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Adding sand to beaches sounds like it’s an oxymoronic thing to do, but it’s totally a thing. And there’s some major benefits, like protecting our coastlines from storms and conserving ecosystems. But there are also some major drawbacks, and the practice of beach nourishment can end up harming the same ecosystems we want to help. So the question is, is it worth it to dump more sand onto our beaches?
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Sources:
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As noted, we've been doing nourishment for decades. I've been aware of them doing it in my hometown for 40 years. And they keep doing it. Because they have to. Because the glorified sand bars we build communities on just weren't meant to be static. The beach is constantly changing and we have to compensate to maintain what we've created. For better or worse, whether you like the pros or fear the cons – either way – it will be done. Repeatedly. And some may argue for naught, because the next Cat 4+ will still push a 15' storm surge and wreak havoc on the area anyway.
It takes a LOT of sand to fill an ocean.
As someone that lives on the Beach.. I say let it all fall into the sea. I have legs and the ability to migrate…just like the rest of Humans throughout History.
I don't like sand. It's coarse and rough and irritating and it gets everywhere.
Sounds to me like beach nourishment wouldn't ne that bad if we just did it alower and smaller. Take less sand from the bottom of the ocean.
Ads it in small segmenta (Maybelline 20m of beach nourished and 80m left as it was… It would take 5.yeara but hopefully more animals would survive it since only part of their habitat was changed and the ones that can move would move over to the old habitat until the new one became livable for them.
Need sands to fill up your beaches? There's a lot of sand in sand dunes!
It's not prudent to backtalk Mother Nature.
My sandpit’s full of cat poo so I don’t think you’ll be wanting that sand!
You know a lot of that sand used for enrichment is stolen from poor countries' beaches, right?
In Denmark, we build these T’s diagonal from the beach. They are about 20 meters out from the coast and a few hundred meters apart. That has stopped the ocean from taking away the sad. We also have these special drainage rods that actually make the waves deposit more sand than they take away. This way we don’t have to move sand by machinery. Much better for the nature and environment.
0:10 you forgot to mention us building houses on sea fronts, covering up a huge sand reservoir that cycled in and out of the water with storm events.
I could give a quick, flippant answer, but that is because I live in Minnesota. I'm sure these will affect my friends in California and especially Florida far more significantly.
The folks at #Hemsby UK would tell you that this strategy of adding sand doesn't particularly work.
You enter in a super complex clockwork tower, act like a childish idiot ruining that masterpiece… And you even have the guts to say "now Is your problem to fix that"?
Get lost and stop touching everything with those ugly hands full of fingers!
2:32 there is no irony in the name though. Irony would be if it were called sth like Muddy or Solid.
So what about desert sand? Seems easier to acquire than ocean floor sand, also would re-sanding be easier on the local ecosystem if it was done in stages rather than the whole beach at once?
Y'all didn't even touch on the dangers of dredging the sand up from the ocean floor for beach nourishment.
They keep doing this in Florida. Hurricanes come, and the storm surge washes away the beach. Because so much of Florida's economy is tourism, they dredge up the sea floor to "restore" the beaches (y'all did touch on all those issues).
However, by doing so they're destroying the natural sand banks, and other features of the sea floor that actually protects Florida's coastline from the worst of the storm surge.
It's almost like nature evolved in such a way to work in harmony with itself. Then we arrived
Although many interesting points are covered, overall it is a very disappointing video. Beach erosion was a thing for hundreds of years even without rising sea levels, but the beaches were able to self regenerate. You don't say how the sandy beaches were created in the first place and the effect of cutting off the original source of the sand supply with roads and developments along the beach.
Adding sand to the beach – more co2 emissions – more warming – sealevel rising – add more sand – cycle completed 🙂
I remember the most beautiful beach sand in my hometown. It was vast thick laid flat sand with cumulus of finest particles having been formed thousands of thousands years long so we could walk there up to at least a hundred meter from the beach without flailing for swimming. And the sand was soft fine with no hole nor stones small peddles to hurt foot at the bottom.
