WEBVTT - Now There's a Helium Shortage and It Affects More Than Balloons 0:00:02.720 --> 0:00:15.840 Bloomberg Audio Studios, Podcasts, radio News. 0:00:18.560 --> 0:00:21.919 Hello and welcome to another episode of the Odd Lats podcast. 0:00:22.000 --> 0:00:23.400 I'm Joe Wisenthal and. 0:00:23.360 --> 0:00:24.320 I'm Tracy Alloway. 0:00:24.440 --> 0:00:26.520 Tracy, one of the things that have been learning over 0:00:26.560 --> 0:00:28.840 the last few weeks is that a lot more than 0:00:28.880 --> 0:00:31.960 oil comes through No for real, Like you know, some 0:00:32.000 --> 0:00:36.559 onegether's war breaking out in the Middle East. You just 0:00:36.560 --> 0:00:40.160 think about oil, right, and then that's probably actually where 0:00:40.200 --> 0:00:42.400 my mind would typically stop. What's the price of oil? 0:00:42.440 --> 0:00:44.479 And we all are watching the price of oil, but 0:00:44.520 --> 0:00:46.800 there are a lot of other things that are sourced 0:00:46.800 --> 0:00:48.919 from the region that are of critical important I'm not 0:00:49.000 --> 0:00:51.560 joking like I'm just saying. 0:00:51.400 --> 0:00:55.200 Like I'm laughing, because we have one of those things 0:00:55.240 --> 0:00:58.400 floating between us. So, speaking of stuff that comes out 0:00:58.440 --> 0:01:01.640 of the Gulf region, here's one of those things. 0:01:01.920 --> 0:01:03.720 Not listeners can't see it. 0:01:03.840 --> 0:01:07.119 Not the aluminum itself, although probably aluminum also comes out 0:01:07.160 --> 0:01:08.880 of the Gulf, but helium. 0:01:09.040 --> 0:01:11.280 Tracy's holding a helium balloon. She went out and got 0:01:11.280 --> 0:01:11.600 a prop. 0:01:11.760 --> 0:01:14.399 I didn't one of our lovely producers did. I have 0:01:14.480 --> 0:01:17.880 to say, I haven't held a balloon for a long time, 0:01:18.000 --> 0:01:19.800 and it's surprisingly entertaining. 0:01:20.160 --> 0:01:22.840 So okay, while you hold on to it, I'll go 0:01:22.880 --> 0:01:25.200 a little bit further, which is I feel bad for 0:01:25.240 --> 0:01:27.720 the people in helium because my understanding is that the 0:01:27.880 --> 0:01:31.320 helium has some pretty important industrial properties. There's not a 0:01:31.360 --> 0:01:34.880 lot of substitutes for it. But someone says helium, and like, oh, 0:01:34.920 --> 0:01:36.160 the clowns are going to be able to make their 0:01:36.200 --> 0:01:37.480 funny voices, et cetera. 0:01:37.920 --> 0:01:40.319 Any chance we have to actually bring one of the 0:01:40.360 --> 0:01:43.520 commodities that we talk about on the show into the studio, 0:01:43.760 --> 0:01:46.160 I'm gonna seeze. So fear is some helium. 0:01:46.160 --> 0:01:49.240 Well, look, the fact that the balloon is floating is 0:01:49.280 --> 0:01:51.640 an indicator of the fact that it must have some 0:01:51.800 --> 0:01:55.880 interesting properties as an element that perhaps have other applications. 0:01:55.880 --> 0:01:57.480 I don't know. I mean it tells you something about 0:01:57.480 --> 0:01:58.240 it as an elementary. 0:01:58.240 --> 0:02:00.240 Well, it's funny you mentioned that, because initially I was 0:02:00.240 --> 0:02:02.760 gonna take this balloon and you know, do the thing 0:02:03.160 --> 0:02:05.680 breathe than the helium and have the funny voice. Well, 0:02:05.720 --> 0:02:07.880 I thought for an audio medium, maybe it would work. 0:02:07.880 --> 0:02:11.120 But then in the course of researching on helium, I 0:02:11.200 --> 0:02:15.160 read about apparently it comes partially from radioactive decay, and 0:02:15.200 --> 0:02:17.560 so I thought, well, maybe maybe I don't want to 0:02:17.560 --> 0:02:19.760 be breathing in the helium, although I also read that 0:02:19.760 --> 0:02:21.600 it's non toxic, so I don't know. We need to 0:02:21.600 --> 0:02:24.320 talk about what helium actually is. Clearly, that's right. 