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The World in a Grain: The Story of Sand and How It Transformed Civilization
The gripping story of the most important overlooked commodity in the world--sand--and the crucial role it plays in our lives.
After water and air, sand is the natural resource that we consume more than any other--even more than oil. Every concrete building and paved road on Earth, every computer screen and silicon chip, is made from sand. From Egypt's pyramids to the Hubble telescope, from the world's tallest skyscraper to the sidewalk below it, from Chartres' stained-glass windows to your iPhone, sand shelters us, empowers us, engages us, and inspires us. It's the ingredient that makes possible our cities, our science, our lives--and our future.
And, incredibly, we're running out of it.
The World in a Grain is the compelling true story of the hugely important and diminishing natural resource that grows more essential every day, and of the people who mine it, sell it, build with it--and sometimes, even kill for it. It's also a provocative examination of the serious human and environmental costs incurred by our dependence on sand, which has received little public attention. Not all sand is created equal: Some of the easiest sand to get to is the least useful. Award-winning journalist Vince Beiser delves deep into this world, taking readers on a journey across the globe, from the United States to remote corners of India, China, and Dubai to explain why sand is so crucial to modern life. Along the way, readers encounter world-changing innovators, island-building entrepreneurs, desert fighters, and murderous sand pirates. The result is an entertaining and eye-opening work, one that is both unexpected and involving, rippling with fascinating detail and filled with surprising characters.
After water and air, sand is the natural resource that we consume more than any other--even more than oil. Every concrete building and paved road on Earth, every computer screen and silicon chip, is made from sand. From Egypt's pyramids to the Hubble telescope, from the world's tallest skyscraper to the sidewalk below it, from Chartres' stained-glass windows to your iPhone, sand shelters us, empowers us, engages us, and inspires us. It's the ingredient that makes possible our cities, our science, our lives--and our future.
And, incredibly, we're running out of it.
The World in a Grain is the compelling true story of the hugely important and diminishing natural resource that grows more essential every day, and of the people who mine it, sell it, build with it--and sometimes, even kill for it. It's also a provocative examination of the serious human and environmental costs incurred by our dependence on sand, which has received little public attention. Not all sand is created equal: Some of the easiest sand to get to is the least useful. Award-winning journalist Vince Beiser delves deep into this world, taking readers on a journey across the globe, from the United States to remote corners of India, China, and Dubai to explain why sand is so crucial to modern life. Along the way, readers encounter world-changing innovators, island-building entrepreneurs, desert fighters, and murderous sand pirates. The result is an entertaining and eye-opening work, one that is both unexpected and involving, rippling with fascinating detail and filled with surprising characters.
294 pages, Hardcover
First published August 7, 2018
About the author
Vince Beiser
4 books33 followersVince Beiser is an award-winning journalist based in Los Angeles. His first book, "The World in a Grain: The Story of Sand and How It Transformed Civilization" was a finalist for a PEN/E.O. Wilson Award and a California Book Award. “Stunning,” says NPR; “impassioned and alarming,” says the Washington Post.
Vince has reported from over 100 countries, states, provinces, emirates, kingdoms, occupied territories, liberated areas, no man’s lands and disaster zones. He has exposed conditions in California’s harshest prisons, trained with troops bound for Iraq, ridden with the first responders to disasters in Haiti and Nepal and hunted down other stories from around the world for publications including Wired, The Atlantic, Harper’s,The Guardian, Mother Jones, Playboy, Rolling Stone, The Wall Street Journal Magazine, The Los Angeles Times, and The New York Times.
Vince has also been a correspondent for the Emmy-winning news show SoCal Connected. Vince’s work has been honored by Investigative Reporters and Editors, the Society of Professional Journalists, the American Society of Journalists and Authors, the Columbia, Medill and Missouri Graduate Schools of Journalism, the National Mental Health Association, the Association of Alternative Newsweeklies and many other institutions. He has twice been part of a team that won the National Magazine Award for General Excellence, the magazine industry’s highest honor. He is also a grantee of the Pulitzer Center on Crisis Reporting.
Vince has reported from over 100 countries, states, provinces, emirates, kingdoms, occupied territories, liberated areas, no man’s lands and disaster zones. He has exposed conditions in California’s harshest prisons, trained with troops bound for Iraq, ridden with the first responders to disasters in Haiti and Nepal and hunted down other stories from around the world for publications including Wired, The Atlantic, Harper’s,The Guardian, Mother Jones, Playboy, Rolling Stone, The Wall Street Journal Magazine, The Los Angeles Times, and The New York Times.
Vince has also been a correspondent for the Emmy-winning news show SoCal Connected. Vince’s work has been honored by Investigative Reporters and Editors, the Society of Professional Journalists, the American Society of Journalists and Authors, the Columbia, Medill and Missouri Graduate Schools of Journalism, the National Mental Health Association, the Association of Alternative Newsweeklies and many other institutions. He has twice been part of a team that won the National Magazine Award for General Excellence, the magazine industry’s highest honor. He is also a grantee of the Pulitzer Center on Crisis Reporting.
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March 17, 2024
Rating: 4* of five
Watch this short film about the sand crisis.
This is a story first and foremost. It gives you the facts in a particular order that keeps the pace going and provides lots of momentum, but never sacrificed the factual nature of the story being told. The first four pages were recently excerpted in the DelanceyPlace.com newsletter. I think they do the best job of showing not telling you why the read was so good... and if you don't like this sample, you won't like the book. Here:
title: The World in a Grain: The Story of Sand and How It Transformed Civilization
publisher: Riverhead Books
date: Copyright 2018 by Vince Beiser
page(s): 1-4
The World in a Grain: The Story of Sand and How It Transformed Civilization is a book I forgot that I had on my Kindle until I saw it promoted today on DelanceyPlace com.
from [The World in a Grain: The Story of Sand and How It Transformed Civilization] by [[Vince Beiser]]. Sand, the most important solid substance on Earth:
{[Sand is the} most important solid substance on Earth, the literal foundation of modern civilization. … Sand is the main material that modern cities are made of. It is to cities what flour is to bread, what cells are to our bodies: the invisible but fundamental ingredient that makes up the bulk of the built environment in which most of us live.
"Sand is at the core of our daily lives. Look around you right now. Is there a floor beneath you, walls around, a roof overhead? Chances are excellent they are made at least partly out of concrete. And what is concrete? It's essentially just sand and gravel glued together with cement.
"Take a glance out the window. All those other buildings you see are also made from sand. So is the glass in that window. So are the miles of asphalt roads that connect all those buildings. So are the silicon chips that are the brains of your laptop and smartphone. If you're in downtown San Francisco, in lakefront Chicago, or at Hong Kong's international airport, the very ground beneath you is likely artificial, manufactured with sand dredged up from underwater. We humans bind together countless trillions of grains of sand to build towering structures, and we break apart the molecules of individual grains to make tiny computer chips.
"Some of America's greatest fortunes were built on sand. Henry J. Kaiser, one of the wealthiest and most powerful industrialists of twentieth-century America, got his start selling sand and gravel to road builders in the Pacific Northwest. Henry Crown, a billionaire who once owned the Empire State Building, began his own empire with sand dredged from Lake Michigan that he sold to developers building Chicago's skyscrapers. Today the construction industry worldwide consumes some $130 billion worth of sand each year.
"Sand lies deep in our cultural consciousness. It suffuses our language. We draw lines in it, build castles in it, hide our heads in it. In medieval Europe (and a classic Metallica song), the Sandman helped ease us into sleep. In our modern mythologies, the Sandman is a DC superhero and a Marvel supervillain. In the creation myths of indigenous cultures from West Africa to North America, sand is portrayed as the element that gives birth to the land. Buddhist monks and Navajo artisans have painted with it for centuries. 'Like sands through the hourglass, so are the days of our lives,' intone the opening credits of a classic American soap opera. William Blake encouraged us to 'see a world in a grain of sand.' Percy Bysshe Shelley reminded us that even the mightiest of kings end up dead and forgotten, while around them only 'the lone and level sands stretch far away.' Sand is both minuscule and infinite, a means of measurement and a substance beyond measuring.
