Sand in the machine

The Economist reports that sand is in demand:

India’s “sand mafia” is doing a roaring trade. The Times of India estimates that the illicit market for sand is worth around 150bn rupees ($2.3bn) a year; at one site in Tamil Nadu alone, 50,000 lorryloads are mined every day and smuggled to nearby states. Gangs around the country frequently turn to violence as they vie to continue cashing in on a building boom.

Much of the modern global economy depends on sand. Most of it pours into the construction industry, where it is used to make concrete and asphalt. A smaller quantity of fine-grade sand is used to produce glass and electronics, and, particularly in America, to extract oil from shale in the fracking industry. No wonder, then, that sand and gravel are the most extracted materials in the world. A 2014 report by the United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP) estimates they account for up to 85% by weight of everything mined globally each year. [. . . ]

Sand may appear plentiful, but is in fact becoming scarce. Not all types are useful: desert sand is too fine for most commercial purposes. Reserves also need to be located near construction sites; as transport costs are high compared with the price, it is usually uneconomical to transport sand a long distance. That, though, does not stop countries with limited domestic resources (and deep pockets). Singapore and Qatar are big importers; the Burj Khalifa skyscraper in Dubai was built using Australian imports.

I have stayed in the Armani hotel (someone else was paying, obviously) at the Burj Khalifa, the tallest building in the world, and been to the outdoor observation platform on Level 148, 555 metres up: I would not have been so confident had I known it was a hotel built on Australian sand.

So here are Lee Hazlewood and Nancy Sinatra in 1968 from their timeless album Nancy and Lee: