The Helium Crisis
The Helium Stewardship Act 2012
The Helium Stewardship Act, authored by Senator Bingaman (D- New Mexico) and Senator John Barasso (R-Wyoming), would authorize the Secretary of the Interior to continue selling the federal helium reserve at market prices and promote new strategies to produce and preserve domestic helium sources.
The proposed legislation presented a responsible resource management strategy for the Federal Helium Reserve, which is under the jurisdiction of the Secretary of the Interior through the Bureau of Land Management (BLM). The draft drew recommendations from private helium refiners, retailers, end users, BLM staff, and the National Academies of Sciences to outline the most pressing problems facing the helium industry, high-tech industrial users, and Federal helium users:
• Securing long-term access to BLM crude helium for all Federal users; • Authorizing continued operation of the Federal Helium Reserve beyond January 1, 2015, when existing authorizations expire;
• Continue the sell off beyond the 2015 “sell by” date that will ensure the remaining helium is managed and sold off responsibly (and predictably) providing more surety to refiners and users until other domestic or international sources of helium can be discovered and brought to market.
• Selling BLM crude helium at prices that recover fair market value for U.S. taxpayers;
• Stimulating development of private sources of helium by adopting market-based prices for BLM helium sales, and encouraging helium extraction from natural gas exploration and production;
• Stewardship of this Federally-owned, non-renewable natural resource
Unfortunatley this Act was not passed in 2012 and a new proposal has been set by committee to be voted on again in 2013.
A bipartisan bill Responsible Helium Administration and Stewardship Act proposed to the U.S. House of Representatives is set to vote week of April 22, 2013 on H.R. 527, for the prosed sale of the Federal Helium Reserve. While Congress must give the Bureau of Land Management new authority to continue selling off crude helium, the bill would create an auction process that could jeopardize existing contracts for the purchase of refined helium by GAWDA ( Gas and Welding Associates) members. In turn, that could affect your ability to meet your customers' needs for helium.
GAWDA submitted comments to the House Natural Resources Committee for a February 14 hearing on H.R. 527, a bill to complete the private sale of the Federal Helium Reserve. The bill would establish an auction at least every six months to sell off the remainder of the reserve to private interests, after giving preference to federal agencies and grant recipients. While all of the witnesses at the hearing agreed that Congress should act this year to reauthorize the Bureau of Land Management sales, current refiners questioned whether they should have to provide access to their refining processes to those purchasers of crude helium without refining capabilities. The fear is that the effect of “winner take all” auctions on long-term contracts with suppliers and customers.
To track this bill you can visit http://www.govtrack.us/congress/bills/hr527 and register for this information.
- We need to understand the geological characteristics and processes that permit the formation of helium-rich gas fields and use this information for future development of methodologies and research in discovering these fields.
• Future potential sites need to be identified for natural storage facilities and create new facilities closer to future major helium producers and to allow an increase in the storage and conservation capabilities of
helium users.
• Develop economic models for the extraction and storage of joint-product, where one nonrenewable resource is dependent on the production of the other and dominated by supply and demand of the other.
• Improve the efficiency of current technologies that depend on helium and develop alternative technologies that do not require helium or can recylce this resource.
With the growing need of helium and the limited current resources that are available for the extraction of crude helium the industry needs to take action in order to ensure a steady supply for our future needs. To continue to sustain our society with this non renewable resource it is our obligation to continue to learn ways to conserve this resource and to develop potential solutions for substitutions and new technologies.
Solutions
Gasworld is holding it's first Global Helium Summit 2013
June 13, 2013 |The Royal Garden Hotel, Kensington, London, England, to address this crucial topic of the helium shortage and bring future business strategies and developments into discussion in hopes of salvaging the situation.
The one day Helium Summit will be attended by key Helium experts and industry decision makers, addressing concerns and insight to the future of the Helium sector.
Includes the following critical subjects:
- Latest project timing and start-up news
- The shift from the US Federal Helium Program to the Helium Stewardship Act
- The future of the Bureau of Land Management (BLM) and helium reserves
- Current global helium supply infrastructure
- Future sourcing planes - especially related to Russian- sourced helium
- Demand dynamics and trends
- Technology drivers and supressors
- Researchers and how helium remains important to science evolution
- What next for helium?
Defining other options for helium will be very difficult and in today's world technically impossible depending upon the application. Helium has many useful properties, some can be substituted (as in welding applications) others cannot (very low temperature cryogenic research).
Helium is the coldest liquid known and at this time no known substitute exists. Helium does not become radioactive; helium will not freeze at liquid oxygen and liquid nitrogen temperatures, so replacement would be difficult for these applications.
High temperature superconductivity (HTS)have been discovered where MRI magnets can be cooled at higher temperatures, avoiding the need for liquid helium, are possible. An ideal solution to the helium shortage would be superconducting coils cooled with liquid nitrogen. Nitrogen makes up 80% of our atmosphere, so it is free and virtually limitless. However there are still over 1600 MRI devices that are operating and would be very expensive to replace.
The resolve the immediate supply problems today it is necessary to both incentivize helium recycling by adjusting the current helium pricing structure imposed by the federal government. Today there are industrial machinery that allow for the capture, refinement, and re-collection of used helium after it is consumed during leak test applications. The Vacuum Instrument Corporation (VIC) has created an industrial-grade mechanism that effectively reduces helium leakage in industrial leak-test processes, and enables recycling the gas with 98% efficiency. The ROI for such technology is estimated to be around two years to eighteen months. Organzations such as NASA currently do not utilize helium recycling technology as a result of its cheap supply price.
Some advanced technology solutions have been proposed, some of which have yet to be perfected or even widely implemented. One solution suggests helium mining on the moon and other planets. Other solutions are the creation of a synthetic helium in the laboratory. These two solutions are considered long-term solutions and would not resolve the immediate situation.
Only some helium recycling is occurring today In Western Europe and Japan, but only when economically feasible.