0:02:24.320 --> 0:02:27.799 And we've been getting requests for a Helium episode ever 0:02:27.919 --> 0:02:31.639 since there was a headline out today Cutter some Helium 0:02:31.680 --> 0:02:34.720 production that is not gonna sit one of those force 0:02:34.800 --> 0:02:37.400 measures or something like that, I don't know whatever or 0:02:37.400 --> 0:02:39.160 something not coming out. Anyway, there's been a lot of 0:02:39.160 --> 0:02:42.320 requests for a Helium episode. We've never done one. Incidentally, 0:02:42.440 --> 0:02:44.399 years ago, I used to lift weights with this guy 0:02:44.440 --> 0:02:46.560 in the East Village who's like sort of an entrepreneur 0:02:46.600 --> 0:02:49.760 and Helium filled with no but he was in Helium 0:02:49.760 --> 0:02:51.640 among all those things. He's one of these guys that 0:02:51.720 --> 0:02:54.359 has his like finger hands and everything, and he also 0:02:54.480 --> 0:02:57.440 had like a Helium venture and he's like, oh, you 0:02:57.480 --> 0:02:59.560 got to talk to my friend one day. You guys 0:02:59.560 --> 0:03:02.079 should do an episode on Helium. And then I got 0:03:02.080 --> 0:03:04.480 connected with our guests who are about to introduce a 0:03:04.520 --> 0:03:06.320 second and I said, hey, do you know this guy 0:03:06.360 --> 0:03:08.639 in the East Village Because okay, maybe like not everyone 0:03:08.680 --> 0:03:12.440 in Canada knows each other, but everyone in the helium industry. 0:03:12.480 --> 0:03:14.079 I must certainly knows each other. He's like, oh, yeah, 0:03:14.200 --> 0:03:16.160 of course I know that guy who used to live 0:03:16.200 --> 0:03:16.680 away to it. 0:03:16.680 --> 0:03:19.520 It does seem to be a small there's a traded industry, 0:03:19.520 --> 0:03:21.240 which is why we're talking about it today, which is. 0:03:21.200 --> 0:03:23.480 Why we're talking about today anyway. What is helium? Why 0:03:23.560 --> 0:03:25.800 is it important? Where do we get it? Why is 0:03:25.800 --> 0:03:28.520 it impaired right now? Many questions that people at answered 0:03:28.880 --> 0:03:30.760 very excited to say. We do have the perfect guest. 0:03:31.000 --> 0:03:32.960 We're going to be speaking with Nick Snyder, founder and 0:03:33.080 --> 0:03:37.120 CEO of North American Helium, which minds and sells helium 0:03:37.160 --> 0:03:39.960 out of Canada. So Nick, thank you so much for 0:03:40.000 --> 0:03:41.160 coming on odd lots. 0:03:41.520 --> 0:03:42.920 Joe Tracy thanks for having me. 0:03:43.080 --> 0:03:46.240 How annoyed argues that like that we brought up balloon, 0:03:46.320 --> 0:03:48.520 they just like, oh, I have the helium company, and 0:03:48.640 --> 0:03:51.240 like everyone, ninety nine percent of the time, people are 0:03:51.280 --> 0:03:53.040 just gonna think that's like the thing for balloons, and 0:03:53.080 --> 0:03:54.320 therefore it can't be that important. 0:03:54.680 --> 0:03:57.720 You know, I've gotten used to it. I've got young 0:03:57.840 --> 0:04:01.160 kids and they had to exercise school asking them what 0:04:01.200 --> 0:04:03.520 their parents did, and they said that I blow up balloons. 0:04:03.680 --> 0:04:07.680 So the teachers definitely think I'm a clown and we 0:04:07.720 --> 0:04:08.440 all get used to it. 0:04:08.560 --> 0:04:11.160 Okay, well, why don't we ask in all seriousness what 0:04:11.360 --> 0:04:16.080 are the industrial applications for helium beyond entertaining us in 0:04:16.160 --> 0:04:16.840 balloon form? 0:04:17.279 --> 0:04:20.039 So the biggest demand source, which you've probably seen in 0:04:20.080 --> 0:04:22.600 the news a little bit because of the events in Iran, 0:04:23.040 --> 0:04:28.040 is manufacturing semiconductors, and beyond that, one of the fastest 0:04:28.040 --> 0:04:31.880 growing end uses is for launching rockets for space exploration. 0:04:32.279 --> 0:04:35.520 And then there's a number of pretty durable, long standing 0:04:35.640 --> 0:04:40.840 uses including leak detection for everything from every cell and 0:04:40.839 --> 0:04:45.480 an electric battery to all sorts of complex machinery manufacturing, 0:04:45.480 --> 0:04:50.039 fiber optics, titanium MRIs and NMR for drug discovery. It's 0:04:50.080 --> 0:04:53.720 pretty well used across all of technology, all right. 