Sand mining
Encyclopedia
Sand mining is a practice that is becoming an environmental issue
as the demand for sand
increases in industry
and construction
. Sand is mined
from beach
es and inland dune
s and dredged from ocean beds and river
beds. It is often used in manufacturing as an abrasive
, for example, and it is used to make concrete
. As communities grow, construction requires less wood and more concrete, leading to a demand for low-cost sand. Sand is also used to replace eroded coastline.
Another reason for sand mining is for the extraction of minerals such as rutile
, ilmenite
and zircon
, which contain the industrially useful elements titanium
and zirconium
. These minerals typically occur combined with ordinary sand, which is dug up, the valuable minerals being separated in water by virtue of their different densities, and the remaining ordinary sand re-deposited.
Sand mining is a direct and obvious cause of erosion
, and also impacts the local wildlife
. For example, sea turtle
s depend on sandy beaches for their nesting, and sand mining has led to the near extinction of ghariyals (a species of crocodiles) in India
. Disturbance of underwater and coastal sand causes turbidity
in the water, which is harmful for such organisms as coral
s that need sunlight. It also destroys fisheries
, causing problems for people who rely on fishing for their livelihoods.
Removal of physical coastal barriers such as dunes leads to flooding of beachside communities, and the destruction of picturesque beaches causes tourism
to dissipate. Sand mining is regulated by law in many places, but is still often done illegally.
and Goa
of India
. Sand mining is done by politically-controlled sand mafia. Conservation and environmental NGO Awaaz Foundation
filed a public interest litigation
in the Bombay High Court
seeking a ban on mining activities along the Konkan coast.
(Captain Cook's landing place in Australia
) to supply the expanding Sydney building market. It continued until 1990 with an estimate of over 70 million tonnes of sand having been removed. The sand has been valued for many decades by the building industry, mainly because of its high crushed shell content and lack of organic matter, it has provided a cheap source of sand for most of Sydney since sand mining operations began. The site has now been reduced to a few remnant dunes and deep water-filled pits which are now being filled with demolition waste from Sydney's building sites. Removal of the sand has significantly weakened the peninsula's capacity to resist storms. Ocean waves pounding against the reduced Kurnell dune system have threatened to break through to Botany Bay
, especially during the storms of May and June back in 1974 and of August 1998.
Sand Mining also takes place in the Stockton sand dunes north of Newcaslte and in the Broken Hill region in the far west of the state.
, Australia
(on North Stradbroke Island) provides a case study in the (disastrous) environmental consequences on a fragile sandy-soil based ecosystem, justified by the provision of low wage casual labor on an island with few other work options.
Sand mining contributes to the construction of buildings and development. However, the negative effects of sand mining include the permanent loss of sand in areas, as well as major habitat destruction.
, off the coast at Pakiri
and offshore from Little Barrier Island.
A sand mine had operated at Whiritoa
on the east coast of the North Island for 50 years extracting 180,000m3 of sand. Coastal sand mines currently operate at Maioro and Taharoa
to recover iron sand.
When an application was lodged in 2005 to mine iron sands on the seabed of the coast of Raglan local residents organised in opposition to the scheme. The application for the mining was turned down by Crown Minerals due to a lack of technical detail.
Environmental issue
Environmental issues are negative aspects of human activity on the biophysical environment. Environmentalism, a social and environmental movement that started in the 1960s, addresses environmental issues through advocacy, education and activism.-Types:...
as the demand for sand
Sand
Sand is a naturally occurring granular material composed of finely divided rock and mineral particles.The composition of sand is highly variable, depending on the local rock sources and conditions, but the most common constituent of sand in inland continental settings and non-tropical coastal...
increases in industry
Industry
Industry refers to the production of an economic good or service within an economy.-Industrial sectors:There are four key industrial economic sectors: the primary sector, largely raw material extraction industries such as mining and farming; the secondary sector, involving refining, construction,...
and construction
Construction
In the fields of architecture and civil engineering, construction is a process that consists of the building or assembling of infrastructure. Far from being a single activity, large scale construction is a feat of human multitasking...
. Sand is mined
Mining
Mining is the extraction of valuable minerals or other geological materials from the earth, from an ore body, vein or seam. The term also includes the removal of soil. Materials recovered by mining include base metals, precious metals, iron, uranium, coal, diamonds, limestone, oil shale, rock...
from beach
Beach
A beach is a geological landform along the shoreline of an ocean, sea, lake or river. It usually consists of loose particles which are often composed of rock, such as sand, gravel, shingle, pebbles or cobblestones...
es and inland dune
Dune
In physical geography, a dune is a hill of sand built by wind. Dunes occur in different forms and sizes, formed by interaction with the wind. Most kinds of dunes are longer on the windward side where the sand is pushed up the dune and have a shorter "slip face" in the lee of the wind...
s and dredged from ocean beds and river
River
A river is a natural watercourse, usually freshwater, flowing towards an ocean, a lake, a sea, or another river. In a few cases, a river simply flows into the ground or dries up completely before reaching another body of water. Small rivers may also be called by several other names, including...
beds. It is often used in manufacturing as an abrasive
Abrasive
An abrasive is a material, often a mineral, that is used to shape or finish a workpiece through rubbing which leads to part of the workpiece being worn away...