"Sand has been important to us for centuries, even millennia. People have used it for construction since at least the time of the ancient Egyptians. In the fifteenth century, an Italian artisan figured out how to turn sand into fully transparent glass, which made possible the microscopes, telescopes, and other technologies that helped drive the Renaissance's scientific revolution.
"But it was only with the advent of the modern industrialized world, in the decades just before and after the turn of the twentieth century, that people really began to harness the full potential of sand and begin making use of it on a colossal scale. It was during this period that sand went from being a resource used for widespread but artisanal purposes to becoming the essential building block of civilization, the key material used to create mass-manufactured structures and products demanded by a fast-growing population.
"At the dawn of the twentieth century, almost all of the world's large structures -- apartment blocks, office buildings, churches, palaces, fortresses -- were made with stone, brick, clay, or wood. The tallest buildings on Earth stood fewer than ten stories high. Roads were mostly paved with broken stone, or more likely, not paved at all. Glass in the form of windows or tableware was a relatively rare and expensive luxury. The mass manufacture and deployment of concrete and glass changed all that, reshaping how and where people lived in the industrialized world.
"Then in the years leading up to the twenty-first century, the use of sand expanded tremendously again, to fill needs both old and unprecedented. Concrete and glass began rapidly expanding their dominion from wealthy Western nations to the entire world. At roughly the same time, digital technology, powered by silicon chips and other sophisticated hardware made with sand, began reshaping the global economy in ways gargantuan and quotidian.
"Today, your life depends on sand. You may not realize it, but sand is there, making the way you live possible, in almost every minute of your day. We live in it, travel on it, communicate with it, surround ourselves with it.
"Wherever you woke up this morning, chances are good it was in a building made at least partly out of sand. Even if the walls are made of brick or wood, the foundation is most likely concrete. Maybe it's also plastered with stucco, which is mostly sand. The paint on your walls likely contains finely ground silica sand to make it more durable, and may include other forms of high-purity sands to increase its brightness, oil absorption, and color consistency.
"You flicked on the light, provided by a glass bulb made from melted sand. You meandered to the bathroom, where you brushed your teeth over a sink made of sand-based porcelain, using water filtered through sand at your local purification plant. Your toothpaste likely contained hydrated silica, a form of sand that acts as a mild abrasive to help remove plaque and stains.
"Your underwear snapped into place thanks to an elastic made with silicone, a synthetic compound also derived from sand. (Silicone also helps shampoo make your hair shinier, makes shirts less wrinkle-prone, and reinforced the boot sole with which Neil Armstrong made the first footprint on the moon. And yes, most famously, it has been used to enhance women's busts for more than fifty years.)
"Dressed and ready, you drove to work on roads made of concrete or asphalt. At the office, the screen of your computer, the chips that run it, and the fiber-optic cables that connect it to the Internet are all made from sand. The paper you print your memos on is probably coated with a sand-based film that helps it absorb printer ink. Even the glue that makes your sticky notes stick is derived from sand."
***
If this appeals, then go forth and procure with confidence.
Watch this short film about the sand crisis.
This is a story first and foremost. It gives you the facts in a particular order that keeps the pace going and provides lots of momentum, but never sacrificed the factual nature of the story being told. The first four pages were recently excerpted in the DelanceyPlace.com newsletter. I think they do the best job of showing not telling you why the read was so good... and if you don't like this sample, you won't like the book. Here:
title: The World in a Grain: The Story of Sand and How It Transformed Civilization
publisher: Riverhead Books
date: Copyright 2018 by Vince Beiser
page(s): 1-4
The World in a Grain: The Story of Sand and How It Transformed Civilization is a book I forgot that I had on my Kindle until I saw it promoted today on DelanceyPlace com.
from [The World in a Grain: The Story of Sand and How It Transformed Civilization] by [[Vince Beiser]]. Sand, the most important solid substance on Earth:
{[Sand is the} most important solid substance on Earth, the literal foundation of modern civilization. … Sand is the main material that modern cities are made of. It is to cities what flour is to bread, what cells are to our bodies: the invisible but fundamental ingredient that makes up the bulk of the built environment in which most of us live.
"Sand is at the core of our daily lives. Look around you right now. Is there a floor beneath you, walls around, a roof overhead? Chances are excellent they are made at least partly out of concrete. And what is concrete? It's essentially just sand and gravel glued together with cement.
"Take a glance out the window. All those other buildings you see are also made from sand. So is the glass in that window. So are the miles of asphalt roads that connect all those buildings. So are the silicon chips that are the brains of your laptop and smartphone. If you're in downtown San Francisco, in lakefront Chicago, or at Hong Kong's international airport, the very ground beneath you is likely artificial, manufactured with sand dredged up from underwater. We humans bind together countless trillions of grains of sand to build towering structures, and we break apart the molecules of individual grains to make tiny computer chips.
"Some of America's greatest fortunes were built on sand. Henry J. Kaiser, one of the wealthiest and most powerful industrialists of twentieth-century America, got his start selling sand and gravel to road builders in the Pacific Northwest. Henry Crown, a billionaire who once owned the Empire State Building, began his own empire with sand dredged from Lake Michigan that he sold to developers building Chicago's skyscrapers. Today the construction industry worldwide consumes some $130 billion worth of sand each year.
"Sand lies deep in our cultural consciousness. It suffuses our language. We draw lines in it, build castles in it, hide our heads in it. In medieval Europe (and a classic Metallica song), the Sandman helped ease us into sleep. In our modern mythologies, the Sandman is a DC superhero and a Marvel supervillain. In the creation myths of indigenous cultures from West Africa to North America, sand is portrayed as the element that gives birth to the land. Buddhist monks and Navajo artisans have painted with it for centuries. 'Like sands through the hourglass, so are the days of our lives,' intone the opening credits of a classic American soap opera. William Blake encouraged us to 'see a world in a grain of sand.' Percy Bysshe Shelley reminded us that even the mightiest of kings end up dead and forgotten, while around them only 'the lone and level sands stretch far away.' Sand is both minuscule and infinite, a means of measurement and a substance beyond measuring.
"Sand has been important to us for centuries, even millennia. People have used it for construction since at least the time of the ancient Egyptians. In the fifteenth century, an Italian artisan figured out how to turn sand into fully transparent glass, which made possible the microscopes, telescopes, and other technologies that helped drive the Renaissance's scientific revolution.
"But it was only with the advent of the modern industrialized world, in the decades just before and after the turn of the twentieth century, that people really began to harness the full potential of sand and begin making use of it on a colossal scale. It was during this period that sand went from being a resource used for widespread but artisanal purposes to becoming the essential building block of civilization, the key material used to create mass-manufactured structures and products demanded by a fast-growing population.
"At the dawn of the twentieth century, almost all of the world's large structures -- apartment blocks, office buildings, churches, palaces, fortresses -- were made with stone, brick, clay, or wood. The tallest buildings on Earth stood fewer than ten stories high. Roads were mostly paved with broken stone, or more likely, not paved at all. Glass in the form of windows or tableware was a relatively rare and expensive luxury. The mass manufacture and deployment of concrete and glass changed all that, reshaping how and where people lived in the industrialized world.
"Then in the years leading up to the twenty-first century, the use of sand expanded tremendously again, to fill needs both old and unprecedented. Concrete and glass began rapidly expanding their dominion from wealthy Western nations to the entire world. At roughly the same time, digital technology, powered by silicon chips and other sophisticated hardware made with sand, began reshaping the global economy in ways gargantuan and quotidian.
"Today, your life depends on sand. You may not realize it, but sand is there, making the way you live possible, in almost every minute of your day. We live in it, travel on it, communicate with it, surround ourselves with it.