0:04:53.760 --> 0:04:57.400 So what is it about the element helium that gives 0:04:57.400 --> 0:05:00.600 it these properties such that it is useful? Well, you 0:05:00.680 --> 0:05:03.880 described as a fairly wide range of industrial applications. 0:05:04.080 --> 0:05:07.039 So what makes it so useful is it's got three 0:05:07.120 --> 0:05:09.719 or four things going for it that are completely unique. 0:05:10.240 --> 0:05:12.839 One is that it has the lowest boiling point of 0:05:12.880 --> 0:05:17.880 anything in nature. So liquid helium is about four degrees kelvin. 0:05:18.400 --> 0:05:21.279 I don't have my uh, you know, conversion in front 0:05:21.279 --> 0:05:23.960 of me. I think that's negative two hundred and seventy 0:05:24.000 --> 0:05:27.680 something degrees celsius. So it's the coldest substance on Earth, 0:05:28.120 --> 0:05:32.240 and that's really important for any sort of superconducting magnets 0:05:32.720 --> 0:05:33.080 to the most. 0:05:33.120 --> 0:05:35.880 Google says that's negative four hundred and fifty two degrees fahrenheit. 0:05:35.960 --> 0:05:37.200 So yeah, that's quite cold. 0:05:37.400 --> 0:05:40.360 We're Canadian companyelium. 0:05:40.760 --> 0:05:43.080 Kelvin is our common language. We don't have to fight 0:05:43.120 --> 0:05:47.000 fahrenheit versus celsia's here. We're gonna class pans with kelvin anyway, 0:05:47.080 --> 0:05:47.520 keep going. 0:05:47.720 --> 0:05:50.880 So just the boiling point alone makes it very unique 0:05:51.120 --> 0:05:54.800 and important. So if you want to have something very cold, 0:05:54.839 --> 0:05:59.680 and that's primarily low temperature physics and superconductors, you need 0:05:59.720 --> 0:06:03.159 to use liquid helium for that. But the boiling point 0:06:03.240 --> 0:06:08.600 is also important for launching rockets because if you're launching rockets, 0:06:08.960 --> 0:06:13.200 you can't pump the liquid rocket fuel into the engine 0:06:13.279 --> 0:06:16.560 fast enough because the volume is so large, so you 0:06:16.600 --> 0:06:20.040 need to pressurize those rockets, and that is primarily done 0:06:20.279 --> 0:06:23.400 with helium because it is light weight. But also it's 0:06:23.440 --> 0:06:26.719 the only substance that is non reactive that remains a 0:06:26.800 --> 0:06:30.400 gas at the temperature of liquid oxygen or liquid kerosene. 0:06:31.160 --> 0:06:34.560 So it also, in addition to being a very cold substance, 0:06:34.640 --> 0:06:39.039 is a liquid. It's also it's a great heat transfer medium. 0:06:39.279 --> 0:06:42.240 So if you think about the fiberglass insulation in your 0:06:42.279 --> 0:06:45.400 walls is a good insulator, and the copper pot you 0:06:45.480 --> 0:06:48.919 cook eggs in is a good heat transfer medium. No 0:06:48.960 --> 0:06:52.359 one really thinks about that with gases, but helium is 0:06:52.560 --> 0:06:56.240 very good at transferring heat. So if you were a 0:06:56.320 --> 0:07:00.000 deep sea diver that they breathe the helium oxygen mix 0:07:00.279 --> 0:07:03.559 mixture so that they don't get nitrogen narcosis when they're 0:07:03.600 --> 0:07:07.360 in that high helium atmosphere, they have to heat their 0:07:07.360 --> 0:07:10.400 habitat to about ninety eight degrees or they'll start shivering. 0:07:10.800 --> 0:07:13.680 Because nitrogen is a very good insulator and helium is 0:07:13.680 --> 0:07:16.640 a very good conductor of heat, and that becomes important 0:07:16.640 --> 0:07:20.880 in semiconductor manufacturing because as they're doing the lithography process, 0:07:21.520 --> 0:07:24.880 they need a carrier gas that is a small molecule, 0:07:24.920 --> 0:07:28.400 and helium is the smallest molecule in nature. That's also 0:07:28.880 --> 0:07:32.840 something that can transfer heat away to avoid errors, and 0:07:32.960 --> 0:07:35.880 also is non reactive. So really what makes helium demand 0:07:36.000 --> 0:07:39.440 so durable in some of these applications, is that you're 0:07:39.520 --> 0:07:42.800 using more than one of the unique attributes of the molecule. 