Sands in Ukraine

General information

Sand is a fri­able, fine­ly clas­tic sed­i­men­ta­ry rock, which is formed of oth­er rocks’ clasts with a size of 0,05 to 2 mm.

Classification of sands

Based on gen­e­sis, sands are clas­si­fied as lake, sea, riv­er, water-ice, and arti­fi­cial.

Based on grain size, sands are clas­si­fied as:
fine-grained (0,05–0,1 mm);
medi­um-grained (0,1–0,25 mm);
coarse-grained (0,25–0,5 mm);
very coarse-grained (0,5–1,00 mm);
grav­el (1–2(3) mm).

The grains of this rock have a round­ed, round­ed-angu­lar, and angu­lar shape. Based on the degree of round­ness, grains are dis­tin­guished as round­ed, sub-round­ed, and angu­lar.

There are dif­fer­ent types of sand based on their com­po­si­tion:
Monomin­er­al­ic sands, which are com­posed of grains of a sin­gle min­er­al;
Oligomic­tic sands, which are com­posed of grains of 2–3 min­er­als, with one min­er­al dom­i­nat­ing;
Polymic­tic sands, which are com­posed of grains of min­er­als and rocks of dif­fer­ent com­po­si­tions.

The most com­mon types of sand are quartz, quartz-feldspar, glau­conite-quartz, and mica sands. They may con­tain impu­ri­ties such as mica, car­bon­ates, gyp­sum, mag­netite, and oth­ers.

Qualitative characteristics of sand

1.Grain size dis­tri­b­u­tion. At first glance, it may seem that sand is com­posed of tiny par­ti­cles of the same size. How­ev­er, this is not the case. All sand grains, like snowflakes, are unique, not only in their shape but also in their size. Some par­ti­cles can be very small, while oth­ers can be too large. To deter­mine the grain size dis­tri­b­u­tion, sand is passed through sieves of dif­fer­ent sizes: 2.5 mm; 1.25 mm; 0.63 mm; 0.315 mm; 0.16 mm; 0.16 mm. Thus, the largest grains remain on the top sieve, while the small­est pass through the open­ings with a diam­e­ter of 0.16 mm. Then, the per­cent­age of grains on each sieve is cal­cu­lat­ed as a pro­por­tion of the total weight of the sam­ple.

2.Grain fine­ness mod­u­lus.. Despite each sand grain hav­ing its own unique shape and size, the pre­dom­i­nant frac­tion is typ­i­cal­ly iden­ti­fied.
Grain fine­ness mod­u­lus is a con­di­tion­al indi­ca­tor of sand coarse­ness. This indi­ca­tor deter­mines how much mate­r­i­al should be used to pre­pare a build­ing mix­ture, the result of the work per­formed, and the qual­i­ty of prod­ucts that include sand in their com­po­si­tion. To deter­mine the grain fine­ness mod­u­lus, the mate­r­i­al must be passed through spe­cial vibrat­ing screens. Dur­ing the screen­ing process, fine par­ti­cles pass through the open­ings while larg­er ones are retained. The grain fine­ness mod­u­lus is cal­cu­lat­ed by divid­ing the sum of the full residue on the sieves by 100.

The fol­low­ing types of sand are dis­tin­guished based on the grain size mod­ule:
Fine – 0.7–1;
Very fine – 1–1.5;
Fine-medi­um – 1.5–2;
Medi­um – 2–2.5;
Coarse – 2.5–3;
Very coarse – 3–3.5.