"Wherever you woke up this morning, chances are good it was in a building made at least partly out of sand. Even if the walls are made of brick or wood, the foundation is most likely concrete. Maybe it's also plastered with stucco, which is mostly sand. The paint on your walls likely contains finely ground silica sand to make it more durable, and may include other forms of high-purity sands to increase its brightness, oil absorption, and color consistency.
"You flicked on the light, provided by a glass bulb made from melted sand. You meandered to the bathroom, where you brushed your teeth over a sink made of sand-based porcelain, using water filtered through sand at your local purification plant. Your toothpaste likely contained hydrated silica, a form of sand that acts as a mild abrasive to help remove plaque and stains.
"Your underwear snapped into place thanks to an elastic made with silicone, a synthetic compound also derived from sand. (Silicone also helps shampoo make your hair shinier, makes shirts less wrinkle-prone, and reinforced the boot sole with which Neil Armstrong made the first footprint on the moon. And yes, most famously, it has been used to enhance women's busts for more than fifty years.)
"Dressed and ready, you drove to work on roads made of concrete or asphalt. At the office, the screen of your computer, the chips that run it, and the fiber-optic cables that connect it to the Internet are all made from sand. The paper you print your memos on is probably coated with a sand-based film that helps it absorb printer ink. Even the glue that makes your sticky notes stick is derived from sand."
***
If this appeals, then go forth and procure with confidence.
September 15, 2018
Ah sand. Who would have thought it could be the subject of such an interesting book? The exploitation of sand as a resource has been going on for a very long time but about 75 years ago with the boom in construction and the world’s population growth oriented towards cities the needle started to shift towards the unsustainable. Specifically the growth and urbanization of China, with more than 100 cities of more than a million people, in twenty years has equaled the use of concrete in the previous hundred years in the United States, accelerating the problem.
I don’t know if I’ll be thinking of this book much a year from now as many science books have very interesting material that goes in my good ear rattles around for a few weeks and then exits the other ear. But if we run out of the high grade sands in my lifetime without some scientifically feasible alternative to replace them, then I’ll most certainly recall this canary in the coal mine of a book.
So back to the book, it is well researched and well written and intended for lay people on a topic that is partly distressing while being mostly fascinating.
The book is broken down into eleven largely independent chapters. Each chapter corresponds to a different industry use for sand, why we are running out and the environmental effects on the earth of overconsumption.
There are many different types of sand and many applications require very particular sand. The areas covered include cement as in highways, cement for urban construction, glass, integrated circuits, coastal beach replenishment, island building in Dubai and the south China Sea, destruction of ocean bottoms near coastal regions to mine for sand, destruction of river beds to mine for sand and so on. Much more nuanced than I would have guessed as there are many positives that all of the aforementioned industries have provided society. The book finishes with a warning on overconsumption.
Probably the best 2018 science book that I’ve read as of September.
I don’t know if I’ll be thinking of this book much a year from now as many science books have very interesting material that goes in my good ear rattles around for a few weeks and then exits the other ear. But if we run out of the high grade sands in my lifetime without some scientifically feasible alternative to replace them, then I’ll most certainly recall this canary in the coal mine of a book.
So back to the book, it is well researched and well written and intended for lay people on a topic that is partly distressing while being mostly fascinating.
The book is broken down into eleven largely independent chapters. Each chapter corresponds to a different industry use for sand, why we are running out and the environmental effects on the earth of overconsumption.
There are many different types of sand and many applications require very particular sand. The areas covered include cement as in highways, cement for urban construction, glass, integrated circuits, coastal beach replenishment, island building in Dubai and the south China Sea, destruction of ocean bottoms near coastal regions to mine for sand, destruction of river beds to mine for sand and so on. Much more nuanced than I would have guessed as there are many positives that all of the aforementioned industries have provided society. The book finishes with a warning on overconsumption.
Probably the best 2018 science book that I’ve read as of September.
August 16, 2018
As if there isn't enough to worry about with the over population of the world...just wait until you delve through this one which is a real eye-opener on just what humans (the most invasive species of all) are doing to our planet. Sand is the 3rd most used natural resource after water and air and is in everything you have around you from your phone, your shampoo, toothpaste, the foundation of your house, the road you drive on and the paint on your walls-to name just a few; and the world is using it up at an alarming rate. I know you are thinking we would never use up all the sand in the world...well, think again because desert sands can't be used (read the book to learn why) so that leaves ocean floors and river beds that are being decimated and all the wildlife and coral reefs right along with them. Dubai is building palm shaped islands off its coast made out of sand and China is the world's largest asphalt consumer. There is a highway linking Beijing with Hong Kong that is a full 50 lanes wide! This book is a well written horror story...except it's non-fiction and if the world doesn't wake up to what humans are doing to it...just picture that hour glass filled with sand....when it's empty.
September 5, 2018
This is THE best nonfiction book I've read in a LONG time! I'm a person who's not very interested in things science/nature/technology, so it was rather a fluke that I even read it in the first place, let alone LOVED it. For starters, it's just the right length—255 pages ... with the perfect amount of information, but not TMI. The information/facts/data/stats are ALL fascinating, gripping, and mind-boggling. I was sitting on the proverbial edge of my seat reading this book, as if it was a thriller! Sand. SAND? A subject of consummate importance and deep source of delight? YES, seriously! There was never a dull moment to the very last grain. The WRITING flows, and there's even much good humor sprinkled throughout. I've gained a new and surprising understanding of the astonishing world of sand. If I sound hyberbolical in this review, so be it, because this book cannot be praised enough. And trust me when I say that you really, really NEED to KNOW about sand!!! OMG! Who knew? Not I.
January 12, 2019
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✱ A Grain of Sand: Nature's Secret Wonder
✱ The Immeasurable World: Journeys in Desert Places
✱ Stuff Matters: Exploring the Marvelous Materials That Shape Our Man-Made World
✱ Caesar's Last Breath: Decoding the Secrets of the Air Around Us
✱ Where the Water Goes: Life and Death Along the Colorado River
✱ The Secret Knowledge of Water
✱ The Human Age: The World Shaped By Us
✱ The Works: Anatomy of a City
✱ Salt
✱ Sugar: A Bittersweet History
✱ The Disappearing Spoon
✱ Concrete Planet
✱ Dirt: The Erosion of Civilizations
✱ A Grain of Sand: Nature's Secret Wonder
✱ The Immeasurable World: Journeys in Desert Places
✱ Stuff Matters: Exploring the Marvelous Materials That Shape Our Man-Made World
✱ Caesar's Last Breath: Decoding the Secrets of the Air Around Us
✱ Where the Water Goes: Life and Death Along the Colorado River
✱ The Secret Knowledge of Water
✱ The Human Age: The World Shaped By Us
✱ The Works: Anatomy of a City
✱ Salt
✱ Sugar: A Bittersweet History
July 23, 2020
Took me a while (it is about sand) but by the end, I felt that I understood the built world and how it came to be a little better.
Some notes:
* Four types of sand: Construction, marine, silica, and desert. Desert sand is useless because it is too round!
* Cement and concrete are different - cement is an ingredient in concrete. Moreover, the difference between asphalt and concrete is their binding agent (bitumens vs. cement respectively).
* One reason NYC switched to asphalt is because it does not absorb horse urine
* Replenished beaches rarely last more than 5 years before needing another round of replenishment
Some notes:
* Four types of sand: Construction, marine, silica, and desert. Desert sand is useless because it is too round!
* Cement and concrete are different - cement is an ingredient in concrete. Moreover, the difference between asphalt and concrete is their binding agent (bitumens vs. cement respectively).
* One reason NYC switched to asphalt is because it does not absorb horse urine
* Replenished beaches rarely last more than 5 years before needing another round of replenishment
December 26, 2018
I never even heard of sand pirates much less imagined it was a thing.
But apparently it is. Sand is one of the most utilized substances in the world and this book goes into some of the more extensive uses humanity has for sand -
Construction - concrete for buildings; bridges; dams; homes; roads since sand is not only in concrete but asphalt.
