We just don't know enough. We don't have that global picture
or that holistic picture of the extraction sites, the
extraction volumes, where it's coming from, where it's going
to how it's being used.
But it can be measured indirectly.
Construction is the biggest demand sector. We know that.
There's a very, very good correlation between the use of
sand and cement. The UN estimates that 4.1 billion
tons of cement is produced every year. And it takes
roughly 10 tons of sand to create one ton of cement. Do
the math, and...
41 billion tons of sand and gravel
That's enough to build a wall nearly 89 feet high by 89 feet
wide, that wraps around the planet every year. And that's
just sand used in cement production. Demand for cement
is driven primarily by China, where construction is booming.
In the last two decades, the amount of sand that we've been
using has been multiplied by three. More than 55, 58% is
being used in in China.
Part of the problem is some countries don't have
regulations in place.
And, then you have people who take sand from the beach. Take
in some parts of the world, there are even sand mafias sands from anywhere because they have to make a living. If
you have a shovel and access to your truck, you an entrepre
eur, you taking sand and you re selling it
There are sand mafia. It is a problem. That's for sure. And
so in some countries where the governance, the policies do
not exist, it's not even illegal to take sand.
Plus, the world faces a rapidly growing population. By
2050, the world could reach nearly 10 billion people.
Africa is going to see its population doubling from now
to 2050. People are shifting from their villages to join
the cities that will request more infrastructure in the
cities. All of that will request the amount of sand
Sand can't be extracted or sourced sustainably to meet
demand from a world of 10 billion people without
effective planning and regulation.
If you are a local government, you need to have a solid land
planning. Identify where the sand and gravels should be
extracted.
The challenge is understanding where it's okay to take it
from and how much
So it's important to plan ahead and to plan
alternatives.
It's a time for innovations in this area.
There's no one size fits all solution for the looming sand
crisis
we need many solutions that, you know, will also work
together. It's not going to be like one alternative material
is going to make the difference. I think it's going
to have to be a big group effort, a big push
collectively to figure this out.
Finding alternatives to sand, including recycled materials,
may help
We can recycle concrete so that we're not wasting that by
dumping these resources as a waste. Because it's not a
waste. It can be recycled
Our current economy is geared towards mining this material
at extreme cost to the environment and to society,
but that isn't factored in. We kind of build things and then
at the end of life, we simply toss it in the landfill. So
it's a very linear economy. But changing this to a
circular economy can be a significant solution. And the
circular economy is a way that keeps materials in use for
longer.
We can improve extracting in a better way by doing
environmental impact assessment prior to mine then
ining in appropriate way respe ting social and envir
nmental conditions, then we ca reduce the amount of sand
y being much more clever on ho we use it, so that means
planning for longer term in te ms of having a building that
s not done after 20, 30 yea s. We extend that to 50, 60 y
ars.
Sand is a finite resource. Every time we remove sand from
the ecosystem, we are taking away critical habitat. We ar
taking away coastal securit because sand along the coas
acts as a storm buffer. S , when we extract sand, it com
s at a cost and this needs to e really really balanced wi
h the needs of futu e generation