KOLKATA (miningweekly.com) – Indian demand for sand, categorised as a ‘minor mineral’, has been estimated at about 700-million tons a year and is growing by 6% to 7% a year, according to a Sand Mining Framework document of the Mines Ministry.

The document; however, does not give any estimation of supplies, but acknowledges a mismatch in demand and supply. The document has proposed options to bridge the gap, which include increasing capacity for production of “manufactured sand” (M-sand), production of sand from coal mine overburden and imports.

The Mines Ministry report maintains that assessment of demand and supply of sand is a challenge, given the wide variations of endowment across provinces and fragmented nature of production across the country.

“Different provinces follow different methodologies for sand demand estimation and from the 14 provinces analysed in the framework document, only a few, like Haryana, Gujarat, Karnataka, Punjab, Rajasthan and Uttar Pradesh, carry out demand assessment. However, even where provinces estimate demand, the methodology adopted does not appear to be robust and estimates have wide variations,” the report notes.

The report advocates that an assessment of sand demand be based either on RBI Index Based Methodology or based on sand consumption assuming a normative ration of cement to sand consumption.

“The quantity of natural sand generation is static. Moreover production of sand is not uniform across seasons with a shortage faced in several jurisdictions. Due to uncertainties and inadequate supplies, the selling rate various significantly leading to black marketing and illegal mining of the mineral. Illegal and uncontrolled mining of sand has adverse environmental impact and consequent judicial interventions from the Supreme Court and National Green Tribunal,” the report notes.

Hence the need for alternative options of M-sand, sand from coal mine overburden and imports, it adds.

M-sand from crushing rocks and quarry stones to the stipulated 450 microns is prevalent in few southern provinces, but needs to be ramped up across the country to bridge the demand-supply gap, even by current estimations.

Karnataka, which faces a significant shortage, has intensified M-sand production by 164 production units with aggregate capacity of 20-million tons.

Other provinces, Telangana, Tamil Nadu, Andhra Pradesh and Gujarat, currently have M-sand production capacities of 7.2-million tons a year, 3.24-million tons a year, one-million tons a year and one-million tons a year, respectively.

On sand from coal overburden, the report says that Western Coalfields Limited (WCL), a wholly owned subsidiary of Coal India Limited, has proposed to set up a 200 m³/d sand plant with the potential to supply sand at one-fourth the current market price of the minor mineral.

If WCL could fully leverage its potential of extracting sand from total overburden, it could produce 45.36-million tons a year of sand and account for about 45% of total sand demand in its hinterland province of Maharasthra.

The Mines Ministry has also proposed imports of sand from Malaysia and Indonesia where ample sand was available as its non removal lead to floods in these countries and such imports need to be explored, particularly by eastern Indian coastal provinces.

It notes that Tamil Nadu and Kerala are readying to import sand from Malaysia. However, the Ministry states that the landed price of imported sand is about Rs 2300/t ($35/t), which is significantly higher than the domestic price. Import options will be viable only in coastal regions facing a very high deficit and having to incur high transportation costs sourcing the mineral from greater inland distances.

The framework document from the federal government is significant inasmuch as it attempts to provide a template for local government to establish a uniform order of governance, monitoring and administration of a sector, dispute for law and order breaches, illegal mining and even deaths.

For example in the central province of Madhya Pradesh, 42 152 cases of illegal mining were registered between 2009 and 2015. Last Monday, a journalist investigating illegal sand mining in the region were run over by a truck, allegedly for his investigations. He had complained to the police about threats to his life before his death.

According to media reports, on Wednesday, the so-called ‘sand mafia’ opened fire on a police patrol checking for illegal sand mining along the Agra-Mumbai highway.