Glass - windows for buildings and vehicles; bottles; screens for laptops, televisions and cellphones; fiberglass kayaks, fiber-optic cables; camera lenses.
Highly specific sand grains for silicon computer chips.
More specific type for adding to the chemicals shot into a oil well bore for oil frakking.
Tourism - imagine some prime vacation spots without their beaches: Hawaii, Miami, the Riviera, Tahiti, and more. The pristine sand often has to be replaced after storms with sand imported from elsewhere.
Man-made land - not only the Palm Jebel Ali in Dubai, but in the Netherlands, Singapore, Japan, Hong Kong, China and more, dumping tons of sand to increase shorelines and acreage.
And then there are some of the unusual uses: microdermabrasion - or sandblasting your skin; sand sculpture contests.
And then there is the other side - China and Mongolia trying to plant thousands of trees in order to block the creeping sand and create more agricultural land.
Dredging for sea sand is inflicting massive damage to marine environments - coral reefs and fish habitats.
The demand for this resource is increasing daily while access to the material is becoming more limited. Earth can not keep up with the demands. Governments try to restrict plundering of their resources but criminal elements are more concerned with the money they can earn. Bribes and graft are common and even brutal assaults, threats and even murder of protesters.
This is about a little-known aspect of today's civilization and this book provides an eye-opening and fascinating look into the sand surrounding us.
But apparently it is. Sand is one of the most utilized substances in the world and this book goes into some of the more extensive uses humanity has for sand -
Construction - concrete for buildings; bridges; dams; homes; roads since sand is not only in concrete but asphalt.
Glass - windows for buildings and vehicles; bottles; screens for laptops, televisions and cellphones; fiberglass kayaks, fiber-optic cables; camera lenses.
Highly specific sand grains for silicon computer chips.
More specific type for adding to the chemicals shot into a oil well bore for oil frakking.
Tourism - imagine some prime vacation spots without their beaches: Hawaii, Miami, the Riviera, Tahiti, and more. The pristine sand often has to be replaced after storms with sand imported from elsewhere.
Man-made land - not only the Palm Jebel Ali in Dubai, but in the Netherlands, Singapore, Japan, Hong Kong, China and more, dumping tons of sand to increase shorelines and acreage.
And then there are some of the unusual uses: microdermabrasion - or sandblasting your skin; sand sculpture contests.
And then there is the other side - China and Mongolia trying to plant thousands of trees in order to block the creeping sand and create more agricultural land.
Dredging for sea sand is inflicting massive damage to marine environments - coral reefs and fish habitats.
The demand for this resource is increasing daily while access to the material is becoming more limited. Earth can not keep up with the demands. Governments try to restrict plundering of their resources but criminal elements are more concerned with the money they can earn. Bribes and graft are common and even brutal assaults, threats and even murder of protesters.
This is about a little-known aspect of today's civilization and this book provides an eye-opening and fascinating look into the sand surrounding us.
April 20, 2019
I haven't read any reviews but I suspect most will boil down to the same point - Who knew sand was so prominent in our lives? Having read and enjoyed the book I'm now seeing sand everywhere I look.
The book grew out of a magazine article and it's hard not to notice. It mostly works as a unified piece but some stories and histories were slightly long and tangential for my taste. At his best the author guides the reader through the characteristics and uses of sand by way of science, stories and statistics. He's at his best for the majority of the book. I also liked that the author spoke with a voice as someone who inhabits this world with the rest of us, he raises daunting environmental issues but recognizes the reality that it's not easy to give up the luxuries of economic prosperity.
The World in a Grain is strong popular science that applies to our everyday lives more than you might think, and that's part of the fun. I would recommend it to most readers.
The book grew out of a magazine article and it's hard not to notice. It mostly works as a unified piece but some stories and histories were slightly long and tangential for my taste. At his best the author guides the reader through the characteristics and uses of sand by way of science, stories and statistics. He's at his best for the majority of the book. I also liked that the author spoke with a voice as someone who inhabits this world with the rest of us, he raises daunting environmental issues but recognizes the reality that it's not easy to give up the luxuries of economic prosperity.
The World in a Grain is strong popular science that applies to our everyday lives more than you might think, and that's part of the fun. I would recommend it to most readers.
December 28, 2023
Y’all. Sand. Who knew? We don’t have enough of it, and there are literal violent black market sand cartels. We mine it (with devastating environmental consequence) for glass, fracking sand, and most of all, concrete. Did you know there are 40+ tons of concrete for every human being on the planet? We build new islands out of dredged sand (see Dubai and China’s military bases in the South China Seas). Most of our well loved beaches are supplied with sand purchased or stolen from other regions (Waikiki, Miami Beach, etc). I’m telling you, this book has altered my world view. Super great and fascinating read.
January 18, 2021
It's a little duped by this book. it has such promise when it talked about the interesting technological developments that were made possible because of sand, but then it would dive down into a rambling complaining session about how getting the sand is destroying the world.
It ended up being a environmentalist book masquerading as a technological development book. For example the tagline on the cover leads you to believe that it's more interested in the technological developments but in the end he was more interested in talking about the environmental impacts of it. I would say it was like one to four in terms of content of technological story versus environmentalist story.frankly I got tired of feeling like everything was destroying the planet.
It ended up being a environmentalist book masquerading as a technological development book. For example the tagline on the cover leads you to believe that it's more interested in the technological developments but in the end he was more interested in talking about the environmental impacts of it. I would say it was like one to four in terms of content of technological story versus environmentalist story.frankly I got tired of feeling like everything was destroying the planet.
July 16, 2019
This really blew my mind on the importance of sand. It seems like one of those bottomless resources--we have whole deserts of sands, for crying out loud. But not only is it not bottomless, we don't even really use desert sand (not the right shape of grain). The majority of sand we use is for concrete (buildings and roads), with some fun forays into the high tech industry and glass and beaches and land-building.
One thing that threw me off a little bit when I started this book was that I thought it'd be like Kurlansky's book on salt and we'd be getting a history of sand through the ages. Instead, it's a bit more focused on the modern age (in the last 100-150 years). It didn't suffer from it, though, as the subtitle of "how it transformed civilization" maybe actually be understating it. Beiser painted quite the picture early on, for example, with really showing the state of our roads before the modern rise of concrete. There's also an important but sad element as the author goes into the damage that sand-mining is doing to our environment. The illegal sand-mining he discovered in India was quite depressing!
I highly recommend this book to anyone with an interest in such a valuable commodity--and even if you're not, you should read it anyway so that I'm not the only one of my friends going around spouting sand facts.
One thing that threw me off a little bit when I started this book was that I thought it'd be like Kurlansky's book on salt and we'd be getting a history of sand through the ages. Instead, it's a bit more focused on the modern age (in the last 100-150 years). It didn't suffer from it, though, as the subtitle of "how it transformed civilization" maybe actually be understating it. Beiser painted quite the picture early on, for example, with really showing the state of our roads before the modern rise of concrete. There's also an important but sad element as the author goes into the damage that sand-mining is doing to our environment. The illegal sand-mining he discovered in India was quite depressing!
I highly recommend this book to anyone with an interest in such a valuable commodity--and even if you're not, you should read it anyway so that I'm not the only one of my friends going around spouting sand facts.
June 23, 2020
I picked up this book after hearing a fascinating interview with the author a couple of years ago.
The subject matter is interesting and Beiser’s writing was well organized and readable. He mixes researched information with first-hand interviews with people affected by or involved in industries that rely on sand.
The book covers the role of sand mining and dredging in our modern world of roads, concrete sidewalks, buildings and foundations, coastal land creation (for example, in Dubai), and beach replenishment. Beiser covers sand’s role in making glass and for silica used in high tech industries, and sand used for oil and gas fracking. Then there is sand mining piracy that occurs in some countries, including illegal theft of sand from beaches. There’s beach and coastal erosion, other environmental damage from sand mines... All this and the important distinction that desert sand, eroded by wind, is too round and for the most common uses for sand, it won’t do. The book touches on many subjects you may never have thought much about, and drives home the importance and ubiquity of sand products and uses that surround us. Beiser also points out looming issues such as increased scarcity of convenient sand and gravel sources, which will drive up cost, and the implications of that. In reading the book I alternated between a giddy feeling from learning new things and a malaise from pondering the downsides of our society’s unquenchable need and desire to take sand from ocean floors, lake bottoms, riverbeds, farmlands...
