In the future, only the 1% will have squeaky voices
June 24, 2015 2:12 PM Subscribe
Is the TLDR; "Short-sighted GOP"?
posted by BrotherCaine at 2:18 PM on June 24, 2015 [2 favorites]
posted by BrotherCaine at 2:18 PM on June 24, 2015 [2 favorites]
Well, it's a *little* more complicated than that.
posted by Chrysostom at 2:19 PM on June 24, 2015
posted by Chrysostom at 2:19 PM on June 24, 2015
A hundred years down the line, a party balloon might be about as precious as a gold ring.
"With this party balloon, I thee wed."
posted by cardioid at 2:24 PM on June 24, 2015 [11 favorites]
"With this party balloon, I thee wed."
posted by cardioid at 2:24 PM on June 24, 2015 [11 favorites]
Well, it's a *little* more complicated than that.
The "little" being that there are plenty of Democrats that are short-sighted as well.
posted by Ickster at 2:25 PM on June 24, 2015 [7 favorites]
The "little" being that there are plenty of Democrats that are short-sighted as well.
posted by Ickster at 2:25 PM on June 24, 2015 [7 favorites]
Is the TLDR; "Short-sighted GOP"?
From TFA:
From TFA:
Both Reagan and Clinton promised to do away with the [National Helium] reserve, and in 1996 Congress passed the Helium Privatization Act. The Act ordered the Reserve to sell off its stockpile, starting in 2005, at a formula-driven price -- not auctioned off at market rate, and to cease sales and shut down operations by 2015.posted by Atom Eyes at 2:26 PM on June 24, 2015 [2 favorites]
We'll solve this in 50 years, of course. Once we have hydrogen fusion, we'll have plenty of helium.
Yeah I was about to say, if we're not swimming in Helium before 2100 we're probably going to be pretty damn fucked. Dry land would probably be the priority.
posted by Talez at 2:28 PM on June 24, 2015
Yeah I was about to say, if we're not swimming in Helium before 2100 we're probably going to be pretty damn fucked. Dry land would probably be the priority.
posted by Talez at 2:28 PM on June 24, 2015
Ickster: "The "little" being that there are plenty of Democrats that are short-sighted as well."
Well, that, and the fact that we'd run out at some point regardless (barring commercial fusion).
posted by Chrysostom at 2:32 PM on June 24, 2015
Well, that, and the fact that we'd run out at some point regardless (barring commercial fusion).
posted by Chrysostom at 2:32 PM on June 24, 2015
I am forming an expedition to mine valuable Helium from its natural home, the Sun, to conduct important magnetic observations, and, if time and resources allow, to also collect the egg of the Sun-fowl if any should dwell there. If you are of hardy flesh and stout heart, please write me c/o the Royal Society.
posted by theodolite at 2:34 PM on June 24, 2015 [63 favorites]
posted by theodolite at 2:34 PM on June 24, 2015 [63 favorites]
previously: Endangered Helium:Bursting the Myth
posted by the man of twists and turns at 2:34 PM on June 24, 2015 [1 favorite]
posted by the man of twists and turns at 2:34 PM on June 24, 2015 [1 favorite]
I am forming an expedition to mine valuable Helium from its natural home, the Sun, to conduct important magnetic observations, and, if time and resources allow, to also collect the egg of the Sun-fowl if any should dwell there. If you are of hardy flesh and stout heart, please write me c/o the Royal Society.
Just remember to go at night so it's not too hot.
posted by kmz at 2:58 PM on June 24, 2015 [26 favorites]
Just remember to go at night so it's not too hot.
posted by kmz at 2:58 PM on June 24, 2015 [26 favorites]
(balloon gas isn't the kind of helium we're running out of)
posted by rum-soaked space hobo at 3:20 PM on June 24, 2015
posted by rum-soaked space hobo at 3:20 PM on June 24, 2015
Uh. Maybe you guys are running out of helium...
posted by batfish at 3:35 PM on June 24, 2015 [3 favorites]
posted by batfish at 3:35 PM on June 24, 2015 [3 favorites]
This came up on reddit quite recently and I saw an interesting fact. We can go ahead and make helium the way much of the existing subterranean helium was made: Radioactive substances that release alpha articles are releasing helium ions which can bond with available electrons to form helium.