, for example, and it is used to make concrete
Concrete
Concrete is a composite construction material, composed of cement and other cementitious materials such as fly ash and slag cement, aggregate , water and chemical admixtures.The word concrete comes from the Latin word...
. As communities grow, construction requires less wood and more concrete, leading to a demand for low-cost sand. Sand is also used to replace eroded coastline.
Another reason for sand mining is for the extraction of minerals such as rutile
Rutile
Rutile is a mineral composed primarily of titanium dioxide, TiO2.Rutile is the most common natural form of TiO2. Two rarer polymorphs of TiO2 are known:...
, ilmenite
Ilmenite
Ilmenite is a weakly magnetic titanium-iron oxide mineral which is iron-black or steel-gray. It is a crystalline iron titanium oxide . It crystallizes in the trigonal system, and it has the same crystal structure as corundum and hematite....
and zircon
Zircon
Zircon is a mineral belonging to the group of nesosilicates. Its chemical name is zirconium silicate and its corresponding chemical formula is ZrSiO4. A common empirical formula showing some of the range of substitution in zircon is 1–x4x–y...
, which contain the industrially useful elements titanium
Titanium
Titanium is a chemical element with the symbol Ti and atomic number 22. It has a low density and is a strong, lustrous, corrosion-resistant transition metal with a silver color....
and zirconium
Zirconium
Zirconium is a chemical element with the symbol Zr and atomic number 40. The name of zirconium is taken from the mineral zircon. Its atomic mass is 91.224. It is a lustrous, grey-white, strong transition metal that resembles titanium...
. These minerals typically occur combined with ordinary sand, which is dug up, the valuable minerals being separated in water by virtue of their different densities, and the remaining ordinary sand re-deposited.
Sand mining is a direct and obvious cause of erosion
Erosion
Erosion is when materials are removed from the surface and changed into something else. It only works by hydraulic actions and transport of solids in the natural environment, and leads to the deposition of these materials elsewhere...
, and also impacts the local wildlife
Wildlife
Wildlife includes all non-domesticated plants, animals and other organisms. Domesticating wild plant and animal species for human benefit has occurred many times all over the planet, and has a major impact on the environment, both positive and negative....
. For example, sea turtle
Sea turtle
Sea turtles are marine reptiles that inhabit all of the world's oceans except the Arctic.-Distribution:...
s depend on sandy beaches for their nesting, and sand mining has led to the near extinction of ghariyals (a species of crocodiles) in India
India
India , officially the Republic of India , is a country in South Asia. It is the seventh-largest country by geographical area, the second-most populous country with over 1.2 billion people, and the most populous democracy in the world...
. Disturbance of underwater and coastal sand causes turbidity
Turbidity
Turbidity is the cloudiness or haziness of a fluid caused by individual particles that are generally invisible to the naked eye, similar to smoke in air. The measurement of turbidity is a key test of water quality....
in the water, which is harmful for such organisms as coral
Coral
Corals are marine animals in class Anthozoa of phylum Cnidaria typically living in compact colonies of many identical individual "polyps". The group includes the important reef builders that inhabit tropical oceans and secrete calcium carbonate to form a hard skeleton.A coral "head" is a colony of...
s that need sunlight. It also destroys fisheries
Fishery
Generally, a fishery is an entity engaged in raising or harvesting fish which is determined by some authority to be a fishery. According to the FAO, a fishery is typically defined in terms of the "people involved, species or type of fish, area of water or seabed, method of fishing, class of boats,...
, causing problems for people who rely on fishing for their livelihoods.
Removal of physical coastal barriers such as dunes leads to flooding of beachside communities, and the destruction of picturesque beaches causes tourism
Tourism
Tourism is travel for recreational, leisure or business purposes. The World Tourism Organization defines tourists as people "traveling to and staying in places outside their usual environment for not more than one consecutive year for leisure, business and other purposes".Tourism has become a...
to dissipate. Sand mining is regulated by law in many places, but is still often done illegally.
India
Sand mining is a practice that is becoming an environmental issue in India. Environmentalists have raised public awareness of illegal sand mining in the state of MaharashtraMaharashtra
Maharashtra is a state located in India. It is the second most populous after Uttar Pradesh and third largest state by area in India...
and Goa
Goa
Goa , a former Portuguese colony, is India's smallest state by area and the fourth smallest by population. Located in South West India in the region known as the Konkan, it is bounded by the state of Maharashtra to the north, and by Karnataka to the east and south, while the Arabian Sea forms its...
of India
India
India , officially the Republic of India , is a country in South Asia. It is the seventh-largest country by geographical area, the second-most populous country with over 1.2 billion people, and the most populous democracy in the world...
