Global Helium Shortage - Guess Who's To Blame?

[angelatc]

According to Popular Mechanics, the fault lies with government.

http://www.popularmechanics.com/science/health/med-tech/why-is-there-a-helium-shortage-10031229

It's a good article, but the nuts and bolts of it are pretty easy: they set the prices far below the market.


Under the federal system, those prices are unstable partly because they have less to do with supply and demand than they do about the need for the government, under the U.S. Bureau of Land Management, to pay off the cost of creating the Federal Helium Reserve, according to David Joyner, president of Air Liquide Helium America, who testified (http://www.energy.senate.gov/public/index.cfm/hearings-and-business-meetings?ID=d5cf8894-15b9-410b-b4e8-5915d2c2b321) before the Senate Energy and Natural Resources Committee in May. Helium prices were set by the BLM based on the amount of the remaining $1 billion debt the government incurred after it purchased its helium stockpile in 1960 and how much of that reserve was left.

"Because the original base pricing of federal helium started at below market levels, the BLM, at the recommendation of the National Academy of Sciences, is now making unpredictable increases to adjust for the base pricing up to market levels and to incorporate additional fees for costs that are specific only to the operation of the BLM reserve," he told the committee. This irregular pricing, he said, "drives up the price of helium for all consumers, not only here in the United States, but also around the world whenever the BLM crude price is adjusted."

Read more: Helium Shortage - Why Is There a Helium Shortage? - Popular Mechanics (http://www.popularmechanics.com/science/health/med-tech/why-is-there-a-helium-shortage-10031229#ixzz2Rc8ngdOq)

[Anti Federalist]

Not the first time that government, fucking with helium supplies, caused disaster.

http://secondsfromdisaster.net/wp-content/uploads/2013/01/hindenburg1.gif

[paulbot24]

Sounds like our trusty government. Get rich by selling mass quantities off to the private sector, then guilt them for using it, make up sob story about a shortage and seize it back.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/National_Helium_Reserve

[sailingaway]

Not the first time that government, fucking with helium supplies, caused disaster.

http://secondsfromdisaster.net/wp-content/uploads/2013/01/hindenburg1.gif

They used hydrogen, I believe which is what the problem was. Both make it float, one is really really combustable.


http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Xi-NYxhnm6w

[Dr.3D]

They used hydrogen, I believe which is what the problem was. Both make it float, one is really really combustable.

Germany used hydrogen because they couldn't get helium.

[paulbot24]

Then the Nazis relocated to the dark side of the moon, which is rich in Helium-3. Look out.;)

[Henry Rogue]

They used hydrogen, I believe which is what the problem was. Both make it float, one is really really combustable.


http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Xi-NYxhnm6wI'm pretty sure AF knows that. If I recall correctly The U.S. is the only source of helium, at least at that time. The U.S. denying Zeppelin Helium forced him to use an alternative which was of course Hydrogen.

[sailingaway]

I'm pretty sure AF knows that. If I recall correctly The U.S. is the only source of helium, at least at that time. The U.S. denying Zeppelin Helium forced him to use an alternative which was of course Hydrogen.

Or they could have decided it was a bad idea to fly people in something that could explode so easily.

[liberty2897]

I watched a documentary with a NASA Engineer that presented very strong argument that this disaster was a result of incorrect manufacturing. Someone along the line decided it would be a good idea to add an aluminum-powder-paste to the exterior. Apparently, docking can cause a large enough electrostatic discharge to ignite this erroneously added material (not in the original design). I'm just posting because I thought it was interesting... not trying to defend government fuck-ups, which I'm pretty sure it was :)

That image might be of a different blimp for all I know...

[Carson]

I watched a documentary with a NASA Engineer that presented very strong argument that this disaster was a result of incorrect manufacturing. Someone along the line decided it would be a good idea to add an aluminum-powder-paste to the exterior. Apparently, docking can cause a large enough electrostatic discharge to ignite this erroneously added material (not in the original design). I'm just posting because I thought it was interesting... not trying to defend government fuck-ups, which I'm pretty sure it was :)

That image might be of a different blimp for all I know...


That's pretty interesting...and would make for a pretty silver blimp.


P.S. That reminds me of something else that must have some for of socialism involved in the pricing. Water. How can regular water be the same price as distilled if the production isn't being subsidized in some way?

I remember when people first started buying water in a big way. It was kind of funny to me. No one else seemed to get the joke. We had a manufactured gas war in the 70's. ? The fuel companies tried to raise prices to account for the inflation created by counterfeiting going on. Then the very people responsible thought they would fix the problem of rising fuel prices by putting a price freeze on things like wages and gasoline.

Instant gas lines.

Many of the people shaking their finger at the prices for gas where holding a new designer bottle of water in the other hand that was costing them more per gallon than the gasoline. :D

I guess you had to be there.

[talkingpointes]

MY gf just the other day was telling me how prices on their helium have gone up 300% this year. She works for a florist, they deliver a ton of balloons. Weird to hear this here now.

[Anti Federalist]

I'm pretty sure AF knows that. If I recall correctly The U.S. is the only source of helium, at least at that time. The U.S. denying Zeppelin Helium forced him to use an alternative which was of course Hydrogen.

This is exactly right. The US government had placed all sorts of sanction of the export of helium, which meant Germany had no alternative but to use hydrogen in the lifting cells.


Or they could have decided it was a bad idea to fly people in something that could explode so easily.

Ah, but think of propaganda loss of not having that airship, sporting the Nazi swastika on all four fins, flying all around the world.


I watched a documentary with a NASA Engineer that presented very strong argument that this disaster was a result of incorrect manufacturing. Someone along the line decided it would be a good idea to add an aluminum-powder-paste to the exterior. Apparently, docking can cause a large enough electrostatic discharge to ignite this erroneously added material (not in the original design). I'm just posting because I thought it was interesting... not trying to defend government fuck-ups, which I'm pretty sure it was :)

That image might be of a different blimp for all I know...

Nope, that is the Hindenburg.

Somewhere in my childhood detrius I have a small frame piece mounted on a plaque, gotta talk to the old man about that.

Yeah, the aluminum powder infused laquer "dope" that the whole thing was coated in, was an electrostatic bomb in and of itself, but the millions of cubic feet of hydrogen in thin "cells" sure helped.

[Henry Rogue]

Or they could have decided it was a bad idea to fly people in something that could explode so easily. True, a dangerous gamble with other peoples lives, but I think helium was Zeppelin's first choice. Which was denied By The U.S. government. All I'm saying is I think that was what AF was eluding to.

[Henry Rogue]

I watched a documentary with a NASA Engineer that presented very strong argument that this disaster was a result of incorrect manufacturing. Someone along the line decided it would be a good idea to add an aluminum-powder-paste to the exterior. Apparently, docking can cause a large enough electrostatic discharge to ignite this erroneously added material (not in the original design). I'm just posting because I thought it was interesting... not trying to defend government fuck-ups, which I'm pretty sure it was :)

That image might be of a different blimp for all I know...I saw that too and years later Myth Busters did a show on that. Did it burn that quickly because of the hydrogen or because of the flammable skin? Myth Busters showed it was the Hydrogen that cause the fast burn time.