Helium Shortage No Laughing Matter, Scientists Say (2024)

FAQs

Is there a true helium shortage? ›

Anyone who uses helium in their business will be well aware that the global helium market has been experiencing 'Helium Shortage 4.0' since the beginning of 2022.

Liquid helium, the coldest element on Earth, is needed to keep the MRI machines running and without it, doctors would lose a critical medical tool. As helium is a non-renewable resource, the Earth is certainly running out of it.

This nonrenewable element is found deep within the Earth's crust and is in short supply, according to NBC reports. The global helium shortage is due mainly to decreased supply from major producers, including Russia which has curtailed production since the war in Ukraine, according to The Harvard Crimson.

Helium Shortage 4.0, as experts refer to it, is expected to continue into 2023 [1]. Gas chromatography contributes, in a very small part, to global helium consumption, but analytical testing laboratories who need to maintain helium as a GC carrier gas risk facing a severe impact from the recurring gas shortage.

Hence, Argon is a substitute for helium.

Once the gas leaks into the atmosphere, it is light enough to escape the Earth's gravitational field so it bleeds off into space, never to return. We may run out of helium within 25–30 years because it's being consumed so freely.

Helium is the second-most-abundant element in the universe, but on Earth it's relatively rare. It results from the decay of uranium, can't be artificially created, and is produced as a byproduct of natural gas refinement.

Helium resources of the world, exclusive of the United States, were estimated to be about 31.3 billion cubic meters (1.13 trillion cubic feet).

Our Sun is middle-aged, with about five billion years left in its lifespan. However, it's expected to go through some changes as it gets older, as we all do — and these changes will affect our planet.

Liquid helium boils off and can be captured and recycled by re-liquefying it. In the U.S., only a small amount of recycling infrastructure is in place. Once helium is released in the atmosphere, it will continue rising until it escapes into space, making it the only truly unrecoverable element.

What will allow the world to not run out of helium? ›

Helium starts out as a different, heavier element. However, exposure to radioactive elements (for example uranium or thorium) can result in the decay of other elements nearby. Essentially, due to exposure to radioactive elements buried under the ground, helium naturally continues to occur.

Helium in the U.S.

Apart from being the world's main producer and one of the largest helium consumers, the U.S holds the most extensive helium reserves worldwide.

Global helium reserves 2022, by country

As of 2022, the reserves of helium in the United States amounted to more than 8.5 billion cubic meters, making it the country with the largest reserves of helium globally.

And that's nothing compared to NASA, the single biggest buyer of helium. NASA consumes approximately 75 million cubic feet annually to cool liquid hydrogen and oxygen for rocket fuel.

We have to use as little as possible!” Without helium, people would live in a different world. Rockets might not work. Airships might instead have to be filled with hydrogen. Hydrogen easily catches fire.

The answer is that the Earth is running out of helium. In fact, helium is the only element on the periodic table that is considered a nonrenewable resource on Earth. According to NPR News, “helium is generated deep underground through the natural radioactive decay of elements such as uranium and thorium.

Perhaps the most familiar use of helium is as a safe, non-flammable gas to fill party and parade balloons. However, helium is a critical component in many fields, including scientific research, medical technology, high-tech manufacturing, space exploration, and national defense.

Technically any gas that's less dense than air will make a balloon float. In comparison, Hydrogen is half the density of helium and can be better at making a balloon float. Hydrogen gas generates good buoyancy but is not one of the popular nonhelium balloon decoration ideas, since it is explosive.

This means that at sea level on a 0ºC day, hydrogen provides enough buoyancy to lift 1.2031 kg per cubic meter, while helium can only lift 1.1145 kg per cubic meter of gas. Hydrogen, then, provides about 8% more gross lift than helium does.

Latex and foil balloons filled with air are proven to last longer than balloons filled with helium because the mass of each particle of air is much larger than a particle of helium.

What will run out by 2030? ›

According to Nobel laureate Prof Robert Richardson of Cornell University, the US supplies 80 per cent of the helium used in the world at a very cheap rate and these supplies will run out in 25 to 30 years' time. Earth's helium reserves will run out by 2030, a leading expert has claimed.

Helium shortage raises concerns around MRI machines. The U.S. is experiencing the fourth in a series of helium shortages since 2006, according to helium consultant Phil Kornbluth. “The world has experienced eight years of helium shortage in the last 17.

