GRINNING FROM EAR TO EAR

Some far-sighted individuals or companies who bought silver at $1.20 an ounce a few years ago, or who held onto unprofitable oil wells, are now grinning from ear to ear. Is there a glut of something now that will be in short supply in coming years?

Yes: helium. The US government has recently ended its strategic stockpile program, reckoning that its hoard of 37 billion cubic feet is big enough. And demand is now small. But in a few years all this will change.

Demand is likely to go up for two reasons, both energyrelated: Helium is used in High Temperature Gas Reactors (see our first item), and it is essential for producing the low temperatures required for electrical superconductivity. This, in turn, is required for power transmission in the future, especially for mass transit by electromagnetic flight (magnetic levitation), and probably for nuclear fusion power as well.

But helium is an inert gas which does not, in nature, form chemical compounds. It is mainly found in natural gas (0.5% in "helium-rich" gas), and in very tiny fractions in the atmosphere. Until recently, extracting it was a slow and costly process. But it is now possible to produce plastic membranes with holes so tiny that helium molecules will squeeze through them, while the much larger methane molecules won't make it. Recycling the gas through the membranes several times will yield a 90% pure stream of helium even from helium-poor gas. The remaining impurities can then be eliminated by conventional methods.

The Alberta Research Council, together with Alberta & Southern Gas Co. and TransCanada Pipelines, is building a pilot plant handling 2 million cu.ft. of gas a day to test the new process. One day, they will be wearing that wide grin. Most other gas companies are still letting the helium escape into the atmosphere.