The best part is how fast it is. A 1-Curie alpha source (such as the standard for the unit, 1 gram of Radium-226) can produce 1 kilogram of helium in just 130 million years.
This degraded into a conversation about hydrogen as a replacement gas for balloons. It's affordable to spend water and electricity to make hydrogen, but balloons don't hold hydrogen very well, and also there would be fires, lots and lots of fires.
posted by Sunburnt at 3:37 PM on June 24, 2015 [2 favorites]
The best part is how fast it is. A 1-Curie alpha source (such as the standard for the unit, 1 gram of Radium-226) can produce 1 kilogram of helium in just 130 million years.
This degraded into a conversation about hydrogen as a replacement gas for balloons. It's affordable to spend water and electricity to make hydrogen, but balloons don't hold hydrogen very well, and also there would be fires, lots and lots of fires.
posted by Sunburnt at 3:37 PM on June 24, 2015 [2 favorites]
A hundred years down the line, a party balloon might be about as precious as a gold ring.
Its is dispiriting to think we are still a century away from people reckoning that some helium-filled Mylar stamped with Spongebob Squarepants' image might not be a great way to use up a finite resource.
posted by ricochet biscuit at 3:39 PM on June 24, 2015 [5 favorites]
Its is dispiriting to think we are still a century away from people reckoning that some helium-filled Mylar stamped with Spongebob Squarepants' image might not be a great way to use up a finite resource.
posted by ricochet biscuit at 3:39 PM on June 24, 2015 [5 favorites]
Presumably whoever finagled the formulaic price deal is stockpiling somewhere, and they can unload helium at a much higher market price when market prices kick in.
posted by Sunburnt at 3:42 PM on June 24, 2015 [2 favorites]
posted by Sunburnt at 3:42 PM on June 24, 2015 [2 favorites]
Sunburnt: "A 1-Curie alpha source can produce 1 kilogram of helium in just 130 million years."
Wait, if helium is lighter than air how does this work. I'm genuinely brainlocked here and you're freaking me out.
posted by boo_radley at 3:53 PM on June 24, 2015
Wait, if helium is lighter than air how does this work. I'm genuinely brainlocked here and you're freaking me out.
posted by boo_radley at 3:53 PM on June 24, 2015
>A hundred years down the line, a party balloon might be about as precious as a gold ring.
Not a problem. Given the general mood of the predictions about absolutely everything, in a hundred years no one will be celebrating anything anyway.
posted by Sing Or Swim at 3:54 PM on June 24, 2015 [1 favorite]
Not a problem. Given the general mood of the predictions about absolutely everything, in a hundred years no one will be celebrating anything anyway.
posted by Sing Or Swim at 3:54 PM on June 24, 2015 [1 favorite]
Well I will be god-damned before I go back to inflating my dirigible with hydrogen like the perfidious Kaiser.
posted by TheWhiteSkull at 4:12 PM on June 24, 2015 [18 favorites]
posted by TheWhiteSkull at 4:12 PM on June 24, 2015 [18 favorites]
Once the National Helium Reserve is depleted, market forces will kick in and the price, now untethered, will rise precipitously into the sky. Like some kind of rocket or a bird or something.
posted by dephlogisticated at 4:15 PM on June 24, 2015 [16 favorites]
posted by dephlogisticated at 4:15 PM on June 24, 2015 [16 favorites]
"A 1-Curie alpha source can produce 1 kilogram of helium in just 130 million years."
Wait, if helium is lighter than air how does this work
An alpha particle is helium, a helium nucleus that's moving really, really fast.
posted by justsomebodythatyouusedtoknow at 4:22 PM on June 24, 2015
Wait, if helium is lighter than air how does this work
An alpha particle is helium, a helium nucleus that's moving really, really fast.
posted by justsomebodythatyouusedtoknow at 4:22 PM on June 24, 2015
Saying we'll "run out of helium" is like people in the 70s oil crisis saying we'll "run out of fossil fuels" as a non-renewable resource. Higher prices will trigger a whole bunch of changes - more implementation and development of closed loop cooling systems (which already exist) and more exploration of helium mining locations. Currently helium is so cheap we're spending it on party balloons and even when cooling scientific instruments (like MRI machines) it's just allowed to boil off into the atmosphere instead of being a closed loop system.
