New Zealand. Photograph: © SAF – Coastal Care.
“Sand is the second most consumed natural resource, after water. The construction-building industry is by far the largest consumer of this finite resource. The traditional building of one average-sized house requires 200 tons of sand; a hospital requires 3,000 tons of sand; each kilometer of highway built requires 30,000 tons of sand… A nuclear plant, a staggering 12 million tons of sand…” Captions by “Sand Wars” Award-Winning Filmmaker: © Denis Delestrac (©-2013).
Excerpts;
New Zealand beer brand DB Export is recycling its used bottles to make a man-made sand – an effort the company hopes will help preserve beaches.
The average Kiwi consumer uses more than 200kg of sand each year, most of which comes from beaches. It’s a non-renewable resource and is also used to make glass.
Through its recycling initiative DB Export aims to convert its used bottles to 100 tonnes of sand substitute. That’s equal to about 500,000 beer bottles.
The company hopes the programme will help cut down the amount of sand dredged from beaches…
Read Full Article, New Zealand Herald (02-21-2017)
WATCH: DB Export beer bottle sand case study; A Youtube Video (02-20-2017)
Sand, Rarer Than One Thinks: A UNEP report (GEA-March 2014)
Despite the colossal quantities of sand and gravel being used, our increasing dependence on them and the significant impact that their extraction has on the environment, this issue has been mostly ignored by policy makers and remains largely unknown by the general public.
In March 2014 The United Nations released its first Report about sand mining. “Sand Wars” film documentary by Denis Delestrac – first broadcasted on the european Arte Channel, May 28th, 2013, where it became the highest rated documentary for 2013 – expressly inspired the United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP) to publish this 2014-Global Environmental Alert.
The Conservation Crisis No One Is Talking About, TakePart (09-21-2016)
Beaches around the world are disappearing. No, the cause isn’t sea-level rise, at least not this time. It’s a little-known but enormous industry called sand mining, which every year sucks up billions of tons of sand from beaches, ocean floors, and rivers to make everything from concrete to microchips to toothpaste…
Sand Wars, An Investigation Documentary, By Award-Winning Filmmaker Denis Delestrac (©-2013)
Is sand an infinite resource? Can the existing supply satisfy a gigantic demand fueled by construction booms? What are the consequences of intensive beach sand mining for the environment and the neighboring populations…? This investigative documentary takes us around the globe to unveil a new gold rush and a disturbing fact: the “Sand Wars” have begun…
From Trash to Treasure: Glass Beach, California, Coastal Living (11-02-2010)
Unlike the truly amazing “Glass Beach, California,” manufactured recycled glass, once processed, does look and feel like natural sand. Photo courtesy of: ©Denis Delestrac.