The book is worth checking out. I recommend it.
The subject matter is interesting and Beiser’s writing was well organized and readable. He mixes researched information with first-hand interviews with people affected by or involved in industries that rely on sand.
The book covers the role of sand mining and dredging in our modern world of roads, concrete sidewalks, buildings and foundations, coastal land creation (for example, in Dubai), and beach replenishment. Beiser covers sand’s role in making glass and for silica used in high tech industries, and sand used for oil and gas fracking. Then there is sand mining piracy that occurs in some countries, including illegal theft of sand from beaches. There’s beach and coastal erosion, other environmental damage from sand mines... All this and the important distinction that desert sand, eroded by wind, is too round and for the most common uses for sand, it won’t do. The book touches on many subjects you may never have thought much about, and drives home the importance and ubiquity of sand products and uses that surround us. Beiser also points out looming issues such as increased scarcity of convenient sand and gravel sources, which will drive up cost, and the implications of that. In reading the book I alternated between a giddy feeling from learning new things and a malaise from pondering the downsides of our society’s unquenchable need and desire to take sand from ocean floors, lake bottoms, riverbeds, farmlands...
The book is worth checking out. I recommend it.
May 30, 2019
A fascinating and horrifying book about a subject I never really though much about before. It turns out that not all sand is created equally, and the good stuff is being consumed at a crazy pace. Sand is big business and as it gets harder to legally procure people are being killed over this stuff. It's around us everywhere in roads, buildings and glass. It's being dredged from the ocean floor to make islands or extend existing ones and in the process destroying the local underwater habitats. More than twice as much concrete is used as a building material than wood and metal combined. Who knew? Add sand to the list of limited resources that we need to concern ourselves about for future generations.
January 27, 2020
So utterly fascinating.
I love books like this which are endless rabbit holes delving into aspects of something you take for granted and expounding them into fully fledged analyses.
Really enjoyed how each chapter was a sort of miniature focus of its own. Inspired me to want to read into every different subject discussed independently.
The interludes were fun.
I love books like this which are endless rabbit holes delving into aspects of something you take for granted and expounding them into fully fledged analyses.
Really enjoyed how each chapter was a sort of miniature focus of its own. Inspired me to want to read into every different subject discussed independently.
The interludes were fun.
April 12, 2019
Maybe I shouldn't have read this, because there goes my last bit of optimism :D
This is the scariest book I have ever read. It's not like with fossil fuels where I know we have alternatives that we can make work. Also, Rail Baltic, coming to a sandmine near you.
The book itself has lots of examples and deep-dives into the different areas of sand use. It was pretty easy and gripping.
I now have sand anxiety.
This is the scariest book I have ever read. It's not like with fossil fuels where I know we have alternatives that we can make work. Also, Rail Baltic, coming to a sandmine near you.
The book itself has lots of examples and deep-dives into the different areas of sand use. It was pretty easy and gripping.
I now have sand anxiety.
November 8, 2023
Very interesting and entertaining read. Enjoyable to learn about something I had no idea about before! Well written and thorough but not too technical or in the weeds.
April 24, 2024
3.5 rounded up
Informative and engagingly written, though a bit bleak and short on solutions.
Informative and engagingly written, though a bit bleak and short on solutions.
November 30, 2018
I read in an article the world is running out of sand because of unending concrete, glass and asphalt demand, so I read this book. Sand is made of loose grains a little larger than the width of a human hair. While some beaches have sand made of decomposed shells, 70% of sand is made of quartz. Quartz is a form of silica. Singapore, is the world’s largest sand importer. Sand theft is common; sand is even being stolen from the sea floor. Concrete is a mix of “about 75% aggregate, 15% water, and 10% cement, in which the cement binds to the aggregate”. The Romans were masters of concrete and when they stopped making it, no new concrete structures appeared “for more than a thousand years”. The best cement today is an old favorite, Portland Cement which constitutes 95% of the U.S. market. Concrete got reinforced with iron and steel because of concrete’s really poor tensile strength (doesn’t bend, but shatters). Asphalt got its start because horse manure and urine in the 1800’s got stuck in the joints of the brick and stone creating a health problem. Asphalt “didn’t soak up urine from the endless parade of horses that were the primary form of transport at the time.” Quick Quiz: What’s the difference between asphalt and concrete? It’s in the binding agent: “In concrete, its cement. In asphalt pavement, it’s bitumen.” Lewis Mumford sadly noted in the 50’s, the new highways “obliterate the towns they pass through.” Whole neighborhoods were bulldozed and/or “suddenly isolated”. “The average driver now puts 14,000 miles on his car each year – a 40 percent increase just since 1980.” Beiser does not mention the massive concrete/asphalt cost of building of Suburbia in the 50’s (counterproductively keeping people away from both their jobs and their food source). Quick Quiz #2: Why does clear glass look green from the side? Because iron is the most common impurity in sand.
You need the finest purest sand if you are working in high tech to form the most complicated man-made objects, and that is called Iota 8. A ton of Iota 8 is $10,000 while construction sand is “a few dollars a ton.” Salacious Southern California beach fact: “topless men were still being arrested as late as 1929.” Sadly, desert sand won’t work at all for either concrete or land reclamation because “The grains are too rounded to lock together strongly.” This means with increasing desertification, we are creating sands we don’t need, while running out of the sand we need. Europe has 35 cities with over a million people. Amateurs! China has “more than 220 cities with over one million inhabitants.” That took a lot of sand. Type “ghost cities in China” on Google - If you watch the videos on Chinese Ghost Cities (like ABC News), you will be amazed such empty spaces exist. All made of sand…
You need the finest purest sand if you are working in high tech to form the most complicated man-made objects, and that is called Iota 8. A ton of Iota 8 is $10,000 while construction sand is “a few dollars a ton.” Salacious Southern California beach fact: “topless men were still being arrested as late as 1929.” Sadly, desert sand won’t work at all for either concrete or land reclamation because “The grains are too rounded to lock together strongly.” This means with increasing desertification, we are creating sands we don’t need, while running out of the sand we need. Europe has 35 cities with over a million people. Amateurs! China has “more than 220 cities with over one million inhabitants.” That took a lot of sand. Type “ghost cities in China” on Google - If you watch the videos on Chinese Ghost Cities (like ABC News), you will be amazed such empty spaces exist. All made of sand…
January 2, 2019
Excellent book! Reads easily and is full of so much information more people need to know. Being in technology I really never did take a step back and realize how important and fundamental sand is to our everyday existence. The extent it is used in nearly every aspect of our lives is fascinating. Vince explains the facts well and having done a lot of investigative reporting himself the personal experience really added to my enjoyment of this book. Highly recommend.
July 17, 2020
"Sand is about the most taken-for-granted natural resource in the world. Hardly anyone thinks about it—what it comes from or what we do to get it. But in a world of 7 billion people, more and more of whom want apartments to live in, offices to work in, malls to shop in, and cell phones to communicate with, we can't afford that luxury anymore. "
This was an interesting book about how sand is used. From concrete and to glass, to technology and beaches, I learned a lot about the many types and uses of sand. I also learned about the politics and conflict that abounds between those who procure sand, those who use it to build/create and those who want to stop them. There's a lot more involved that I realized.
The author is a journalist and the book is written in a journalistic style. It's easy to read. I wouldn't call it dry, but it's also not riveting..I guess it's kind of a pleasant in between with lots of facts/figures and some human interest elements. I thought it was a little repetitive both in pattern (detailed below) and in some of the content. He brings up some of the same concepts in multiple chapters which felt a little disorganized.