3.Content of dust-like and clay par­ti­cles. This is the most impor­tant char­ac­ter­is­tic of sand, as it deter­mines the degree of mate­r­i­al puri­ty and thus its suit­abil­i­ty for var­i­ous appli­ca­tions. Sandy and clay par­ti­cles have a size less than 0.063 mm. These par­ti­cles reduce the adhe­sion of larg­er grains, which leads to a decrease in the strength of prod­ucts made from this mate­r­i­al. There­fore, for exam­ple, only clean sand is nec­es­sary for mak­ing con­crete. The pres­ence of sandy and clay par­ti­cles depends direct­ly on the pro­cess­ing method of the raw mate­r­i­al. The clean­est is washed sand. Water wash­es away all the dust from the mate­r­i­al, mak­ing it of high­er qual­i­ty. How­ev­er, this increas­es the cost of sand. The Ukrain­ian State Stan­dard estab­lish­es require­ments for the con­tent of such par­ti­cles. For exam­ple, in nat­ur­al sand, they should not exceed 3%, and in arti­fi­cial sand — no more than 5%. The spe­cif­ic val­ue is deter­mined with respect to the quan­ti­ty of screened par­ti­cles to the main mass.

4.Clay con­tent in lumps. Clay is a plas­tic mate­r­i­al that is char­ac­ter­ized by its vis­cos­i­ty. In sand, its con­tent should not exceed 0.5% of the total mass. To deter­mine the spe­cif­ic indi­ca­tor, a sam­ple of the mate­r­i­al is moist­ened with water, and then the par­ti­cles are sep­a­rat­ed using a nee­dle. Clay usu­al­ly has low strength, mak­ing it easy to iden­ti­fy tac­tu­al­ly. After that, the ratio of the amount of clay to the amount of sand is com­pared. Clay is well washed away with water, but it can­not be removed by dry sift­ing. More­over, when it enters any build­ing solu­tion, it remains there for­ev­er. The pres­ence of clay lumps in con­crete reduces its water resis­tance, which is unac­cept­able for hydraulic struc­tures and under­wa­ter con­struc­tions.

5.Porosity. It is the pres­ence of cav­i­ties larg­er than 2 mm between sand grains. The ratio of the vol­ume of pores to the vol­ume of the rock itself is an indi­ca­tor of this char­ac­ter­is­tic. For sand, poros­i­ty ranges from 37 to 47%. The spe­cif­ic indi­ca­tor depends on the type of sand. Riv­er sands have the high­est indi­ca­tor since their grains are more round­ed. Grains obtained by crush­ing rock will have sharp­er edges and, accord­ing­ly, low­er poros­i­ty.

6.Moisture con­tent. The name of this char­ac­ter­is­tic speaks for itself. It is the per­cent­age of mois­ture present in sand. Mois­ture con­tent may vary depend­ing on the degree of sand dry­ing, stor­age con­di­tions, cli­mat­ic con­di­tions, and oth­er fac­tors. Some appli­ca­tions of sand have spe­cif­ic require­ments for the mois­ture con­tent of the prod­uct sup­plied. For exam­ple, a mois­ture con­tent of up to 5% is allowed for the pro­duc­tion of dry cement mix­tures and con­crete prepa­ra­tion. The mois­ture con­tent of sand intend­ed for out­door use is irrel­e­vant.

7.Filtration coef­fi­cient. The fil­tra­tion coef­fi­cient shows how quick­ly a liq­uid pass­es through a lay­er of soil at full sat­u­ra­tion and with a unit gra­di­ent of hydraulic head. The sand fil­tra­tion coef­fi­cient is deter­mined in a lab­o­ra­to­ry. For riv­er sand, this coef­fi­cient ranges from 5 to 20 meters per day. In quar­ry sand, this val­ue is much low­er, rang­ing from 0.5 to 7 meters per day.

8.Foreign inclu­sions con­tent. Var­i­ous for­eign inclu­sions can also be present in the sand. They con­t­a­m­i­nate the mate­r­i­al, low­er its qual­i­ty, and lim­it its scope of appli­ca­tion. For exam­ple, the sand may con­tain wood, organ­ic mat­ter, tur­tle shell frag­ments, pieces of rock, and var­i­ous types of lit­ter (such as glass, plas­tic, paper, etc.). While it is pos­si­ble to man­u­al­ly remove for­eign inclu­sions from sand, this approach is only effec­tive if the inclu­sions are large and not too numer­ous. If the sand con­tains a sig­nif­i­cant amount of small for­eign inclu­sions, addi­tion­al screen­ing will be required, which will result in extra expens­es.