Same with oil: vehicles became more efficient, more sources of oil were now economically viable (deep sea mining / fracking), alternative energy sources were developed (hybrids / electric cars).
Even if oil goes up to $1,000 a barrel, we'll never run out of oil: most cars will switch to electric, consumption will drop, and whatever oil reserves are in the ground will be conserved since demand falls off. If you wanted to buy a barrel at $1,000, sure you could - we'll never actually run out of it.
We'll develop higher temperature superconductors and use something like nitrogen where possible, where not we'll have closed loop systems that have a one time fill up of say 50 litres of helium instead of an annual use of 2,000 litres.
posted by xdvesper at 4:25 PM on June 24, 2015 [3 favorites]
Same with oil: vehicles became more efficient, more sources of oil were now economically viable (deep sea mining / fracking), alternative energy sources were developed (hybrids / electric cars).
Even if oil goes up to $1,000 a barrel, we'll never run out of oil: most cars will switch to electric, consumption will drop, and whatever oil reserves are in the ground will be conserved since demand falls off. If you wanted to buy a barrel at $1,000, sure you could - we'll never actually run out of it.
We'll develop higher temperature superconductors and use something like nitrogen where possible, where not we'll have closed loop systems that have a one time fill up of say 50 litres of helium instead of an annual use of 2,000 litres.
posted by xdvesper at 4:25 PM on June 24, 2015 [3 favorites]
balloons don't hold hydrogen very well, and also there would be fires, lots and lots of fires. -- SunburntHydrogen is much easier to store in the airship's envelope than Helium since the H2 molecule is larger than the He noble gas atom. The safety issue might be [citation needed]; see the controversial Hindeburg - cause of ignition article for plenty of theories.
While Hydrogen is flammable, we deal with dangerous substances in almost all of our motorized transportation. Lithium polymer batteries combust when exposed to air and jet fuel in modern airplanes can ignite in crashes (and melt steel beams).
posted by autopilot at 4:26 PM on June 24, 2015 [1 favorite]
1 kilogram of helium
Wait, if helium is lighter than air how does this work.
I don't know if this is how they do it, but, can't you compress the gas into a small enough volume where it's no longer buoyant in air? I bet you could weigh it if you did that.
posted by reprise the theme song and roll the credits at 4:45 PM on June 24, 2015
Wait, if helium is lighter than air how does this work.
I don't know if this is how they do it, but, can't you compress the gas into a small enough volume where it's no longer buoyant in air? I bet you could weigh it if you did that.
posted by reprise the theme song and roll the credits at 4:45 PM on June 24, 2015
That or use the ideal gas equation (PV=nRT). Plug in the pressure, volume, and temperature of your tank and out plops the amount of helium in moles. From that you can easily calculate the weight.
posted by dephlogisticated at 5:05 PM on June 24, 2015
posted by dephlogisticated at 5:05 PM on June 24, 2015
xdvesper: We'll develop higher temperature superconductors and use something like nitrogen where possible, where not we'll have closed loop systems that have a one time fill up of say 50 litres of helium instead of an annual use of 2,000 litres.
I am absolutely sick to death over economists' willingness to write checks that science has no earthly idea whether we'll be able to cash.
posted by traveler_ at 5:06 PM on June 24, 2015 [16 favorites]
I am absolutely sick to death over economists' willingness to write checks that science has no earthly idea whether we'll be able to cash.
posted by traveler_ at 5:06 PM on June 24, 2015 [16 favorites]
There's also this property of matter called "mass", which a kilogram is a measure of.
posted by LionIndex at 5:27 PM on June 24, 2015 [4 favorites]
posted by LionIndex at 5:27 PM on June 24, 2015 [4 favorites]
traveler_
The technology is already available. "It's much like if you were trying to cool some drinks. Do you get a sack of ice cubes or a refrigerator?"