0:07:43.000 --> 0:07:47.960 Wait, just to be clear on semiconductor lithography, the actual etching, 0:07:48.520 --> 0:07:51.400 how is the helium used in that process? Is it 0:07:51.480 --> 0:07:54.440 just like in the environment around to keep it cool, 0:07:54.600 --> 0:07:56.040 or like, how is it being deployed. 0:07:56.480 --> 0:07:58.480 So I'm not an expert here, I don't want to 0:07:58.480 --> 0:08:01.440 get out of my depth, but basically, you know, they 0:08:01.480 --> 0:08:04.840 have a light source and a mask and then they 0:08:04.840 --> 0:08:06.720 have to deposit something on there that. 0:08:06.840 --> 0:08:10.240 Is vapor deposition. They need to carry your gas for 0:08:10.600 --> 0:08:13.040 whatever they're depositing on there, and they need that to 0:08:13.080 --> 0:08:15.480 be you know, something with a very high heat transfer 0:08:15.600 --> 0:08:17.920 rate and also a small molecule. They use it in 0:08:17.960 --> 0:08:20.520 a bunch of other parts of the semiconductor process, but 0:08:21.120 --> 0:08:23.200 a lot of them like cooling the backside of the 0:08:23.200 --> 0:08:27.040 wafer you can recycle. It's the lithography process where they're 0:08:27.120 --> 0:08:32.240 essentially polluting the helium with other volatile compounds. That's what's 0:08:32.280 --> 0:08:35.079 causing demand to grow so quickly in semiconductors. And I've 0:08:35.120 --> 0:08:38.040 seen estimates that the new leading edge chips use ten 0:08:38.120 --> 0:08:42.480 times more helium per ship than older technologies, So the 0:08:42.679 --> 0:08:45.640 helium demand from that sector is growing. It roughly double 0:08:45.760 --> 0:08:49.080 the volume of silicon from that sector is growing. 0:08:49.400 --> 0:08:52.960 Okay, and I feel very after school special asking this 0:08:53.040 --> 0:08:55.760 next question while next to a balloon. But where does 0:08:55.760 --> 0:08:57.040 helium actually come from? 0:08:57.640 --> 0:09:00.920 Helium is only created on Earth by, as you said, 0:09:01.240 --> 0:09:05.800 radioactive decay of uranium and thorium. Helium itself is not radioactive, 0:09:05.880 --> 0:09:08.479 and divers can breathe it as long as there's oxygen 0:09:08.559 --> 0:09:11.600 in there as well. What's interesting about helium is that, 0:09:12.000 --> 0:09:15.439 unlike any other critical mineral, once you use it, it 0:09:15.559 --> 0:09:17.959 leaves the atmosphere, so you can't go get it out 0:09:18.000 --> 0:09:21.360 of a landfill after the fact. So that means that 0:09:21.440 --> 0:09:25.200 you can only find helium on Earth underground where it's 0:09:25.200 --> 0:09:28.640 been trapped. And the generation time scales are roughly in 0:09:28.760 --> 0:09:31.480 order of magnetudes larger than for oil and gas. So 0:09:32.160 --> 0:09:35.200 an oil and gas deposit might have taken ten million 0:09:35.280 --> 0:09:38.520 years to be created. In helium, you're talking about hundreds 0:09:38.520 --> 0:09:41.240 of millions of years because it's a very slow process. 0:09:41.920 --> 0:09:44.960 So we're going to get to North American helium and 0:09:45.080 --> 0:09:49.600 the deposits that you have access to. But there's helium deposits, 0:09:49.640 --> 0:09:52.680 and then helium also e merges as a byproduct of 0:09:53.080 --> 0:09:55.920 natural gas. So talk to us about how helium comes 0:09:55.960 --> 0:09:58.559 out of the grown Typically, you know, we're talking about 0:09:58.679 --> 0:10:01.640 the Middle East, somewhere Tatar there's a lot of gas 0:10:01.720 --> 0:10:03.760 versus say, where you're mining healing, and then we'll get 0:10:03.800 --> 0:10:05.120 into some of these different processes. 0:10:05.440 --> 0:10:11.200 So that's really primarily a function of exploration. Okay, helium 0:10:11.440 --> 0:10:15.360 is much more rare than natural gas, but most of 0:10:15.400 --> 0:10:18.160 the world's helium supply comes as a byproduct of natural 0:10:18.160 --> 0:10:21.440 gas because there's been a huge amount of exploration drilling 0:10:21.440 --> 0:10:24.520 for natural gas, so that's where they've found it. And 0:10:24.559 --> 0:10:29.200 there's one gigantic field in the US Mid Continent called 0:10:29.200 --> 0:10:32.160 the Hugoton that's been on production for one hundred years. 