Nuclear Fusion stymied due Global Helium Shortage

[Rheghead]

Nuclear fusion research hasn't even got off the ground to save us from fossil fuels and climate change and we are in danger of running out of its helium fuel before it becomes a reality.

Helium 3 is a non renewable resource and as such like some fossil fuels it will be used up in just a couple of decades.

http://www.independent.co.uk/news/science/take-a-deep-breath-why-the-world-is-running-out-of-helium-2059357.html

This must place a greater emphasis on the development of renewable energy like wind, tidal and wave etc. :eek:

[Ricco]

Ahh, but I know where to lay my hands on several trillion tonnes of it! ;)

[Mystical Potato Head]

Nuclear fusion research hasn't even got of the ground to save us from fossil fuels and climate change and we are in danger of running out of its helium fuel before it becomes a reality.

Helium 3 is a non renewable resource and as such like some fossil fuels it will be used up in just a couple of decades.

http://www.independent.co.uk/news/science/take-a-deep-breath-why-the-world-is-running-out-of-helium-2059357.html

This must place a greater emphasis on the development of renewable energy like wind, tidal and wave etc. :eek:

There's plenty of it on the moons upper regolith.The Chinese plan to land on the moon in 2017 to do a bit of prospecting.They estimate there is over 1,000,000 tonnes of it and around 100 tonnes would be needed to power the earth for a year.

[Corrie 3]

This must place a greater emphasis on the development of renewable energy like wind, tidal and wave etc.
Oh Rheghead,
This post is just clutching at straws for your quest to cover Caithness in wind farms......How is this green energy going to be used to run MRI scanners and fill the Bairns balloons...we are talking about a very different element here...unless you are thinking of inventing a turbine that produces Helium??

Get a grip Man!!!

C3....:roll::cool::eek:

[ywindythesecond]

Nuclear fusion research hasn't even got of the ground to save us from fossil fuels and climate change and we are in danger of running out of its helium fuel before it becomes a reality.

Helium 3 is a non renewable resource and as such like some fossil fuels it will be used up in just a couple of decades.

http://www.independent.co.uk/news/science/take-a-deep-breath-why-the-world-is-running-out-of-helium-2059357.html

This must place a greater emphasis on the development of renewable energy like wind, tidal and wave etc. :eek:

I found the article very interesting and informative. It shows how difficult it is to work our way through to a, and I hate the word because of the cheap "green" connotations, sustainable energy solution to our established lifestyle needs.

We need to moderate our energy needs first of all, and we need to plan how to meet those needs which we can't or won't moderate.

A proper plan is needed, and tinkering with market forces is not a plan.

Wind, Tidal, and Wave may have a place in the plan, but until we have the plan, we don't know what that will be.

[orkneycadian]

As ywindy says, very interesting and informative. I for one was not aware that helium (whatever its isotope) was only produced on earth by radioactive decay of terrestrial rock. Somehow, I'd just imagined that you could fractionally distil air and helium would be one of the fractions you could harvest. How wrong you can be!

£75 for a helium party balloon! Why not fill the kids balloons full of hydrogen? Should make for an altogether more interesting party, especially when the balloons settle on the candles on the birthday cake! Would only be a relatively minor explosion surely, and would teach the kids the perils of playing with fire and flammable gases! :)

And the lowest boiling point gas there is? Bet it makes far better ice cream than LN2! :cool:

[bekisman]

As ywindy says, very interesting and informative. I for one was not aware that helium (whatever its isotope) was only produced on earth by radioactive decay of terrestrial rock. Somehow, I'd just imagined that you could fractionally distil air and helium would be one of the fractions you could harvest. How wrong you can be!

£75 for a helium party balloon! Why not fill the kids balloons full of hydrogen? Should make for an altogether more interesting party, especially when the balloons settle on the candles on the birthday cake! Would only be a relatively minor explosion surely, and would teach the kids the perils of playing with fire and flammable gases! :)

And the lowest boiling point gas there is? Bet it makes far better ice cream than LN2! :cool:

But we do get Helium 3 from nuclear weapons. 15 kilograms of Helium 3 is produced by decaying nuclear weapons each year

[George Brims]

Why not fill the kids balloons full of hydrogen? Should make for an altogether more interesting party, especially when the balloons settle on the candles on the birthday cake! Would only be a relatively minor explosion surely, and would teach the kids the perils of playing with fire and flammable gases! :)
A long time ago they used to be filled with hydrogen! I remember being in Woollies in Wick, and some people passed us with a balloon from the sideshows, which were in town that week. A few seconds later there was a flash as someone's cigarette both burst the balloon and ignited the hydrogen. A small child got melted balloon rubber stuck to her face.


And the lowest boiling point gas there is? Bet it makes far better ice cream than LN2! :cool:
Actually it won't, expense aside. Although the boiling point is lower, the specific heat is much lower. It takes 17 times as much heat to boil a litre of liquid helium as a litre of liquid nitrogen. If you tried to use the helium to make ice cream, it would boil off practically on contact , leaving you without ice cream, but with a very high pitched voice.

[orkneycadian]

it would boil off practically on contact , leaving you without ice cream, but with a very high pitched voice.

Should be safe enough to gargle with then for added comedy voice effects?

Seriously though (and excusing my lack of knowledge of terrestrial fusion capability), are we completely stuffed for fusion power if we don't have any helium? Is this the only way we can realistically achieve terrestrial fusion, or is something that might happen someday with other elements?

[achingale]

Ahh, but I know where to lay my hands on several trillion tonnes of it! ;)

Funnily enough, I do too, for real.

[dafi]

Wheres that then?

[Tubthumper]

Funnily enough, I do too, for real.
Gonnae gis a clue?

[Rheghead]

Well I was always hoping that nuclear fusion was going to be the white knight that stepped in to make the wind turbines redundant but it appears I was being very optimistic.