If some people seriously think helium is going to run out, just like people thought oil was going to run out, and prices are going to go up 10x or 100x, well, it's the perfect investment opportunity. Go and invest in the new helium production facilities in the Middle East or China...
People who invested in oil - "non renewable and running out" and "critical" resource - got severely burned when prices dropped 50% in the past year.
Realistically nothing is going to happen with helium.
posted by xdvesper at 5:30 PM on June 24, 2015
The technology is already available. "It's much like if you were trying to cool some drinks. Do you get a sack of ice cubes or a refrigerator?"
If some people seriously think helium is going to run out, just like people thought oil was going to run out, and prices are going to go up 10x or 100x, well, it's the perfect investment opportunity. Go and invest in the new helium production facilities in the Middle East or China...
People who invested in oil - "non renewable and running out" and "critical" resource - got severely burned when prices dropped 50% in the past year.
Realistically nothing is going to happen with helium.
posted by xdvesper at 5:30 PM on June 24, 2015
We have a lot more oil than we have Helium. And a lot more shortsightedness than either.
posted by effugas at 5:47 PM on June 24, 2015
posted by effugas at 5:47 PM on June 24, 2015
I honestly never thought we'd see Peak Helium in my lifetime; or, at least not during my career as a semi-professional clown.
posted by i_have_a_computer at 5:57 PM on June 24, 2015 [1 favorite]
posted by i_have_a_computer at 5:57 PM on June 24, 2015 [1 favorite]
Helium has a million and one uses. Many of those uses depend not on its very low boiling point, but on its chemical inertness, or its biological inertness, or its nuclear inertness. Many of those uses have no known substitute in all the known universe. None. At all.
You're misrepresenting the argument: none of the people who understood the problem claimed that oil was going to "run out" in the sense that one day all the pumps just stop and all the refineries close and all the cars halt. They meant it was going to run out in the sense the California's water has run out: it gets drastically more expensive and alternatives become economically viable, because they're necessary.
Which is basically what you're saying, so great that's a point of agreement—but the problem is with, well, the perception that that's a problem. When California reaches Peak Water, people can use xeriscaping or trickle irrigation or change crops or whatever and that handles the issue somewhat. But not all goods and processes are perfectly substitutable, in fact none of those substitutions are perfect—xeriscaped yards aren't Kentucky Bluegrass lawns. You can't use them in the same way and sometimes that matters.
When helium's inherent scarcity catches up with the system, the prices will rise, as you say. That will make alternatives relatively affordable, but only by making helium expensive! The less elastic our technologies and processes are in their helium demand, the more they are going to be fundamentally and inescapably hurt by the helium crunch and the fact that their neighbors the MRI machines are doing ok but only by using a more expensive cooling process will be zero consolation.
Which brings me to my Tl;Dr: you're selling the whole entire helium technology world as being like that MRI refrigeration system. But you not only don't know that, you can't know that because it's not knowable. And my colleagues will be the ones responsible for trying to invent all those alternatives, and will sometimes fail.
posted by traveler_ at 6:01 PM on June 24, 2015 [11 favorites]
You're misrepresenting the argument: none of the people who understood the problem claimed that oil was going to "run out" in the sense that one day all the pumps just stop and all the refineries close and all the cars halt. They meant it was going to run out in the sense the California's water has run out: it gets drastically more expensive and alternatives become economically viable, because they're necessary.
Which is basically what you're saying, so great that's a point of agreement—but the problem is with, well, the perception that that's a problem. When California reaches Peak Water, people can use xeriscaping or trickle irrigation or change crops or whatever and that handles the issue somewhat. But not all goods and processes are perfectly substitutable, in fact none of those substitutions are perfect—xeriscaped yards aren't Kentucky Bluegrass lawns. You can't use them in the same way and sometimes that matters.
When helium's inherent scarcity catches up with the system, the prices will rise, as you say. That will make alternatives relatively affordable, but only by making helium expensive! The less elastic our technologies and processes are in their helium demand, the more they are going to be fundamentally and inescapably hurt by the helium crunch and the fact that their neighbors the MRI machines are doing ok but only by using a more expensive cooling process will be zero consolation.
