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Nope, that's not true. It's a popular misconception, with a kernel of truth, but the kernel is very, very small: hydrogen and helium are light enough that they are not gravitationally bound to our planet. In other words, if you release some helium in the atmosphere, in time it will eventually escape to space. While this is true, it's also irrelevant. Once you release a gas into the atmosphere, it's economically lost. It does not matter if it stays in the atmosphere forever, or it makes its way to the larger Universe. For example neon. Or kripton. Or chlorine for that matter. Separately, there is plenty of helium in natural gas fields. We extract about 4 trillion cubic meters of gas per year. Natural gas contains between 0.01% and 7% helium. At the lower end, we pull out of the ground 400 million cubic meters of helium per year, but we simply don't bother to separate it. This is more than three times the entire Federal Helium reserve. Now, if you read the article, you'll find out that this Federal Helium reserve is being sold as per a law enacted in 2013. Why did Congress pass such a law? I don't know, but presumably they have looked into the issue and determined that it's worth their time to bring it to the floor and hold a vote on it. The original helium reserve was instituted before WW2, when dirigibles were a thing, and the US was concerned with the Nazi Germany's lead in this particular technology. After WW2 though, dirigibles are only a curiosity here and there. Helium is not a strategic resource anymore. |