Known as 'that sand girl' on TikTok, 24-year-old Franziska Trautmann is trying to help restore Louisiana's eroding coastline ... with glass sand. 
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The state loses about an American football field's worth of land every 100 minutes because of coastal erosion, so Trautmann and her co-founder, Max Steitz, decided to take action and launch Glass Half Full, the only glass recycling facility in New Orleans.

So far the venture has diverted more than 2.2m lbs of glass from landfills, and the charity is working with scientists to expand its work to other parts of the world experiencing coastal erosion.  Sand is the most exploited resource in the world after water but its use is largely ungoverned, meaning we are consuming it faster than it can be naturally replaced.

50bn tonnes of sand and gravel extracted each year, finds UN study ► https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2022/apr/26/50bn-tonnes-of-sand-and-gravel-extracted-each-year-finds-un-study

Green teen memes: how TikTok could save the planet ► https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2020/aug/28/green-teen-memes-how-tiktok-could-save-the-planet-aoe

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#TikTok #Sand #CoastalErosion