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Comment by EugeneOZ | Hacker News Reader

But what is wrong with glass? I think we have no shortage of sand.

The article makes a pretty clear comparison as to why this material is better than glass.

No. They don't say a word about PVA production. They are bringing number of emissions for glass production, but they aren't trying to predict numbers for this technology.

Also, comparison of materials is done without any numbers. Very low-quality article.

Hmm... Bringing this up because seeing your comment rung a bell about something I read a year or so ago now...

Google "world sand shortage"

Maybe there's more to it than what immediately meets the eye, but it does seem like there's a bit of a shortage.

Wind blown sand you find in the Sahara is fine for glassmaking. The shortage is really about a specific type of sand useful for it’s mechanical not chemical properties.

I think that is the special* type of sand required for concrete production.

* Concrete requires coarse grains, which are found in river beds and beaches. A lot of the worlds sand is in deserts, which has fine grains due to its age / years of tumbling.

1) use fine sand to make tempered glass

2) break it

3) Now use those small pieces of broken glass as if they were coarse sand to make concrete. Or even better recicle all those old cracked car panes lying in the dumpster.

Problem solved.

Maybe you could even obtain cool semitransparent concrete, if you polish the finished stuff. I dunno. Would be cool stuff in any case.

Also, it is perfectly possible to make the necessary qualities of sand from coarser rocks. It is just more expensive. So the great sand shortage is just a shortage of cheap sand.

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