Which brings me to my Tl;Dr: you're selling the whole entire helium technology world as being like that MRI refrigeration system. But you not only don't know that, you can't know that because it's not knowable. And my colleagues will be the ones responsible for trying to invent all those alternatives, and will sometimes fail.
posted by traveler_ at 6:01 PM on June 24, 2015 [11 favorites]
Various fusor designs can be used to manufacture helium. There is a difference between these devices and self sustaining fusion reactors.
posted by humanfont at 6:09 PM on June 24, 2015
posted by humanfont at 6:09 PM on June 24, 2015
Once we have hydrogen fusion, we'll have plenty of helium.
In 2011, the United States used about 25 TWh (about 9 * 10^16J) of energy in all its various forms.
The nuclear reaction with the highest amount of Helium output per unit of energy is the proton/Boron reaction, which produces about 7 * 10^13 Joules of energy for every kilogram of Hydrogen and Boron that it turns into Helium.
So, a bunch of 100% efficient p/B fusion reactors would produce about 1300 kg of Helium if they were used to power the entire United States (electricity and a complete replacement of fossil fuels).
Of course, a 100% efficient reactor is impossible. So let's say we have 1% efficient reactors instead. They would require 100 times as much fuel and produce around 130,000 kg of Helium while powering the entire United States.
The United States consumed 47 million cubic meters of Helium in 2013. If I did my cubic meters-to-kilograms conversion correctly, that's about 8.4 million kilograms.
So, best case scenario, a full conversion of our economy to fusion power might generate 1% of our current Helium usage.
posted by Hatashran at 6:13 PM on June 24, 2015 [10 favorites]
In 2011, the United States used about 25 TWh (about 9 * 10^16J) of energy in all its various forms.
The nuclear reaction with the highest amount of Helium output per unit of energy is the proton/Boron reaction, which produces about 7 * 10^13 Joules of energy for every kilogram of Hydrogen and Boron that it turns into Helium.
So, a bunch of 100% efficient p/B fusion reactors would produce about 1300 kg of Helium if they were used to power the entire United States (electricity and a complete replacement of fossil fuels).
Of course, a 100% efficient reactor is impossible. So let's say we have 1% efficient reactors instead. They would require 100 times as much fuel and produce around 130,000 kg of Helium while powering the entire United States.
The United States consumed 47 million cubic meters of Helium in 2013. If I did my cubic meters-to-kilograms conversion correctly, that's about 8.4 million kilograms.
So, best case scenario, a full conversion of our economy to fusion power might generate 1% of our current Helium usage.
posted by Hatashran at 6:13 PM on June 24, 2015 [10 favorites]
I want to know what Strindberg thinks of this.
posted by um at 6:44 PM on June 24, 2015 [2 favorites]
posted by um at 6:44 PM on June 24, 2015 [2 favorites]
It is really annoying how much of it is being wasted on ballons and things; Do you know how much scientific and medical gear needs it to run? Every NMR and MRI machine, to start with. They've started adding reclamation loops to the top of a lot of them, but a lot of places still don't bother. Really, things like that on finite resources should be mandatory. Also, fixed pricing for medical and research use at far lower prices then industrial and fun uses.
posted by Canageek at 6:49 PM on June 24, 2015 [1 favorite]
posted by Canageek at 6:49 PM on June 24, 2015 [1 favorite]
I bought a canister of helium for a school party just the other week - turns out it's more expensive than you'd think to inflate 50-odd balloons; but, as the party-gear shopowner assured me, it's still a steal compared to what's in store. In his explanation, the main issue was Algeria, and its current political instability. That's the European take, which was already surprising to learn. The Helium Reserve backstory definitely compounds the bleak, unsqueaking future the shopowner was hinting at...
posted by progosk at 7:37 PM on June 24, 2015 [1 favorite]
posted by progosk at 7:37 PM on June 24, 2015 [1 favorite]
Well, crap.
My math was off by a factor of 1000.
It wasn't 25 TWh, it was 25,000 TWh.
So multiply my Helium yield numbers by 1000.
A fusion-based energy grid could provide us with our current consumption of Helium.
Though extracting a trickle of Helium from a fusion reactor might not be easy.
posted by Hatashran at 9:09 PM on June 24, 2015 [2 favorites]
My math was off by a factor of 1000.