0:10:32.160 --> 0:10:35.080 That's what we use to originally fill the Federal Helium Reserve. 0:10:35.600 --> 0:10:39.160 The field and cutter which they share with Iran. Although 0:10:39.160 --> 0:10:42.360 Iran is not able to extract helium that has one 0:10:42.720 --> 0:10:45.360 twentieth of one percent helium in it, so it's a 0:10:45.520 --> 0:10:49.199 very very small quantity. But because they're doing so much 0:10:49.280 --> 0:10:52.520 pre treatment, because there's hydrogen sulfide in the gas, and 0:10:52.559 --> 0:10:55.640 because the scale of their LNG facility is so large. 0:10:56.120 --> 0:10:58.760 That's the largest single source of helium in the world. 0:10:58.840 --> 0:11:00.880 This is really helpful because I just sort of, you know, 0:11:00.920 --> 0:11:03.079 when we do these things like where's that fane come from, 0:11:03.120 --> 0:11:06.520 it's like all these byproducts. So I assumed that helium 0:11:06.640 --> 0:11:08.760 was yet just like another byproduct thing that shows up 0:11:08.760 --> 0:11:11.400 anytime you're looking for natural gas. But it sounds like, no, 0:11:11.559 --> 0:11:13.720 the reason it's there is just because there's been a 0:11:13.720 --> 0:11:16.360 lot of exploration in that area and they found helium. 0:11:16.559 --> 0:11:19.760 But that it's not inevitable that anywhere you have natural gas, 0:11:19.840 --> 0:11:20.720 I're going to find helium. 0:11:20.840 --> 0:11:21.240 Yeah, yea. 0:11:21.720 --> 0:11:25.160 So actually, on that note, so if I go exploring 0:11:25.360 --> 0:11:29.320 for nat gas and I happen to find a helium deposit, like, 0:11:29.600 --> 0:11:32.000 what happens to that helium if I decide that I 0:11:32.040 --> 0:11:34.240 want to monetize it, Like, how do I actually extract 0:11:34.280 --> 0:11:36.640 it out of the ground? How do I store it? 0:11:36.760 --> 0:11:40.080 Do I set up a helium facility right next to 0:11:40.320 --> 0:11:43.320 where the deposit actually is, or do I move it 0:11:43.600 --> 0:11:45.760 somewhere else? What's the next step in the process. 0:11:46.200 --> 0:11:49.800 The way that the gas separation process works is for 0:11:49.880 --> 0:11:53.560 the most part, you're actually separating everything except for the 0:11:53.600 --> 0:11:57.160 helium because helium is a small, non reactive molecule, you 0:11:57.200 --> 0:12:00.280 can't just take that out. So for the most part, 0:12:01.280 --> 0:12:04.360 helium always shows up with nitrogen, so you'd already have 0:12:04.400 --> 0:12:07.480 a high nitrogen content in the gas, and then you're 0:12:07.520 --> 0:12:11.800 going to remove the nitrogen and the methane and be 0:12:11.960 --> 0:12:14.800 left with the helium, which you can then purify. And 0:12:14.840 --> 0:12:16.800 there's really only a couple of fields in the world. 0:12:17.040 --> 0:12:20.120 There's one field in Algeria that's been on production for 0:12:20.160 --> 0:12:23.080 a long time and it's falling off. There's one field 0:12:23.480 --> 0:12:27.680 in Siberia. There's the field in the Middle East, the 0:12:27.720 --> 0:12:29.960 field that's been depleting for a long time in the 0:12:30.080 --> 0:12:33.160 US Mid Continent. But it is really quite rare. And 0:12:33.200 --> 0:12:35.480 if you think about what are the ingredients you need 0:12:35.520 --> 0:12:38.840 for this, you need to have an area with uranium 0:12:38.880 --> 0:12:40.920 and thorium, and we sort of know where that is 0:12:41.000 --> 0:12:43.120 because the US and the Russians during the Cold War 0:12:43.160 --> 0:12:46.319 looked all over the world for uranium. And you need 0:12:46.360 --> 0:12:49.600 to have an area where you've got a sedimentary basin, 0:12:49.640 --> 0:12:53.079 where you're going to have traditional oil reservoir rocks. You're 0:12:53.160 --> 0:12:56.600 sort of looking for a sandstone, and in general, you're 0:12:56.640 --> 0:12:59.520 looking for an area where there aren't any mountains because 0:12:59.640 --> 0:13:02.400 it's a small molecule that wants to escape to the surface. 