Dubai imports sand

http://www.bbc.com/capital/story/20160502-even-desert-city-dubai-imports-its-sand-this-is-why

Even the United Arab Emirates imported $456m worth of sand, stone and gravel in 2014, according to the UN. Despite being in the heart of the desert, imported sand built Dubai, according to Pascal. Wind-formed desert sand is too smooth for construction.

Meanwhile, in the UK, the need for sand has dropped off as new construction cools and recyclables get a political push. Demand for rock, gravel and sand is 25% below 2007 levels, according to the UK Mineral Products Association.

And in the US, the rise of hydraulic fracturing or “fracking” has created a huge appetite for sand. In 2013, the production of sand for fracking wells was 19 times higher than a decade earlier, according to the USGS. The process involves injecting water, sand and chemicals down a horizontally drilled well thousands of feet below the earth’s surface into a rock formation to extract oil or natural gas.

While the market for industrial sand has tracked overall economic growth in the US, the demand for frac sand has been as volatile as oil prices. From 2011 to 2014 the demand for frac sand more than doubled from 24 million tons to 59 million tons, but then dropped off last year to 50 million tons, said Randhawa.