One of the things I found a little annoying was the "on the one hand, on the other hand" type of reporting. Almost every chapter (the book was divided into chapters on different uses of sand) sought to explain how sand is used in certain industries, then went into the negative impact of that use, often citing researchers and activists who were fighting it, and then usually concluded with something along the lines of "but we can't stop using it all together." I guess it's fair and honest to acknowledge that there are problems with our dramatic consumption of this natural resource, but that really any human interaction with the world is going to damage it. But it felt like every chapter went through this back and forth pattern and in the end you feel like throwing your hands up in defeat. There are some proposed solutions, but even those solutions will have negative impacts in other areas (e.g. not mining for sand in one area means using more gas and creating more wear and tear on roads when it has to be trucked in from further away). It left kind of a negative taste in my mouth about sand. You learn about all the ways its used only to be depressed about all the ways its used.
It's an eye-opening book about a topic I new very little about but it didn't blow my mind in structure or content.
This was an interesting book about how sand is used. From concrete and to glass, to technology and beaches, I learned a lot about the many types and uses of sand. I also learned about the politics and conflict that abounds between those who procure sand, those who use it to build/create and those who want to stop them. There's a lot more involved that I realized.
The author is a journalist and the book is written in a journalistic style. It's easy to read. I wouldn't call it dry, but it's also not riveting..I guess it's kind of a pleasant in between with lots of facts/figures and some human interest elements. I thought it was a little repetitive both in pattern (detailed below) and in some of the content. He brings up some of the same concepts in multiple chapters which felt a little disorganized.
One of the things I found a little annoying was the "on the one hand, on the other hand" type of reporting. Almost every chapter (the book was divided into chapters on different uses of sand) sought to explain how sand is used in certain industries, then went into the negative impact of that use, often citing researchers and activists who were fighting it, and then usually concluded with something along the lines of "but we can't stop using it all together." I guess it's fair and honest to acknowledge that there are problems with our dramatic consumption of this natural resource, but that really any human interaction with the world is going to damage it. But it felt like every chapter went through this back and forth pattern and in the end you feel like throwing your hands up in defeat. There are some proposed solutions, but even those solutions will have negative impacts in other areas (e.g. not mining for sand in one area means using more gas and creating more wear and tear on roads when it has to be trucked in from further away). It left kind of a negative taste in my mouth about sand. You learn about all the ways its used only to be depressed about all the ways its used.
It's an eye-opening book about a topic I new very little about but it didn't blow my mind in structure or content.
January 1, 2019
Wow, The World in a Grain is one of the best non-fiction books I've read in a long time. Excellent. From the very first page, I was hooked, and at 255 pages, it was just the right length -- the book did not drag on and get bogged down with long rambles or unnecessary detail; every word was fascinating and added to the book. I look forward to reading more by Vince Beiser.
Before reading this book, I didn't give much thought to sand, and this book really opened up my eyes. Sand is so important and has shaped human civilization and our way of living. It's used in construction, roads, glass, fracking, and "beach nourishment," something I had never heard of before. Who knew that our beaches are disappearing (largely due to human activity) and need to be replenished? Who knew that sand mining is such an important -- and dangerous -- industry? I learned so much from this book, including brief histories of roads in America and Dubai. Now, I will never be able to look at a building or road in the same way again.
Before reading this book, I didn't give much thought to sand, and this book really opened up my eyes. Sand is so important and has shaped human civilization and our way of living. It's used in construction, roads, glass, fracking, and "beach nourishment," something I had never heard of before. Who knew that our beaches are disappearing (largely due to human activity) and need to be replenished? Who knew that sand mining is such an important -- and dangerous -- industry? I learned so much from this book, including brief histories of roads in America and Dubai. Now, I will never be able to look at a building or road in the same way again.
June 20, 2019
Mildly interesting, not significant
This book was just so-so. It contains some interesting facts and stories, but mostly they felt more like trivia, rather than the essential information about sand and its uses.
It also not only covers the historic/factual background, but also tries to shape the reader's opinion of these facts, not trusting readers to do it themselves. Appealing to emotions rather than reasoning in a few places did not leave a good impression as well.
In the end, this book is one more reminder that as more and more people rise out of poverty and start to be able to afford nonessential items, the problem that there are not enough resources for all of us to live the 'western lifestyle' is going to get progressively worse. Now I know that sand is one of such resources as well.
This book was just so-so. It contains some interesting facts and stories, but mostly they felt more like trivia, rather than the essential information about sand and its uses.
It also not only covers the historic/factual background, but also tries to shape the reader's opinion of these facts, not trusting readers to do it themselves. Appealing to emotions rather than reasoning in a few places did not leave a good impression as well.
In the end, this book is one more reminder that as more and more people rise out of poverty and start to be able to afford nonessential items, the problem that there are not enough resources for all of us to live the 'western lifestyle' is going to get progressively worse. Now I know that sand is one of such resources as well.
April 4, 2021
Full disclosure. I didn’t get to the end of the book. For me, this book falls into the “interesting but could have been an article” category. On the plus side, I have never spent any time thinking about sand & as it turns out, there’s a lot to consider. Much of the information was new & interesting, but it was way way more than I need or want to know. It was also repetitive and a little off putting stylistically. That doesn’t even take into account the author’s constant & consistent environmental warnings with no real possible solutions other that we all need to consume less of everything.
I was forcing myself to read more & I learned long ago, as I read for pleasure, that if it’s not pleasurable & I don’t feel engaged, I stop. So I stopped about 2/3 of the way through.
I was forcing myself to read more & I learned long ago, as I read for pleasure, that if it’s not pleasurable & I don’t feel engaged, I stop. So I stopped about 2/3 of the way through.
August 28, 2018
Vince Beiser is a great writer and a brilliant researcher. I never expected that learning about sand could be so interesting.
The book delves into the history of sand, how our civilization has come to rely on it, the negative ramifications of sand mining and how this finite natural resource is running out. It's frightening in some ways, but fascinating, and Beiser does a great job at laying it all out.
The book delves into the history of sand, how our civilization has come to rely on it, the negative ramifications of sand mining and how this finite natural resource is running out. It's frightening in some ways, but fascinating, and Beiser does a great job at laying it all out.
October 24, 2018
Captivating, so many unknown facts presented! As a material scientist I've always known that sand is a fascinating material, but this book is so much more, it's just such a treat from an engineering/scientific/political and environmental point of view that it's definitely worth your time!
January 10, 2024
Eye-opening.
July 25, 2023
Captivating. The supply side of urban growth, from concrete to silica
February 12, 2022
هذا الكتاب هو مثال عن كيف يؤلف الصحفي كتاباً
يختار موضوع يصلح كمقالة ممتازة ثم يحشوه بقصص وتحقيقات أو دراسات ذات علاقة حتى يصبح بالحجم المناسب للنشر ككتاب
وفي حالة هذا الكتاب كانت القصص التي اختارها الكاتب جيدة وكتبت بأسلوب جيد .. شيء موجز عن الرمل ممزوجاً بالكثير من قصص رواد الأعمال الذين
كانت أعمالهم متعلقة به وتحقيقات محدودة اجراها الكاتب خصوصا في أماكن تعدين الرمل والشواطئ الرملية في أمريكا مع عناوين أخرى متعلقة بالموضوع
لكن لن يرفع ذلك من مستوى الكتاب عن تصنيف أعلى من جيد
يكتب المؤلف في بداية الكتاب أن الرمل هو أهم مادة صلبة على الأرض والأساس الفعلي للمدنية الحديثة
الفصل الأول:
ما هو الرمل؟ مصطلح الرمل يشمل الحبات الطليقة من أي مادة صلبة بقطر يتراوح بين 2 و0.0625 مليمتر (حسب مقياس أدن- ونتوورث, أكثر المقاييس الجيولوجية شيوعاً)
سبعين بالمئة تقريباً من كل حبات الرمل على الأرض عبارة عن كوارتز الذي هو شكل من ثاني أكسيد السليكون المعروف بالسيليكا
هناك أنواع عديدة من حبات الرمل لكل منها خصائص ونقاط قوة وضعف مختلفة تحدد بدورها الاستعمالات الملائمة لكل نوع. فالبعض منها مقدراً لصلابته
والآخر لمرونته أو لونه او نقائه او استداريته وهكذا
رمال البناء: الحبات الصلبة الزاوية المستخدمة أساسا في صنع الخرسانة
الرمال البحرية: التي تسحب من قيعان البحار والمفيدة لبناء الأراضي الاصطناعية
الرمال الصناعية: الأكثر نقاء – 95% على الأقل سيليكا- التي نحتاجها لصنع الزجاج، وبعض أنواعها (رمل التكسير ) تستخدم للتكسير الهيدروليكي للنفط والغاز
في أغلب الأحوال نحن لا نسحب رمال الصحراء لخدمتنا. أغلب حبات الرمال الموجودة في الصحراء مستديرة جداً الى حد لا يسمح باستخدامها في البناء.