0:13:02.440 --> 0:13:05.520 So if you are in a tectonic area, that's going 0:13:05.600 --> 0:13:06.840 to be a big problem for you. 0:13:07.040 --> 0:13:11.640 That's interesting. So the existence of mountains implies I hadn't 0:13:11.640 --> 0:13:13.480 thought about that at all. I would say, oh, mountains, 0:13:13.520 --> 0:13:15.960 that's great. Is probably more deeply buried, less place for 0:13:16.000 --> 0:13:19.760 it to escape. But the existence of mountains implies tectonic activity, 0:13:19.800 --> 0:13:22.560 and that's how you get leaked. Super interesting. Do they 0:13:22.559 --> 0:13:24.400 have it in Kazakhson? I know they have a lot 0:13:24.400 --> 0:13:27.760 of uranium. There is there helium in kazakhs On. 0:13:28.160 --> 0:13:30.800 I think there's a little bit of helium content in 0:13:30.880 --> 0:13:34.040 one of the stranded gas fields there. Certainly there's no 0:13:34.120 --> 0:13:38.040 production there, Okay, And again you know the the LNG 0:13:38.280 --> 0:13:42.120 operation and cutter is somewhat unique with a very small 0:13:42.160 --> 0:13:45.760 helium content. If you were to go drill for helium 0:13:45.800 --> 0:13:48.839 in North America and you're not going to have one 0:13:48.840 --> 0:13:52.840 of the world's largest energy complexes there, generally one third 0:13:52.840 --> 0:13:55.760 of one percent is sort of considered an economic cutoff 0:13:56.120 --> 0:13:57.160 for the helium downtown. 0:14:13.440 --> 0:14:16.719 Is it true? We used to have a strategic a 0:14:16.800 --> 0:14:19.000 national helium reserve. I can't believe we don't have a 0:14:19.040 --> 0:14:24.200 strategic pork reserve, but there was a federal helium reserve once. 0:14:24.080 --> 0:14:26.560 Upon a time when our government was very foresighted. We 0:14:26.680 --> 0:14:30.040 did build a helium reserve during the Cold War, which 0:14:30.160 --> 0:14:33.720 was a brilliant idea, both because helium is an important 0:14:33.720 --> 0:14:37.040 thing to have, but also because that gas would have 0:14:37.120 --> 0:14:40.160 been vented otherwise. And you know a good example of 0:14:40.200 --> 0:14:44.200 this is in Algeria, they have one field with helium 0:14:44.200 --> 0:14:47.480 content that mixes in with everything else. If they're making 0:14:47.640 --> 0:14:51.400 LNG from the gas stream in Algeria, then they can 0:14:51.440 --> 0:14:53.880 recover the helium. But if they're putting it into the 0:14:53.920 --> 0:14:57.280 pipeline to Europe, which unfortunately is where the majority of 0:14:57.320 --> 0:14:59.560 it's going right now because gas prices are very high 0:14:59.560 --> 0:15:03.040 in Europe, it can't be recovered. And that helium when 0:15:03.040 --> 0:15:05.440 you turn on your stove is just going to escape 0:15:05.440 --> 0:15:06.320 into the atmosphere. 0:15:06.400 --> 0:15:09.160 Oh that's really interesting. So even if you don't have 0:15:09.200 --> 0:15:11.080 a market or an easy way to sell it at 0:15:11.080 --> 0:15:14.680 the time, what the strategic reserve did was allow us 0:15:14.680 --> 0:15:18.640 to capture something that would have been otherwise lost permanently 0:15:19.160 --> 0:15:20.880 had we not had this thing. So tell us the 0:15:20.920 --> 0:15:24.920 story because I'm evidently we don't have it anymore. What 0:15:25.000 --> 0:15:27.400 was in it? Where was it and where did it go? 0:15:27.440 --> 0:15:28.720 Who do we sell it to? What happened? 0:15:28.760 --> 0:15:33.480 So it was primarily the helium that was the Hugoton field, 0:15:33.480 --> 0:15:37.680 which is this very large field across Texas and Oklahoma 0:15:37.720 --> 0:15:39.000 and parts of Kansas. 