It wasn't 25 TWh, it was 25,000 TWh.
So multiply my Helium yield numbers by 1000.
A fusion-based energy grid could provide us with our current consumption of Helium.
Though extracting a trickle of Helium from a fusion reactor might not be easy.
posted by Hatashran at 9:09 PM on June 24, 2015 [2 favorites]
Interplanetary travel to the rescue!: Exoplanets With Helium Skies May Abound in Milky Way Galaxy
posted by agog at 10:16 PM on June 24, 2015
posted by agog at 10:16 PM on June 24, 2015
> Wait, if helium is lighter than air how does this work. I'm genuinely brainlocked here and you're freaking me out.
Helium's not in possession of anti-gravity, it's just that, as a gas, it's buoyant in our atmospheric air at pressures near the surface. Weighing it with a scale would be like trying to weigh a block of pinewood underwater. If you had some on the moon or other vacuum, it would sit around in a cloud or puddle just like every other gas. If you want to weigh it, you have to remove the atmosphere first. I recommend doing this only on a limited scale.
> I don't know if this is how they do it, but, can't you compress the gas into a small enough volume where it's no longer buoyant in air? I bet you could weigh it if you did that.
Yes. You can pressurize helium-- the tank of He at the party store definitely weighs more when full than empty. You can also compress it by making it chill out: Helium can be liquefied somewhat expensively. liquid helium has some strange physical properties of frictionless flow, so there's a decent chance it'll climb itself out of the bucket, or slip through an invisible crack that no other fluid can get through.
posted by Sunburnt at 10:48 PM on June 24, 2015 [1 favorite]
Helium's not in possession of anti-gravity, it's just that, as a gas, it's buoyant in our atmospheric air at pressures near the surface. Weighing it with a scale would be like trying to weigh a block of pinewood underwater. If you had some on the moon or other vacuum, it would sit around in a cloud or puddle just like every other gas. If you want to weigh it, you have to remove the atmosphere first. I recommend doing this only on a limited scale.
> I don't know if this is how they do it, but, can't you compress the gas into a small enough volume where it's no longer buoyant in air? I bet you could weigh it if you did that.
Yes. You can pressurize helium-- the tank of He at the party store definitely weighs more when full than empty. You can also compress it by making it chill out: Helium can be liquefied somewhat expensively. liquid helium has some strange physical properties of frictionless flow, so there's a decent chance it'll climb itself out of the bucket, or slip through an invisible crack that no other fluid can get through.
posted by Sunburnt at 10:48 PM on June 24, 2015 [1 favorite]
> While Hydrogen is flammable, we deal with dangerous substances in almost all of our motorized transportation.
True...but the kind of balloons I had in mind involved children's birthday parties, carnivals, and amazing deals at used car dealerships. Kids in the future might have to make do with balloon animals.
posted by Sunburnt at 10:59 PM on June 24, 2015
True...but the kind of balloons I had in mind involved children's birthday parties, carnivals, and amazing deals at used car dealerships. Kids in the future might have to make do with balloon animals.
posted by Sunburnt at 10:59 PM on June 24, 2015
I'm kind of wondering what shape the "smartness vs. survival as a species" curve looks like. If we were too stupid, we'd probably not have made it even this far. But is it an inverted-U shape where if we get too smart, we wipe ourselves out in ways a stupider species couldn't have made work? Or is there another upward trend after that inverted U where we get smart enough to realize the consequences of our cleverness and head them off? The equivalent of the uncanny valley of smarts, which we are potentially now in?
posted by FishBike at 7:42 AM on June 25, 2015 [2 favorites]
posted by FishBike at 7:42 AM on June 25, 2015 [2 favorites]
My big question is: What lobbying money would induce two Presidents from opposing parties to make such a promise (to privatize the reserve) and for what purpose? I don't believe the Balloon Council is that powerful.
posted by RobotVoodooPower at 8:03 AM on June 25, 2015
posted by RobotVoodooPower at 8:03 AM on June 25, 2015
I think it was just a classic case of "this is *obvious* government boondoggery, we don't have zeppelins anymore!"
posted by Chrysostom at 8:05 AM on June 25, 2015
posted by Chrysostom at 8:05 AM on June 25, 2015
Funnily enough, scuba divers have been aware of the impending helium shortage for a while. Helium is used in breathing-gas mixtures at serious depths (60 m and deeper), where nitrogen has an intoxicating effect and oxygen is toxic (it can cause seizures and loss of consciousness).