صدق او لا تصدق: الاستراليون يبيعون رمل البناء الى دبي التي تقع على حافة الصحراء الهائلة في شبه الجزيرة العربية
ثم في الأقسام اللاحقة من الكتاب يحكي الكاتب قصصا عن الخرسانة والاسفلت والزجاج ويروي السير الذاتية عن رواد الاعمال المتعلقة بكل منها. ثم تحقيقات عن تصنيع السيليكون المستخدم في صناعة رقائق الحاسوب.
ثم يتحدث عن الشواطئ الرملية خصوصا الامريكية منها
و الأراضي الاصطناعية و يركز على امارة دبي
و التصحر ومكافحته ويركز على إقليم دولون بالصين ثم يعرج على الخرسانة مجددا
أخيرا يعنون الفصل الحادي عشر والأخير بـ: ما وراء الرمل
حيث أن مواردنا محدودة وهناك ثمن لاستخدامها وإساءة استخدامها و يجب أن نفهم أن القضية الأكبر تتعلق بإيجاد طريقة لبناء حياة لسبعة مليارات شخص على أساس أكثر متانة من الرمل.
يختار موضوع يصلح كمقالة ممتازة ثم يحشوه بقصص وتحقيقات أو دراسات ذات علاقة حتى يصبح بالحجم المناسب للنشر ككتاب
وفي حالة هذا الكتاب كانت القصص التي اختارها الكاتب جيدة وكتبت بأسلوب جيد .. شيء موجز عن الرمل ممزوجاً بالكثير من قصص رواد الأعمال الذين
كانت أعمالهم متعلقة به وتحقيقات محدودة اجراها الكاتب خصوصا في أماكن تعدين الرمل والشواطئ الرملية في أمريكا مع عناوين أخرى متعلقة بالموضوع
لكن لن يرفع ذلك من مستوى الكتاب عن تصنيف أعلى من جيد
يكتب المؤلف في بداية الكتاب أن الرمل هو أهم مادة صلبة على الأرض والأساس الفعلي للمدنية الحديثة
الفصل الأول:
ما هو الرمل؟ مصطلح الرمل يشمل الحبات الطليقة من أي مادة صلبة بقطر يتراوح بين 2 و0.0625 مليمتر (حسب مقياس أدن- ونتوورث, أكثر المقاييس الجيولوجية شيوعاً)
سبعين بالمئة تقريباً من كل حبات الرمل على الأرض عبارة عن كوارتز الذي هو شكل من ثاني أكسيد السليكون المعروف بالسيليكا
هناك أنواع عديدة من حبات الرمل لكل منها خصائص ونقاط قوة وضعف مختلفة تحدد بدورها الاستعمالات الملائمة لكل نوع. فالبعض منها مقدراً لصلابته
والآخر لمرونته أو لونه او نقائه او استداريته وهكذا
رمال البناء: الحبات الصلبة الزاوية المستخدمة أساسا في صنع الخرسانة
الرمال البحرية: التي تسحب من قيعان البحار والمفيدة لبناء الأراضي الاصطناعية
الرمال الصناعية: الأكثر نقاء – 95% على الأقل سيليكا- التي نحتاجها لصنع الزجاج، وبعض أنواعها (رمل التكسير ) تستخدم للتكسير الهيدروليكي للنفط والغاز
في أغلب الأحوال نحن لا نسحب رمال الصحراء لخدمتنا. أغلب حبات الرمال الموجودة في الصحراء مستديرة جداً الى حد لا يسمح باستخدامها في البناء.
صدق او لا تصدق: الاستراليون يبيعون رمل البناء الى دبي التي تقع على حافة الصحراء الهائلة في شبه الجزيرة العربية
ثم في الأقسام اللاحقة من الكتاب يحكي الكاتب قصصا عن الخرسانة والاسفلت والزجاج ويروي السير الذاتية عن رواد الاعمال المتعلقة بكل منها. ثم تحقيقات عن تصنيع السيليكون المستخدم في صناعة رقائق الحاسوب.
ثم يتحدث عن الشواطئ الرملية خصوصا الامريكية منها
و الأراضي الاصطناعية و يركز على امارة دبي
و التصحر ومكافحته ويركز على إقليم دولون بالصين ثم يعرج على الخرسانة مجددا
أخيرا يعنون الفصل الحادي عشر والأخير بـ: ما وراء الرمل
حيث أن مواردنا محدودة وهناك ثمن لاستخدامها وإساءة استخدامها و يجب أن نفهم أن القضية الأكبر تتعلق بإيجاد طريقة لبناء حياة لسبعة مليارات شخص على أساس أكثر متانة من الرمل.
May 16, 2019
Who knew? We've been aware for a long time that humankind is running out of drinkable water and the rare earth elements essential to advanced communications technology. Overfishing is endangering fish populations. And arable land is also growing scarce. But sand? Really? Sand?
Our civilization is built on sand
Well, as journalist Vince Beiser tells us in his revealing study of the subject, The World in a Grain, it's not strictly true. There's far more sand in the world's deserts than we would ever want, and they're growing. But it turns out that there are numerous varieties of sand. And the stuff in deserts like the Sahara or the Gobi just isn't suitable for use in concrete. The sand we do need to build all those buildings, manufacture computer chips, and lay all those roads, bridges, and dams is, indeed, becoming scarce. Just as is the case with oil, there may be more than enough of the stuff around, but it's getting harder, and more expensive, to get it out. The problem is, sand is "about the most taken-for-granted natural resource in the world." But it's "the stuff they used to pave paradise and put up a parking lot."
Who knew that the story of sand could be so fascinating?
Beiser's book is a revelation. Reporting on a subject that could bore us to tears, he has produced a fascinating study of the history of civilization from the perspective of the sand we've used to build it. And even his ventures into the complex technical aspects of making concrete and harvesting sand are hard to put down.Progress is our most important product . . . and it's killing us
The heart of the problem is the "progress" we celebrate as the fruits of civilization. "At the dawn of the twentieth century, almost all of the world's large structures . . . were made with stone, brick, clay, or wood. The tallest buildings on Earth stood fewer than ten stories high. Roads were mostly paved with broken stone, or more likely, not paved at all. Glass in the form of windows or tableware was a relatively rare and expensive luxury."
Producing cement results in releasing 5-10 percent of total carbon emissions worldwide
Then that all changed, as the automobile became a necessity, the science of making concrete advanced, and inventors found ways to automate the production of glass. Today, even though the use of sand in construction goes back at least to 7000 BCE, its use was never so widespread as to require extreme efforts to obtain it. But now "your life depends on sand. You may not realize it, but sand is there, making the way you live possible, in almost every minute of your day. We live in it, travel on it, communicate with it, surround ourselves with it." And the price we pay is huge: "Cement is made in at least 150 countries, and produces between 5 and 120 percent of the total carbon emissions worldwide."