The alpha particles that are emitted from the decaying atom bond with loose electrons underground, producing helium atoms. Currently, this natural process is the only method with which helium is produced on Earth. In other words: You cannot make your own helium!

The more pure helium you inhale, the longer your body is without crucial oxygen. Breathing in pure helium can cause death by asphyxiation in just minutes. Inhaling helium from a pressurized tank can also cause a gas or air embolism, which is a bubble that becomes trapped in a blood vessel, blocking it.

Unfortunately, since it's impossible to make helium via a chemical reaction, it would require a considerable sum of money to blow up helium balloons yourself. If you need a helium balloon and want to inflate it at home, it's best to buy a special canister of helium.

Breathing in pure helium deprives the body of oxygen, as if you were holding your breath. If you couldn't breathe at all, you'd start to die in minutes—as soon as your body exhausted the supply of oxygen stored in the blood.

Helium may be the second most abundant gas in the universe, but it is also the second lightest, making it easy to slip right out of the earth's atmosphere. While outer space is overflowing with Helium, its presence deep under the earth's crust makes it difficult to harvest.

The main commercial source of helium is known as natural gas, which contains an average of. Helium.

There is some uncertainty in the calculations, but recent results suggest 1.5 billion years until the end. That is a much shorter span of time than the five billion years until the planet is engulfed by the Sun. (Though still long enough that you need not change your investment strategies.)

One billion years from now, Earth's atmosphere will contain very little oxygen, making it uninhabitable for complex aerobic life. Today, oxygen makes up around 21 per cent of Earth's atmosphere. Its oxygen-rich nature is ideal for large and complex organisms, like humans, that require the gas to survive.

Will Earth run out of oil? ›

According to the U.S. Energy Information Administration's (EIA) International Energy Outlook 2021 (IEO2021), the global supply of crude oil, other liquid hydrocarbons, and biofuels is expected to be adequate to meet the world's demand for liquid fuels through 2050.

Helium does not contribute to global warming but is another sign of the increased use of fossil fuels. The researchers also measured a rise in levels of a rarer isotope called helium-3.

Balloons are constructed of polyurethane, though they used to be made of rubber. Since the switch from air to helium, the behemoth balloons have coasted along with a big dose of help from volunteer balloon wranglers.

The main medical use of liquid helium is for magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) systems. Liquid helium is needed as a refrigerant for the superconducting magnets that are critical components in many of these devices.

Founded in 2019, Helium is a Google-backed startup that's on a mission to disrupt the telecom industry. It is a decentralised, blockchain-powered network which aims to provide connectivity for IoT devices and, more recently, 5G devices too. Helium is a wireless network for IoT devices.

The BLM operates and maintains a helium storage reservoir, enrichment plant, and pipeline system near Amarillo, TX, that in FY 2021 supplied approximately 12 percent of domestic demand for helium.

NASA has selected Air Products and Chemicals, Inc of Allentown, Pennsylvania, to supply 33 million liters of liquid helium to the agency's Kennedy Space Center in Florida. The sole source contract includes the lease of six proprietary liquid helium pumps.

The reserve was established with the enactment of the Helium Act of 1925. The strategic supply provisioned the noble gas for airships, and in the 1950s became an important source of coolant during the Cold War and Space Race.

Is helium renewable (does it naturally replenish itself after humans use it)? No, helium is a non-renewable resource. That is why the Federal Government stored 44 billion cubic feet of helium in a natural gas reservoir at Cliffside, just outside of Amarillo, Texas.

In 2022, helium exports from the United States amounted to an estimated 40 million cubic meters. This figure marks the lowest export volume of helium in the period of consideration.

Why is there no helium anywhere? ›

Helium is the second-most-abundant element in the universe, but on Earth it's relatively rare. It results from the decay of uranium, can't be artificially created, and is produced as a byproduct of natural gas refinement. Only a limited number of countries produce it, with the U.S. and Russia among top suppliers.

Where does helium come from? Helium is a non-renewable natural resource that is most commonly recovered from natural gas deposits. Geologic conditions in Texas, Oklahoma, and Kansas make the natural gas in these areas some of the most helium-rich in the world (with concentrations between 0.3 percent and 2.7 percent).

Richardson said it has taken 4.7 billion years for the Earth to accumulate our Helium reserves. The United States' reserves were purchased in 1925 and will be gone in only a hundred years from getting it. Once the Helium is released into the atmosphere it is gone forever.

On Earth, however helium is exceedingly rare and comprises only 5.2 ppm of Earth's atmosphere.