Most scuba divers use an "open-circuit" system, where every breath you exhale ends up in the water around you as bubbles. If you've dived on scuba before, you know what I mean.
The alternative is a closed-circuit or "rebreather" system, where you breathe from a closed loop: the gas you exhale goes back into a system that is checked by various sensors and has small amounts of oxygen, nitrogen, and helium added to keep the mixture constant. (I'm simplifying things here.) This means that the only gas consumed is oxygen (because you metabolise it); everything else can be recycled. This means that the helium you are using can last you for dive after dive - some people keep helium cylinders in their garage to top up their rebreathers.
An open-circuit (OC) scuba system costs at most around €1000 and is pretty cheap to maintain - around €100 a year, barring catastrophic failures. OC has very few points of failure, as well: if your system is working 5 m below the surface, it should work at 60 m.
For comparison's sake: a rebreather system starts at around €8k. You also can't buy most of them off the shelf - you have to give the vendor the address of the instructor who will be teaching you how to use the unit, and the vendor will send it to the instructor. This is because rebreathers are incredibly dangerous in the wrong hands. They are also sensitive to malfunction: they require about 30 minutes' testing by a competent user and if a single test fails, the dive is off. (This can mean that three members of a team cancel a dive because one test failed.)
And yet! Helium is becoming so expensive that deep divers are starting to turn to rebreathers, in spite of the fact that they are (a) expensive, (b) dangerous and (c) temperamental. Buying a rebreather is frequently called "paying for your helium up front" and it's said to pay for itself in at most five years.
This has been your "zb20h talks interminably about diving" for 25 June.
posted by Zeinab Badawi's Twenty Hotels at 8:43 AM on June 25, 2015 [5 favorites]
Most scuba divers use an "open-circuit" system, where every breath you exhale ends up in the water around you as bubbles. If you've dived on scuba before, you know what I mean.
The alternative is a closed-circuit or "rebreather" system, where you breathe from a closed loop: the gas you exhale goes back into a system that is checked by various sensors and has small amounts of oxygen, nitrogen, and helium added to keep the mixture constant. (I'm simplifying things here.) This means that the only gas consumed is oxygen (because you metabolise it); everything else can be recycled. This means that the helium you are using can last you for dive after dive - some people keep helium cylinders in their garage to top up their rebreathers.
An open-circuit (OC) scuba system costs at most around €1000 and is pretty cheap to maintain - around €100 a year, barring catastrophic failures. OC has very few points of failure, as well: if your system is working 5 m below the surface, it should work at 60 m.
For comparison's sake: a rebreather system starts at around €8k. You also can't buy most of them off the shelf - you have to give the vendor the address of the instructor who will be teaching you how to use the unit, and the vendor will send it to the instructor. This is because rebreathers are incredibly dangerous in the wrong hands. They are also sensitive to malfunction: they require about 30 minutes' testing by a competent user and if a single test fails, the dive is off. (This can mean that three members of a team cancel a dive because one test failed.)
And yet! Helium is becoming so expensive that deep divers are starting to turn to rebreathers, in spite of the fact that they are (a) expensive, (b) dangerous and (c) temperamental. Buying a rebreather is frequently called "paying for your helium up front" and it's said to pay for itself in at most five years.
This has been your "zb20h talks interminably about diving" for 25 June.
posted by Zeinab Badawi's Twenty Hotels at 8:43 AM on June 25, 2015 [5 favorites]
A hundred years down the line, a party balloon might be about as precious as a gold ring.
Oh the humanity!
posted by Gungho at 9:39 AM on June 25, 2015
Oh the humanity!
posted by Gungho at 9:39 AM on June 25, 2015
The best part is how fast it is. A 1-Curie alpha source (such as the standard for the unit, 1 gram of Radium-226) can produce 1 kilogram of helium in just 130 million years.