0:15:38.760 --> 0:15:40.680 That's close to Amarillo, isn't it. 0:15:40.760 --> 0:15:43.720 So the field is very large. The gas production from that, 0:15:43.840 --> 0:15:49.040 we started recovering helium. We were always the Saudi Arabia 0:15:49.120 --> 0:15:52.000 of helium, if you will. You know. A side note 0:15:52.000 --> 0:15:56.080 there is that the Hinden Bird was designed for helium, 0:15:56.440 --> 0:16:01.000 and the US Senate blocked export of helium for military 0:16:01.040 --> 0:16:03.120 reasons to Germany, and that's why they filled it up 0:16:03.160 --> 0:16:06.640 with hydrogen instead. So this has been going on for 0:16:06.680 --> 0:16:09.080 a while, and we talk about it being a small 0:16:09.160 --> 0:16:12.960 molecule and difficult to trap underground. A good example of 0:16:12.960 --> 0:16:16.320 that is when it was first found in Kansas. Originally, 0:16:16.400 --> 0:16:19.160 helium was discovered by looking at the sun during an 0:16:19.160 --> 0:16:21.840 eclipse and someone was able to see from the spectral 0:16:21.880 --> 0:16:26.040 lines that there's another element out here. And then they 0:16:26.080 --> 0:16:29.120 found an inert gas well in Kansas and they were 0:16:29.200 --> 0:16:35.040 able to distill the helium basically by putting the gas 0:16:35.160 --> 0:16:39.560 through a bunch of really narrow glass tubes, and the 0:16:39.600 --> 0:16:42.320 helium will go through the glass because it's such a 0:16:42.360 --> 0:16:45.080 small molecule and that's how they were able to distill it. 0:16:45.640 --> 0:16:49.520 So anyways, we built the world's only helium reserve during 0:16:49.520 --> 0:16:52.280 the Cold War, and this is something that the science 0:16:52.280 --> 0:16:56.280 community was very excited about because they recognized that this 0:16:56.440 --> 0:16:58.920 is really important for a bunch of science and physics, 0:16:58.960 --> 0:17:03.040 but more importantly, think about the long term. We're living 0:17:03.320 --> 0:17:07.120 in interesting times in many ways, but an interesting time 0:17:07.119 --> 0:17:10.199 if you think very long term in terms of the 0:17:10.320 --> 0:17:14.240 last hundred years have seen drilling for natural gas all 0:17:14.280 --> 0:17:17.760 over the place, and particularly for conventional deposits. It's important 0:17:17.800 --> 0:17:22.040 to understand you can't find helium and economic quantities in 0:17:22.680 --> 0:17:27.159 unconventional resources like shale. So prior to our company, the 0:17:27.280 --> 0:17:31.440 last new discovery of helium that was commercialized in North 0:17:31.440 --> 0:17:34.760 America's fifty years ago, the oil and gas companies aren't 0:17:34.760 --> 0:17:38.920 looking for these conventional fields anymore. But the American Physical 0:17:38.960 --> 0:17:42.080 Society got very upset when we talked about selling off 0:17:42.080 --> 0:17:46.720 the helium reserve, and they said, basically, this is a 0:17:46.800 --> 0:17:49.439 molecule that's only getting more important. We're finding more and 0:17:49.480 --> 0:17:51.640 more uses for it, and if you think about today, 0:17:52.160 --> 0:17:55.560 what are some future uses. They're using this for quantum 0:17:55.560 --> 0:17:58.720 computing to keep things very cold, they're using it for 0:17:58.840 --> 0:18:02.480 nuclear fusion, for the superconducting magnets. They're now using it 0:18:02.720 --> 0:18:05.280 in I think X Energy just filed for an IPO. 0:18:05.440 --> 0:18:08.919 Those are helium cooled fission reactors that they're building SMRs, 0:18:09.440 --> 0:18:13.520 because like if you think about Fukushima, that was a 0:18:13.520 --> 0:18:16.320 water cooled reactor and the water got hot and then 0:18:16.480 --> 0:18:18.880 the water turned into steam and it got so hot 0:18:18.920 --> 0:18:21.560 that the steam separated into hydrogen and oxygen and then 0:18:21.640 --> 0:18:23.960 things blew up. But because helium is such a good 0:18:24.000 --> 0:18:27.160 heat transfer medium, you can use helium as the primary 0:18:27.200 --> 0:18:30.719 loop there in these reactors and it makes it passively safe. 0:18:30.840 --> 0:18:33.919 So the physics community