It was drained on building constructions by heavy machinery and the scale of scooping the sand was enormous enough to make many sink holes on the bottom of the sea bed. When the constructors took away a large proportion of the sand, suddenly the seashore didn't hold its sand anymore. All sands began to be washed away by the waves starting to change the seascape of the beach. It used to be the most beautiful beach, but with the problem of sand washing away, its beautiful renounced beach sand no longer maintained its fame.
So government hastily dropped the sand from somewhere else, but in vain. Once washing away was started, there was no way to stop it. That's how we spoiled the most beautiful seascape as well as the finest golden sea sand beach in my city.
I hate those constructors. And despite pouring down new sands x times of its drained volume, the seashore didn't restore its original shape. It happened during the period of my country's rapid development. Along with the beach, countless ponds and springs, brooks were all gone for good.
In the Netherlands for decades we have used this "zandmotor" (sand engine) where we dump sand in one particular spot along the coast, near Den Haag (The Hague) and have it resupply the beaches upstream in a less invasive way (I think). Doesn't fix the foreign sand issue, but might make it less stressful for all that lives there.
After Hurricane Camille (Category 5 at landfall) hit the Mississippi gulf coast in August 1969, they literally had to replace the beach by dredging sand out of Mississippi Sound. The water was going right up to old Highway 90.
no thanks, nothing worse than a sandy beach
They need to stop messing with stuff so much based on what they like or their personal preferences and focus on what actually matters and messing with things that are only necessary and is for the better or benefit of more than just humanity and if they want a fancy building or some sandy beaches
Beach renourishment is a great way to ruin the ecology of the beach for the benefit of the rich and tourists.
Sand that's not suitable for its purposes, from places it's not supposed to be, and being placed where it isn't needed.
in 500 years it will not matter like wtf are these people smoking
Hello. In Holland we have something called a zandmotor (sandmotor in english). Here is a (dutch) video about it, maybe it will be nice update on this story. her is the link https://youtu.be/Q1spHyWQx5k
Hey @SciShow Please know your new video set up, location, background, and everything is a very nice, modern change, and it really brings a nice feel to the channel. Unique, homey feeling, very Nice!
That coarse sand is necessary for concrete aggregate. Construction uses massive amounts of it every year.
What if you just add the sand really gradually? Like a few buckets a day all year round? Replace it as it's eroding so you never disturb it all at once. And the changes in sand type will be really gradual.
As for getting the sand: Go deep instead of wide. Pick a spot, and just dig deeper in that one place as long as you can. You don't have to get a lot at any one time, but by going back to the same spot each time, you're disturbing a smaller area. It'll fill in a little bit between digs anyway. When it gets too deep to be feasible, you pick spot that's not terribly far away, maybe even just 100 meters. The first spot will start filling in. After a while, you just rotate between two or three spots that'll always just be sand "wells". And get the sand via a pump rather than scraping the ocean or river floor. If you can do it with oil, you can do it with sand.
They should source it from The Sahara. There's a lot, and should keep digging until you hit rock to see what's under the desert.
Also, unlike river sand, desert sand isn't useful to make concrete. The rounder grains make it almost identical to regular beach sand.
It be like that sometimes
People need to stop messing with nature… Let nature do as nature does-
Maybe beach erosion wouldnt be such a problem in the first place if we could just leave native mangrove forest and dunes grasses in place. Just about every single foot of beach has to get torn up to put up tacky, overpriced buildings.
I'd like to see if the study of home destruction by beach nourishment was controlled for the per capita income of the area, I'd expect richer areas to be nourishing their beaches and having more recently built homes.
More climate hysteria awesome new level of God Complex achievement complete
Much like preventing forest fires, we are only delaying and compounding the problem.
slow birth rate way down is the first step imo
The beaches aren't natural.
Stop trying to overpower mother nature. Robbing Peter to pay Paul will not have a good outcome.