Earlier quoted context omitted.
Isaac Asimov was an early writer on this, noting that if the earth's crust was converted into biomass the limiting element was phosphorous --- look at USDA photos of food crops grown w/ and w/o fertilizer including that element for a very sobering view. Currently, we expend up to 10 calories of petro-chemical energy to get 1 calorie of food energy (depending on food) --- peak oil is still worrisome given how much of…
> I worry my children will live in a time when commercial fishing is no longer feasible. I worry that my parents lived in a time when commercial fishing was no longer feasible, but no one noticed and kept siphoning all the seafood anyway.
Is the world really running out of sand?
61–70 of 218 posts
Re: Is the world really running out of sand?
#62Earlier quoted context omitted.
The Washington Post headline: >'The Eagle Has Landed' – Two Men Walk on the Moon That is the entire story, in the headline as it should be. I want to know more! The first sentence should add the most relevant added information. It shouldn't be "As a child Neil Armstrong always dreamed about..." burying the next most important detail 2/3 through the article. The importance/relevance/interest should start high, end low…
Holy cow, don't look for recipes on the web. If you're luck any ingredients and instructions are only 2/3 through. More often 23 pages through.
Your comment and my response exist in so many places on the internet, but I wanted to point out that most of the web-based recipes I use have a convenient "jump to recipe" button. I won't attempt to explain what SEO/copyright/whatever reasons there are for the excess prose at the beginning, though.
What bothers me more about these sites is how heavyweight they can feel even with ads stripped. I wonder if they all use a similar, bloated JS widget that my phone cannot run smoothly.
Re: Is the world really running out of sand?
#63The first time I heard about this, I wondered why we didn't just blast desert sand at itself to rough it up to give it better properties. Sure it takes some energy but the sand mafia probably isn't getting cheaper.
> I wondered why we didn't just blast desert sand at itself to rough it up to give it better properties.
The grain size of desert (or most maritime) sand is already far too small, and if you blast it to pieces it will get even smaller - too small to be used for concrete.
Re: Is the world really running out of sand?
#64I just got back from the beach and my car is full of it if anyone needs some.
Re: Is the world really running out of sand?
#65Earlier quoted context omitted.
> and 70% of the world's supply comes from just one place in North Carolina A quick search seems to say there are more places available for getting that than North Carolina. Is it possible that this specific mine just happens to be the cheapest available right now, but in case they for some reason disappear, there are alternatives everyone would switch to? Or is the situation that if that mine disappears, there is no…
Could not even be the cheapest, Just the refinement process was developed for this particular sand. A different sand might have different impurities and need different processes to handle.
If the particular impurities of this source can be chelated out with safer or cheaper chemicals, maybe in fewer steps, then the cost goes down.
Of course jurisdictions with poor worker conditions can just use the less safe chemicals and externalize the human toll instead of using more complex safety procedures.
Re: Is the world really running out of sand?
#66Every time I watch a practical engineering video I like Grady more and more. Great presenter, interesting videos, great value for the time spent watching. Gets right to the point in the first sentence, and the rest of the video is still worth watching. Add me to the long list of people who heard the bit about desert sand not being suitable for concrete and believed it. I'm happy to be corrected.
I almost feel like his videos are anti-clickbait. On my YouTube recommendations page, often his title and cover image are the least eye-grabbing, but the actual video is always satisfying.
His water infrastructure videos always get me because the thumbnail shows off the very cool model that he built just for it :)
Re: Is the world really running out of sand?
#67Ironically, we just hit an entirely different "sand catastrophe" - https://mastodon.social/@mimsical/113232531800424706 > the crucibles used to create ingots of silicon which become microchips are made from an ultra-pure quartz sand -- and 70% of the world's supply comes from just one place in North Carolina [Spruce Pine]
Oh, cool. One of the most common glass batches (raw materials melted to make glass) used by artists is "Spruce Pine Batch".
Wonder if it’s the same stuff or if glass people get a different bin.
Re: Is the world really running out of sand?
#68Ironically, we just hit an entirely different "sand catastrophe" - https://mastodon.social/@mimsical/113232531800424706 > the crucibles used to create ingots of silicon which become microchips are made from an ultra-pure quartz sand -- and 70% of the world's supply comes from just one place in North Carolina [Spruce Pine]
The majority of the earth's crust is believed to be made of silicon dioxide. I don't know how much I would believe that we would have a scarcity. It may all come from one source simply because of history.
Re: Is the world really running out of sand?
#69Bonus points for articles that start with a tldr and don't try to bury the lead
Note that "bury the lede" isn't really about "make the reader get to the end to find out the answer" but when a reporter/writer emphasizes the wrong part of a story in the intro then you'd say they buried the lede. Like, if the first graf is all about a politician attending a ribbon-cutting ceremony in Podunk, IL and then in the third graf you have "at the rally, he called for all left-handed people to be put in jail…
Burying the lede is in the same spirit as “the real wtf was…”
Re: Is the world really running out of sand?
#70I recently bought his book. It's as great as you'd expect it to be.