was very up in arms when 0:18:33.920 --> 0:18:36.679 we decided to sell this off because they said, you know, 0:18:36.720 --> 0:18:39.199 what happens fifty years from now when we need this 0:18:39.200 --> 0:18:42.440 for space exploration and quantum computing and everything else, And 0:18:43.000 --> 0:18:46.480 there's no one drilling for conventional gas anymore. So you know, 0:18:46.560 --> 0:18:50.960 that's sort of the issue there, and you know, we 0:18:50.960 --> 0:18:52.720 can get into why we sold it off, it won't 0:18:52.760 --> 0:18:53.960 be a terrible hold on it. 0:18:53.960 --> 0:18:55.919 Where did it go? Because I can't imagine, like, have 0:18:55.960 --> 0:18:58.280 we bought the strategic helium reserve. Let's just go make 0:18:58.280 --> 0:19:00.320 a bunch of balloons, like I assume that didn't happened. 0:19:00.400 --> 0:19:02.240 So who bought it and what did they do with it? 0:19:02.560 --> 0:19:05.400 So we actually stockpiled two things during the Cold War 0:19:05.480 --> 0:19:08.480 helium and ten ten is also used for semiconductors. We 0:19:08.520 --> 0:19:10.840 sold them both off prior to right now when we 0:19:10.880 --> 0:19:13.600 started building semiconductor fabs in the US. So that's sort 0:19:13.600 --> 0:19:18.000 of a not a great choice necessarily with regard to 0:19:18.000 --> 0:19:23.159 the helium reserve. When they originally started, they took the 0:19:23.200 --> 0:19:25.959 helium out of the gas stream, and to your point, Tracy, 0:19:26.840 --> 0:19:30.080 they put it into an old natural gas field in Amarillo. 0:19:30.359 --> 0:19:33.320 So that's why the helium reserve was there, and they 0:19:33.359 --> 0:19:37.960 filled that up. But the government never appropriated funds to 0:19:38.200 --> 0:19:42.440 pay for the helium. So the Bureau of Land Management 0:19:42.480 --> 0:19:46.120 or their predecessor, basically owed the government three hundred million 0:19:46.200 --> 0:19:49.760 dollars for this because no funds were appropriated, and that 0:19:49.800 --> 0:19:52.440 three hundred million dollars was accruing interest to the point 0:19:52.520 --> 0:19:56.680 where I think in nineteen ninety six, Newt Gingrich got 0:19:56.720 --> 0:19:59.160 into power and it was time to start talking about 0:19:59.160 --> 0:20:03.320 privatizing things. And Christopher Cox went to the House floor 0:20:03.359 --> 0:20:05.600 and basically said, you know, do you know the government, 0:20:05.720 --> 0:20:08.680 this dumb government has one point four billion dollars of 0:20:08.720 --> 0:20:13.080 party balloon debt. And a bill was quickly passed and 0:20:13.560 --> 0:20:16.480 you know, signed by Clinton, and we decided to sell 0:20:16.520 --> 0:20:19.080 the whole thing off. The original plan, I believe, was 0:20:19.119 --> 0:20:22.959 to sell it off in equal parts over thirty years 0:20:23.000 --> 0:20:26.280 for exactly one point four billion, with no regard to 0:20:26.320 --> 0:20:28.680 the market, just to pay off the government so called 0:20:28.720 --> 0:20:31.600 party balloon debt. And the physics community was up in 0:20:31.680 --> 0:20:33.840 arms about this. But you know, they don't have that 0:20:33.920 --> 0:20:34.640 many senators. 0:20:36.200 --> 0:20:37.879 That's amazing, and I feel like we could do a 0:20:37.880 --> 0:20:42.600 whole episode just on the helium reserve. But serious question, 0:20:42.680 --> 0:20:45.399 I guess, or maybe a related question, how difficult is 0:20:45.440 --> 0:20:49.440 helium to store? Because we're used to you know, maybe 0:20:49.480 --> 0:20:52.440 you go into the party balloon shop in the Party 0:20:52.480 --> 0:20:57.160 Balloon district of downtown New York and you see canisters 0:20:57.200 --> 0:20:59.359 of helium gas lying there. But on the other hand, 0:20:59.359 --> 0:21:02.920 I imagine you're talking about the world's smallest molecule. As 0:21:02.960 --> 0:21:06.440 you've said, it must escape quite easily. 0:21:07.359 --> 0:21:10.399 So if you decide to get into the party balloon 0:21:10.520 --> 0:21:13.200