Yeah I don't care what it is 1g of. You're not getting 1kg of anything from it no matter how long you wait.
posted by edd at 10:13 AM on June 25, 2015
Yeah I don't care what it is 1g of. You're not getting 1kg of anything from it no matter how long you wait.
posted by edd at 10:13 AM on June 25, 2015
"also there would be fires, lots and lots of fires."
posted by Sunburnt at 5:37 PM on June 24
Eponysterical
posted by symbioid at 12:20 PM on June 25, 2015 [1 favorite]
posted by Sunburnt at 5:37 PM on June 24
Eponysterical
posted by symbioid at 12:20 PM on June 25, 2015 [1 favorite]
edd: I think the suggestion is you need to have a radiation source that stays at 1 Curie for the whole 130 million years. So you'd have to replace the radium every so often.
posted by goingonit at 1:43 PM on June 25, 2015
posted by goingonit at 1:43 PM on June 25, 2015
Radium 226 appears to have a halflife of around 1600 years, which means there might not be enough radium on the currently planet to maintain a 1 Curie source to emit a kilo of helium. Fortunately, we can make more very expensively.
Probably would be cheaper to head to the moon and get more Helium-2 and -3 from there-- the He-3 should have some cool possibilities as a fuel for nuclear power, and that might pay for the trip. We should just have to scrap the top surface of the lunar moon regolith to find it. We'll have to bring the He-2 back as well, because as I implied above, helium-filled party balloons are just sad on the moon. It's also handy for pressurizing spacecraft hydraulics and such.
We can start all that now, by getting Kevin Spacey to record the voice of the robot companion for the poor schlub we send up there to monitor all that equipment.
posted by Sunburnt at 3:42 PM on June 25, 2015
Probably would be cheaper to head to the moon and get more Helium-2 and -3 from there-- the He-3 should have some cool possibilities as a fuel for nuclear power, and that might pay for the trip. We should just have to scrap the top surface of the lunar moon regolith to find it. We'll have to bring the He-2 back as well, because as I implied above, helium-filled party balloons are just sad on the moon. It's also handy for pressurizing spacecraft hydraulics and such.
We can start all that now, by getting Kevin Spacey to record the voice of the robot companion for the poor schlub we send up there to monitor all that equipment.
posted by Sunburnt at 3:42 PM on June 25, 2015
My big question is: What lobbying money would induce two Presidents from opposing parties to make such a promise (to privatize the reserve) and for what purpose? I don't believe the Balloon Council is that powerful.
posted by RobotVoodooPower
Like my previous answers, it's just economics - it was a program that was costing the government a lot of money (it had losses of $1.4 billion dollars) and so it was a "no brainer" to cut it from government expenditure - I suppose enough people like me were of the mind that like that like oil, helium would always be available, at a reasonable price fit for purpose, with alternatives emerging if the price went up, so there was no strategic reason to continue to waste billions of dollars hoarding it. You're more likely to get elected if you're spending money on schools or healthcare rather than losing money on helium.
I get that people are free to disagree, but as I said, if you truly believe you're in possession of some information the rest of the world doesn't have, you have a distinct advantage in being able to turn that knowledge into profits by investing in the right areas of the economy.
posted by xdvesper at 3:42 PM on June 25, 2015
posted by RobotVoodooPower
Like my previous answers, it's just economics - it was a program that was costing the government a lot of money (it had losses of $1.4 billion dollars) and so it was a "no brainer" to cut it from government expenditure - I suppose enough people like me were of the mind that like that like oil, helium would always be available, at a reasonable price fit for purpose, with alternatives emerging if the price went up, so there was no strategic reason to continue to waste billions of dollars hoarding it. You're more likely to get elected if you're spending money on schools or healthcare rather than losing money on helium.
I get that people are free to disagree, but as I said, if you truly believe you're in possession of some information the rest of the world doesn't have, you have a distinct advantage in being able to turn that knowledge into profits by investing in the right areas of the economy.
posted by xdvesper at 3:42 PM on June 25, 2015
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posted by eriko at 2:17 PM on June 24, 2015 [5 favorites]