Helium shortage affecting more than party stores
Helium probably brings thoughts of birthday balloons and high-pitched voices, but what will happen when all helium is lost? How will people know it’s a special occasion if there are no balloons?!
In all seriousness, if we lose helium sources many more important inventions will become useless.
For example, MRI machines’ magnetic fields are powered by tanks of helium. The rockets we send to space burn helium because it stays in its gaseous state at low temperatures. Overall, scientific research dependent on helium will be brought to a stand still.
I feel it is wrong how the conversation on the world’s depleting resources is being overshadowed by party supply sales figures.
According to Kornbluth Helium Consulting, in a New York Times article said we are seeing the third shortage in 14 years. The earth is giving us all that it can, and we’re sending resources to space on a rocketship before it has the chance to get there on it’s own.
My main concern is for medical imaging: If we do run out of helium, will MRIs stop being available to the public? Will only the rich have access to medical imaging, hoarding it from the rest of us?
I want leaders, world and community leaders alike, to realize the crisis my generation and those to come are facing. We need change now!
There will soon be no use to some technological advancements that rely on helium which we were promised would usher us into the future.
What I would like to see in response to headlines reading “HELIUM SHORTAGE” is: “let’s halt all unnecessary consumption of the gas,” not “We need to stockpile this stuff till it comes around again.”
This is a warning sign that we all need to be more aware of how we use our resources.
So, sure buy that balloon for your kid’s birthday — at this rate they won’t be able to do that for their own child.
