"As Coroner, I must aver I thoroughly examined her. And she's not only merely dead, She's really, most sincerely dead."
Posted on 06/28/2016 2:40:26 PM PDT by sparklite2
What scientists are calling a "game changer" for society has been discovered deep in Tanzania's Rift Valley: a massive helium gas field with enough of the precious commodity to fill more than 1.2 million MRI scanners, Phys.org reports.
Besides the sheer amount of gas, the discovery is notable because it appears to be the first time that stores of helium have been purposely found (they're usually stumbled upon during oil and gas drilling). And the find, which will be presented Tuesday by Durham University PhD student Diveena Danabalan at a Japanese geochemistry conference, could help restock nearly depleted stockpiles. Researchers figure there's about 54 billion cubic feet of helium in just one section of the valley. To put that in context, the Federal Helium Reserve in Texas, which supplies more than 40% of domestic helium needs and contains about 30% of the world's total helium supply, right now holds about 24.2 billion cubic feet, per Live Science.
(Excerpt) Read more at newser.com ...
if they tap it, will we stop floating in space? :)
When I was kid I thought helium was something you put on a cut.
"As Coroner, I must aver I thoroughly examined her. And she's not only merely dead, She's really, most sincerely dead."
Helium is not flammable.
But, Wait! Thirty five years ago MOTHER EARTH NEWS groups were claiming that all natural helium would be exhausted in ten years!
IT WAS SETTLED SCIENCE!
LOL! Was thinking the same.
No worries -- helium isn't explosive. You're thinking of hydrogen as in the Hindenberg disaster.
Actually, no. Helium is by far the preferred carrier gas for use in gas chromatography...which is probably, by the numbers, the most widely used analytical instrument type that there is. Folks who depend on GC analyses will be ecstatic with this news.
Helium doesn’t go boom.
Careful, it will float away. Cue Roger Dean.
Nah, helium can’t remain in the upper atmosphere long enough to be a greenhouse gas, it would just escape into space.
Bad way of describing it, they use liquid helium to cool the magnets and there are losses when it vaporizes. Is it 1.2 million MRI scanners for one day or for 100 years? Without the timeframe, the illustration is not illustrative.
“Tanzania will make sure it gets squandered.”
Of course it will. Just as in Venezuela, the people could sit atop a mountain of riches and still starve to death due to corruption and politics.
That’s hydrogen you’re thinking of. Helium is not flammable.
Here in the U.S. there is only enough helium left in the government reserve near Amarillo to last about another three years. The reasons are both technological and political.
The above is from 2012.
Yes , you are right.
Thank you for the clarification
Thank you so much for challenging me the other day. I don’t recall every hearing about “abiotic oil” specifically and certainly don’t recall reading about it. I do remember reading about the Russian Deep Bore project in Norway, IIRC some 20 years ago but what I read was just as they were beginning. So I am sure I didn’t just dream it up independently but it did resonate with me. I recall the Fischer Trop process from Organic Chem 40 years ago.
I did look up abiotic oil just now on Wikipedia and was shocked to find an article. Even more shocked to see Fischer Trop referenced. Interesting. I honestly had never seen any of that.
The reason I pinged you is I recall hearing or reading that Helium is always associated with petroleum but as I recall there is no theory to explain why. Thoughts?
Crazy minds think alike.
Yup, now they can tie millions of helium balloons to the top of Guam so it can’t tip over.
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