You think concrete buildings and roads are permanent? Guess again.Unfortunately, even though we assume that buildings, dams, and bridges made of concrete reinforced with steel are permanent, that is far from the case. Concrete inevitably weakens over time, and can even collapse if the builders cut corners by using inferior sand. Beiser quotes an expert on the subject, who wrote "Hardly any of the concrete structures that now exist are capable of enduring two centuries, and many will begin to disintegrate after fifty years." If you're a member of the Millennial Generation, that may seem like a very long time. But take it from me. It's not. So don't expect permanence from a civilization built on sand.
Surprises galore in this fascinating book
The World in a Grain is full of surprises:
** Amazingly, "China alone used more cement between 2011 and 2013 than the United States used in the entire twentieth century." But that should be no big surprise, since "[t]here are more than 220 Chinese cities with over a million inhabitants" compared to the whole of Europe, which counts only 35.
** The harvesting of sand is nearly universal—"There is no one key source, no Saudi Arabia of sand"—and it's everywhere damaging. (In fact, "Saudi Arabia is worried about running out of sand.") Sadly, the increasing competition for sand has led to more and more extreme measures to harvest it. And "[the] process of pulling sand from the earth [and from rivers and oceans] causes at best a little damage, and at worst, catastrophe."
** The increasing scarcity of sand suitable for use in making concrete and glass has led to the rise of crime. Beiser details numerous horror stories such as this one: "Thieves in Jamaica made off with 1,300 feet of white sand from one of the islands finest beaches in 2008" and "[s]and miners have completely obliterated at least two dozen Indonesian islands since 2005." Everywhere sand thieves operate, corruption and sometimes even murder comes in their wake.
** While rising ocean levels drown low-lying coastal areas around the globe, efforts by Singapore, Dubai, and Lagos to reclaim land support the "booming market in sand." Beiser notes that "human beings since 1985 have added 5,237 square miles of artificial land," which has consumed titanic quantities of sand.
** The roads and buildings we build with sand increase our need for air conditioning. "[P]aved areas can boost the temperature in some cities by as much as 19 degrees Fahrenheit."Rising prosperity and overpopulation are the root of the problemAs is the case with the depletion of other natural resources, the increasing difficulty we're facing is a direct result of overpopulation and the rise of prosperity around the world. "The building methods and materials that a hundred years ago were mostly confined to wealthy Western nations have in the past thirty spread to virtually every country," Beiser notes. "This epochal shift is what lies behind the sand crisis."
So, what can be done? There's really only one way to mitigate the problem, as Beiser sees it: use less stuff . . . and quickly.
Our civilization is built on sand
Well, as journalist Vince Beiser tells us in his revealing study of the subject, The World in a Grain, it's not strictly true. There's far more sand in the world's deserts than we would ever want, and they're growing. But it turns out that there are numerous varieties of sand. And the stuff in deserts like the Sahara or the Gobi just isn't suitable for use in concrete. The sand we do need to build all those buildings, manufacture computer chips, and lay all those roads, bridges, and dams is, indeed, becoming scarce. Just as is the case with oil, there may be more than enough of the stuff around, but it's getting harder, and more expensive, to get it out. The problem is, sand is "about the most taken-for-granted natural resource in the world." But it's "the stuff they used to pave paradise and put up a parking lot."
Who knew that the story of sand could be so fascinating?
Beiser's book is a revelation. Reporting on a subject that could bore us to tears, he has produced a fascinating study of the history of civilization from the perspective of the sand we've used to build it. And even his ventures into the complex technical aspects of making concrete and harvesting sand are hard to put down.Progress is our most important product . . . and it's killing us
The heart of the problem is the "progress" we celebrate as the fruits of civilization. "At the dawn of the twentieth century, almost all of the world's large structures . . . were made with stone, brick, clay, or wood. The tallest buildings on Earth stood fewer than ten stories high. Roads were mostly paved with broken stone, or more likely, not paved at all. Glass in the form of windows or tableware was a relatively rare and expensive luxury."
Producing cement results in releasing 5-10 percent of total carbon emissions worldwide
Then that all changed, as the automobile became a necessity, the science of making concrete advanced, and inventors found ways to automate the production of glass. Today, even though the use of sand in construction goes back at least to 7000 BCE, its use was never so widespread as to require extreme efforts to obtain it. But now "your life depends on sand. You may not realize it, but sand is there, making the way you live possible, in almost every minute of your day. We live in it, travel on it, communicate with it, surround ourselves with it." And the price we pay is huge: "Cement is made in at least 150 countries, and produces between 5 and 120 percent of the total carbon emissions worldwide."
You think concrete buildings and roads are permanent? Guess again.Unfortunately, even though we assume that buildings, dams, and bridges made of concrete reinforced with steel are permanent, that is far from the case. Concrete inevitably weakens over time, and can even collapse if the builders cut corners by using inferior sand. Beiser quotes an expert on the subject, who wrote "Hardly any of the concrete structures that now exist are capable of enduring two centuries, and many will begin to disintegrate after fifty years." If you're a member of the Millennial Generation, that may seem like a very long time. But take it from me. It's not. So don't expect permanence from a civilization built on sand.
Surprises galore in this fascinating book
The World in a Grain is full of surprises:
** Amazingly, "China alone used more cement between 2011 and 2013 than the United States used in the entire twentieth century." But that should be no big surprise, since "[t]here are more than 220 Chinese cities with over a million inhabitants" compared to the whole of Europe, which counts only 35.
** The harvesting of sand is nearly universal—"There is no one key source, no Saudi Arabia of sand"—and it's everywhere damaging. (In fact, "Saudi Arabia is worried about running out of sand.") Sadly, the increasing competition for sand has led to more and more extreme measures to harvest it. And "[the] process of pulling sand from the earth [and from rivers and oceans] causes at best a little damage, and at worst, catastrophe."
** The increasing scarcity of sand suitable for use in making concrete and glass has led to the rise of crime. Beiser details numerous horror stories such as this one: "Thieves in Jamaica made off with 1,300 feet of white sand from one of the islands finest beaches in 2008" and "[s]and miners have completely obliterated at least two dozen Indonesian islands since 2005." Everywhere sand thieves operate, corruption and sometimes even murder comes in their wake.
** While rising ocean levels drown low-lying coastal areas around the globe, efforts by Singapore, Dubai, and Lagos to reclaim land support the "booming market in sand." Beiser notes that "human beings since 1985 have added 5,237 square miles of artificial land," which has consumed titanic quantities of sand.
** The roads and buildings we build with sand increase our need for air conditioning. "[P]aved areas can boost the temperature in some cities by as much as 19 degrees Fahrenheit."Rising prosperity and overpopulation are the root of the problemAs is the case with the depletion of other natural resources, the increasing difficulty we're facing is a direct result of overpopulation and the rise of prosperity around the world. "The building methods and materials that a hundred years ago were mostly confined to wealthy Western nations have in the past thirty spread to virtually every country," Beiser notes. "This epochal shift is what lies behind the sand crisis."
So, what can be done? There's really only one way to mitigate the problem, as Beiser sees it: use less stuff . . . and quickly.
May 27, 2024
This is the second book I read on the topic of sand. This one is more extensive and explains all the fundamental ways we need it. We have it in the fiber optic glass cables for the internet, in our computers and gadgets, windows, glass bottles, for our road fundaments and our buildings. It’s everywhere and completely essential to our way of life.
Sand is not just sand. Desert sand isn’t very useful because the sand is too rounded to hold up well. Saudi Arabia imports sand from Australia!
Sand is finite, of varying quality and increasingly difficult to get at. Environmental destruction is real, particularly on ocean floors.
The book is well written, entertaining and shocking and well worth reading. Highly recommended!
Sand is not just sand. Desert sand isn’t very useful because the sand is too rounded to hold up well. Saudi Arabia imports sand from Australia!
Sand is finite, of varying quality and increasingly difficult to get at. Environmental destruction is real, particularly on ocean floors.
The book is well written, entertaining and shocking and well worth reading. Highly recommended!
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