9.Radioactivity of Sand. All mate­ri­als extract­ed from rocks have a cer­tain lev­el of radi­a­tion. Sand is no excep­tion. The radioac­tiv­i­ty of all build­ing mate­ri­als is mea­sured in bec­querels per kilo­gram (Bq/kg).

There are four class­es of radioac­tiv­i­ty:
Class 1 — the radioac­tiv­i­ty index is less than 370 Bq/kg;
Class 2 — the index is up to 740 Bq/kg;
Class 3 — up to 1500 Bq/kg;
Class 4 — over 1500 Bq/kg.

In con­struc­tion, prod­ucts with a radioac­tiv­i­ty lev­el not exceed­ing 1500 Bq/kg are used. This is still a high num­ber, as mate­ri­als with a radioac­tiv­i­ty lev­el of less than 370 Bq/kg are typ­i­cal­ly used. The vast major­i­ty of sands belong to the first class, which means that their use is com­plete­ly safe. The excep­tion is the so-called “black sand.” It is a clus­ter of heavy min­er­als, includ­ing ilmenite, which con­tains tita­ni­um, and mon­azite. Black sands are wide­spread through­out the plan­et, and in Ukraine, they are found on the shores of the Azov Sea. They have a rel­a­tive­ly high lev­el of radi­a­tion (up to 1000 microR/h), so they are not used in con­struc­tion or oth­er areas.

Genesis of Sands

Sands are main­ly formed as a result of chem­i­cal or phys­i­cal break­down of rocks, a process known as weath­er­ing in geol­o­gy. Both types of weath­er­ing are close­ly relat­ed and work togeth­er. How­ev­er, the inten­si­ty of each type, which is deter­mined by a range of fac­tors such as cli­mate, min­er­al com­po­si­tion of rocks, relief, etc., varies in dif­fer­ent places.

Weath­er­ing trans­forms rock for­ma­tions under the influ­ence of var­i­ous fac­tors: water, car­bon diox­ide, oxy­gen, dai­ly and sea­son­al tem­per­a­ture fluc­tu­a­tions. Usu­al­ly, this is how gran­ite is bro­ken down. The com­po­si­tion of gran­ite con­sists of crys­tals of quartz, feldspar, mica, and oth­er var­i­ous min­er­als. Feldspar, when in con­tact with water, breaks down faster than quartz, caus­ing the gran­ite to crum­ble into frag­ments. Then the process of denuda­tion occurs, which is the destruc­tion of rocks and the trans­porta­tion of debris to low­er parts of the earth­’s sur­face due to grav­i­ty, water, and wind. After­ward, sed­i­men­ta­tion (accu­mu­la­tion) of debris occurs. These process­es cause the smooth­ing of the sur­face of both the con­ti­nent and the ocean floor. These are rel­a­tive­ly slow process­es, tak­ing hun­dreds, thou­sands, and even mil­lions of years to occur.

Sand applications

Sand is an impor­tant nat­ur­al resource for the econ­o­my and is used in many indus­tries. It is a com­po­nent of plas­ter and con­crete mix­es, added to clay to reduce shrink­age and crack­ing dur­ing brick pro­duc­tion, and mixed with asphalt for road con­struc­tion. In foundry work, sand is used as a mold­ing and sep­a­rat­ing mate­r­i­al. It is also used as an abra­sive mate­r­i­al, such as in sand­pa­per and sand­blast­ing. Some sands are used to improve soils (such as lime sands) and as fer­til­iz­ers (such as glau­conite sands). Sand’s fil­ter­ing prop­er­ties are wide­ly used, and it is used in rail­way trans­port as a “brak­ing” mate­r­i­al.

