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The Crude Helium Enrichment Unit in the Cliffside Gas Field. Remnants of the Amarillo Helium Plant in 2015. The National Helium Reserve, also known as the Federal Helium Reserve, is a strategic reserve of the United States, which once held over 1 billion cubic meters (about 170,000,000 kg) [a] of helium gas.
Helium production and storage in the United States, 1940-2014 (data from USGS) In 1903, an oil exploration well at Dexter, Kansas, produced a gas that would not burn.. Kansas state geologist Erasmus Haworth took samples of the gas back to the University of Kansas at Lawrence where chemists Hamilton Cady and David McFarland discovered that gas contained 1.84 percent
The oil and gas reservoir was the primary helium source for the United States during the 1910s and at the commencement of World War I. By 1921, the North Texas natural gas field was estimated as near gas depletion exceeding the Petrolia helium reserves-to-production ratio yields.
The natural gas in the Hugoton field of Kansas and Oklahoma, plus the Panhandle Field of Texas, contains unusually high concentrations of helium, from 0.3% to 1.9%. Because of the large size of these fields, they contain the largest reserves of helium in the United States.
The Federal Helium Reserve was supposed to be sold off in 2021. Scientists hope it will remain in government hands. The fate of America's largest supply of helium is up in the air
The basin holds one of the most prolific natural gas reserves in North America, with ultimate gas production in excess of 100 trillion cubic feet (2,800 km 3) of gas. [3] In 2010, the U.S. Geological Survey estimated that the Anadarko Basin held 27.5 trillion cubic feet of natural gas and 410 million barrels of natural gas liquids (NGL). [ 4 ]
Several research organisations have released statements on the scarcity and conservation of helium. [6] [4] Among these are the American Physical Society, counting approximately 53,000 members, the Materials Research Society, an international organisation with 16,000 members, and the American Chemical Society, the world's largest scientific society with some 158,000 members. [4]
The helium market after World War II was depressed but the reserve was expanded in the 1950s to ensure a supply of liquid helium as a coolant to create oxygen/hydrogen rocket fuel (among other uses) during the Space Race and Cold War. Helium use in the United States in 1965 was more than eight times the peak wartime consumption.