. Sand mining is done by politically-controlled sand mafia. Conservation and environmental NGO Awaaz Foundation
Awaaz Foundation
Awaaz Foundation is a charitable trust and non-governmental organization in Mumbai, India, which builds awareness, carries out advocacy, and is involved in educational projects to protect the environment and prevent environmental pollution. It has impacted many important decisions by the government...
filed a public interest litigation
Public interest litigation
In Indian law, Public Interest Litigation OR जनहित याचिका means litigation for the protection of the public interest. It is litigation introduced in a court of law, not by the aggrieved party but by the court itself or by any other private party...
in the Bombay High Court
Bombay High Court
Bombay High Court at Mumbai, Maharashtra, is the High Court of India with jurisdiction over the states of Maharashtra & Goa, and, the Union Territories of Daman and Diu and Dadra and Nagar Haveli...
seeking a ban on mining activities along the Konkan coast.
New South Wales
In the 1930s mining operations began on the Kurnell PeninsulaKurnell, New South Wales
Kurnell is a suburb in southern Sydney, in the state of New South Wales, Australia. Kurnell is located south of the Sydney central business district, in the local government area of the Sutherland Shire....
(Captain Cook's landing place in Australia
Australia
Australia , officially the Commonwealth of Australia, is a country in the Southern Hemisphere comprising the mainland of the Australian continent, the island of Tasmania, and numerous smaller islands in the Indian and Pacific Oceans. It is the world's sixth-largest country by total area...
) to supply the expanding Sydney building market. It continued until 1990 with an estimate of over 70 million tonnes of sand having been removed. The sand has been valued for many decades by the building industry, mainly because of its high crushed shell content and lack of organic matter, it has provided a cheap source of sand for most of Sydney since sand mining operations began. The site has now been reduced to a few remnant dunes and deep water-filled pits which are now being filled with demolition waste from Sydney's building sites. Removal of the sand has significantly weakened the peninsula's capacity to resist storms. Ocean waves pounding against the reduced Kurnell dune system have threatened to break through to Botany Bay
Botany Bay
Botany Bay is a bay in Sydney, New South Wales, a few kilometres south of the Sydney central business district. The Cooks River and the Georges River are the two major tributaries that flow into the bay...
, especially during the storms of May and June back in 1974 and of August 1998.
Sand Mining also takes place in the Stockton sand dunes north of Newcaslte and in the Broken Hill region in the far west of the state.
Queensland
A large and long running sand mine in QueenslandQueensland
Queensland is a state of Australia, occupying the north-eastern section of the mainland continent. It is bordered by the Northern Territory, South Australia and New South Wales to the west, south-west and south respectively. To the east, Queensland is bordered by the Coral Sea and Pacific Ocean...
, Australia
Australia
Australia , officially the Commonwealth of Australia, is a country in the Southern Hemisphere comprising the mainland of the Australian continent, the island of Tasmania, and numerous smaller islands in the Indian and Pacific Oceans. It is the world's sixth-largest country by total area...
(on North Stradbroke Island) provides a case study in the (disastrous) environmental consequences on a fragile sandy-soil based ecosystem, justified by the provision of low wage casual labor on an island with few other work options.
Sand mining contributes to the construction of buildings and development. However, the negative effects of sand mining include the permanent loss of sand in areas, as well as major habitat destruction.
United States
The current size of the sand mining market in the United States is slightly over a billion dollars per year. The industry has been growing by nearly 10% annually since 2005. The majority of the market size for mining is held by Texas and Illinois.New Zealand
Sand mining occurs in the Kaipara HarbourKaipara Harbour
Kaipara Harbour is a large enclosed harbour estuary complex on the north western side of the North Island of New Zealand. The northern part of the harbour is administered by the Kaipara District and the southern part is administered by the Rodney District...
, off the coast at Pakiri
Pakiri
Pakiri is a locality in Auckland, in the former Rodney District of New Zealand. Leigh is about nine km to the south-east. The Pakiri River flows through the area and into the Hauraki Gulf to the north-east.The area is named for the Ngāti Wai chief, Te Kiri....
and offshore from Little Barrier Island.
A sand mine had operated at Whiritoa
Whiritoa
Whiritoa is a small beach village on the Coromandel Peninsula between Whangamata and Waihi Beach. It has a permanent population in the low hundreds, which swells to over a thousand during the New Year holiday period....
on the east coast of the North Island for 50 years extracting 180,000m3 of sand. Coastal sand mines currently operate at Maioro and Taharoa
Taharoa
Taharoa is a small village on the West coast of the North Island of New Zealand to the south west of Kawhia Harbour. The main source of revenue is through iron sand mining run by BlueScope Steel Limited....
to recover iron sand.
When an application was lodged in 2005 to mine iron sands on the seabed of the coast of Raglan local residents organised in opposition to the scheme. The application for the mining was turned down by Crown Minerals due to a lack of technical detail.