Sands can be sources of rare min­er­als and ele­ments. Some sands con­tain gold, while oth­ers con­tain pre­cious stones, plat­inum, ura­ni­um, tin, and more. In addi­tion to the impor­tant role that sands play in extract­ing rare com­po­nents, they are also very impor­tant col­lec­tors of var­i­ous valu­able liq­uid sub­stances. They serve as large reser­voirs for fresh water, brine, oil, and gas. Liq­uids and gas­es can also be inject­ed into sand. This prop­er­ty of sands is used to cre­ate nat­ur­al gas stor­age facil­i­ties and to inject fresh water for future use.

Availability of Ukraine

The most com­mon types of sand for con­struc­tion in Ukraine are riv­er and quar­ry sand. Although marine sand is also extract­ed in small quan­ti­ties in Ukraine, it is not as pop­u­lar.

In the con­struc­tion indus­try, riv­er sand is high­ly val­ued. It is a clean mate­r­i­al with­out any unnec­es­sary impu­ri­ties or debris, which is extract­ed by wash­ing the riverbed. In Ukraine, the riverbed of the Dnieper Riv­er is the largest source of riv­er sand, account­ing for approx­i­mate­ly 75% of all riv­er deposits. The Kyiv region has a third (about 12 zones) of all offi­cial riv­er sand deposits in Ukraine.

Marine sand is extract­ed by open-pit min­ing in the coastal areas of the Odessa, Myko­laiv, and Kher­son regions. There are sev­er­al rea­sons why it is extract­ed in the small­est quan­ti­ties. First­ly, it has a high salt and marine min­er­al con­tent, mak­ing it unsuit­able for many uses. Sec­ond­ly, indus­tri­al sand min­ing is pro­hib­it­ed in most of the coastal areas of the Black and Azov Seas.

Quar­ry sand is most com­mon­ly extract­ed by open-pit min­ing and is the cheap­est type of sand. Dur­ing pro­cess­ing, it can be cleaned of large debris and impu­ri­ties through wash­ing or screen­ing. Sand quar­ries can be found in every region of Ukraine. Depend­ing on the char­ac­ter­is­tics of the deposit, build­ing mate­ri­als may con­tain impu­ri­ties such as clay, soil, quartz, and so on.

Accord­ing to the State Ser­vice of Ukraine for Geo­desy, Car­tog­ra­phy and Cadas­tre, Ukraine has 42 deposits of quartz sand. Quartz sand is used for glass pro­duc­tion and is wide­spread in almost all regions of Ukraine. As of Jan­u­ary 1, 2021, the total bal­ance reserves of quartz sand in Ukraine amount­ed to 240.57 mil­lion tons.

References

ДСТУ Б В.2.7–32-95 Будівельні матеріали. Пісок щільний природний для будівельних матеріалів, виробів, конструкцій і робіт. Технічні умови.
Мала гірнича енциклопедія : у 3 т. Т. 2 : Л — Р / В. С. Білецький [та ін.] ; ред. В. С. Білецький. – Донецьк : Донбас, 2007. – 652 с.
Петтиджон Ф. Дж., Поттер П., Сивер Р. Пески и песчаники. — М.: «Мир», 1976. — 535 с.
Свинко Й. М. Геологія / Свинко Й. М., Сивий М. Я. – Київ : Либідь, 2003. – 480 с.
Термінологічний словник-довідник з будівництва та архітектури / Р.А.Шмиг, В.М.Боярчук, І.М.Добрянський, В.М.Барабаш; за заг. ред. Р.А.Шмига. – Львів, 2010. – 222 с.

 

The Insti­tute of Geol­o­gy is ready to pro­vide a full range of ser­vices in the field of sand extrac­tion: con­duct geo­log­i­cal stud­ies of ter­ri­to­ries, assist with obtain­ing spe­cial per­mits, or per­form geo­log­i­cal-eco­nom­ic eval­u­a­tion and devel­op a devel­op­ment project.

 

You may be interested in other publications: