For the bored - Helium

For those having a boring Tuesday and who may wish to expand the mind. It's
a little known fact that the world has been experiencing a Helium shortage,
gas and liquid. Prices doubled and doubled again over the past decade. Not
so much a problem with supply per se, but with capture and processing
capacity, and with the Yanks.

A situation that is due to improve but of today I have an MR scanner which
is 9% above the critical point and BOC are struggling to supply me with a
Flask. A large MR contains about 1200L of liquid helium. I'm mostly
blaming Ivan and his monster magnets.

Despite being the second most common element in the Universe (1) the process
of planetary formation left no Helium here. Radioactive decay forms Helium-4
and this has accumulated in recoverable quantities in some Natural Gas
fields. A limited and dwindling resource it is almost impossible to contain
and recycle due to the Rollin Effect. So any dreams of a superconducting
future should be put on ice.

The science and physics of Helium in the solid, liquid and gaseous phases is
*utterly* fascinating. Reading a little is a window into the nature of the
universe and of matter (2). Someone has put up a great Wiki entry.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Helium

(1) as observed to date
(2) if it doesn't interest you check your pulse, you died last night

 

first time I can recall you being funny.

 

I'd noticed.

 

Heliox?

 

<fx:squeaky voice>

It wasn't me.

</fx:sv)

 

Trimix, prices appear to have doubled from a couple of years back.

 

http://www.theregister.co.uk/2010/02/05/helium_dome_forever/

 

Hence my comment about them.

Europe is securing it's own source and reclamation facility in North Africa
but that is not fully operational yet.

Nevertheless in human terms it is going to become a rare resource far too
soon. Particularly if Ivan overcooks the magnet power supply again.

I've sourced 750Litres now and it arrives tomorrow. Got anything you want
embrittling.

 

Don't be doing too much blaming -- installations like CERN and PSI
recycle as much helium as possible, with their own liquefaction plants.
Blame divers who use it to replace nitrogen, people selling party balloons,
etc, and NASA for using it to flush out cryogenic rocket fuel tanks...
....and Congress who dictated that the US Strategic reserve should be sold
off by a given deadline (IIRC from a article I read a few days ago).

OK, our little 4 T NMR magnet at Brunel doesn't have a recovery
line (we use it to test photodetectors used in CMS), but it only uses a
60 l fill twice a year; is your MR scanner hooked up to a recovery line?

Not just that; as with hydrogen its average thermal velocity is
above the Earth's escape velocity -- it leaks into space!

...only if it's cooled to the superfluid phase, nicht wahr?

There are now lots of superconductors that work above 77 K; I've
stopped following the field so I don't know what the current (pardon the pun)
record is. (135 K according to Wiki.)

--
Ivan Reid, School of Engineering & Design, _____________ CMS Collaboration,
Brunel University. Ivan.Reid@[brunel.ac.uk|cern.ch] Room 40-1-B12, CERN
GSX600F, RG250WD "You Porsche. Me pass!" DoD #484 JKLO#003, 005
WP7# 3000 LC Unit #2368 (tinlc) UKMC#00009 BOTAFOT#16 UKRMMA#7 (Hon)
KotPT -- "for stupidity above and beyond the call of duty".

 

Ah, that's the article I'd seen.

Look, I wasn't on shift when that happened, OK? (I was when another
little accident happened to CMS, but I was just an observer being told what
to do at that stage.)

Hydrogen would be better for embrittlement, no? Helium from alpha
radiation can do the same thing, I guess, but over a longer timescale.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hydrogen_embrittlement

--
Ivan Reid, School of Engineering & Design, _____________ CMS Collaboration,
Brunel University. Ivan.Reid@[brunel.ac.uk|cern.ch] Room 40-1-B12, CERN
GSX600F, RG250WD "You Porsche. Me pass!" DoD #484 JKLO#003, 005
WP7# 3000 LC Unit #2368 (tinlc) UKMC#00009 BOTAFOT#16 UKRMMA#7 (Hon)
KotPT -- "for stupidity above and beyond the call of duty".

 

Alpha radiation is just uppity helium.

 

did I ever tell you the tale of when I was at uni and we hid an alpha
source in the rucksack of a twat we didn't like?

I wonder if he died.

 

I never ceased to amaze me what the massive increase in cost was with
anything to do with the cryogenic pumps, feed lines or couplings for an
Ariane 5.

Not forgetting the techniques used to shift 3 tons of cryogenic fuel
into an engine per second.

 

Possibly, but very unlikely to be anything to do with lugging an Alpha
source around.


--
Catman MIB#14 SKoGA#6 TEAR#4 BOTAFOF#38 Apostle#21 COSOC#3
Tyger, Tyger Burning Bright (Remove rust to reply)
116 Giulietta 3.0l Sprint 1.7 GTV TS GT 3.2 V6
Triumph Sprint ST 1050: It's blue, see.
www.cuore-sportivo.co.uk

 

Oh I don't know - if it got mixed up in his sandwich...

 

Werll I *spose* but IIRC Alpha particles can barely penetrate clothes /
skin. So 72ish hours internal exposure.

Unless it was also *poisonous*?

OTOH Wiki seems to think I'm talking crap. Again! Who'd have thought it.


--
Catman MIB#14 SKoGA#6 TEAR#4 BOTAFOF#38 Apostle#21 COSOC#3
Tyger, Tyger Burning Bright (Remove rust to reply)
116 Giulietta 3.0l Sprint 1.7 GTV TS GT 3.2 V6
Triumph Sprint ST 1050: It's blue, see.
www.cuore-sportivo.co.uk

 

go tell that to Alexander Litvinenko.

oh wait...

 

So long as he didn't have any significant alpha particle inhibitors in
his rucksack.

You know, sheets of paper, that kind of thing.

 

Well I never. I thought it was simply the chemical[1] toxicity of the
Polonium that did for him. It appears to be more complex than that, TY.

[1] as opposed to the radioactivity, for want of a better word.


--
Catman MIB#14 SKoGA#6 TEAR#4 BOTAFOF#38 Apostle#21 COSOC#3
Tyger, Tyger Burning Bright (Remove rust to reply)
116 Giulietta 3.0l Sprint 1.7 GTV TS GT 3.2 V6
Triumph Sprint ST 1050: It's blue, see.
www.cuore-sportivo.co.uk

 

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