Diveena Danabalan, et al., report that helium is the second most abundant element in theuniverse, and yet here on Earth it is a more limited commodity. Supplies come from only four countries. The USA has dominated the market for decades but in the last few years it has been joined by Algeria, Qatar and Russia. Superficially, this would appear to be a good development, but supply of helium to the western world is precarious.
Why is this a problem? Helium is not only used in party balloons and advertising blimps. Cryogenics accounts for around 32% of global demand, with medical cryogenics (such as MRI scanners) becoming ever more important and abundant. For these there is no adequate substitute for He - it really is an elemental hero. The Large Hadron Collider, for example, requires 120 tonnes of superfluid helium to maintain its magnets at their operating temperature of 1.9K. A new truckload is required to arrive in Geneva each week, to top it up. Helium is also extensively used in arc welding, purging leak detection, chromatography, superconduction, breathing mixtures, heat transfer, gas lift; and (extensively) as a purge gas in the oxygen/hydrogen propulsion units used for space rocketry and nuclear ICBMs. All current He reserves were discovered by accident.
What is needed is a strategy for finding this precious commodity on purpose. Reserves in the USA have declined significantly in recent years, while those in Qatar, although massive, are entirely dependent upon the Liquefied Natural Gas (LNG) market remaining robust, because helium is a by-product of the cryogenic process needed to produce it.
Read on. A good article.
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