"Lesser" is a relative term. My hope is that we replace hydrocarbons quite thoroughly with fusion if/when the tech becomes viable; which probably won't solve the problem but will certainly help.
We'll basically have the same situation as we have with plutonium once the terrestrial/natural resources die out - which is bad but not nearly as impossible as simply not having access to the element.
Even if we replaced all energy generation with fusion. And I mean all of it. As far as I'm aware, the amount of waste helium produced wouldn't meet our needs.
Maybe you don't realize just how much industrial helium is used... but it's a lot. According to:
As of 2013, some 47 million cubic meters, or 1.8 billion cubic feet, to be exact.
Every MRI uses Helium, as do many other systems, for cryogenics. It's also used in applications where an inert environment is required, which includes arc welding applications (think all those aluminum trucks rolling off assembly lines).
"Some" is more than "none" by a significant margin. A single functioning MRI is significantly more than no functioning MRIs.
> I'm aware, the amount of waste helium produced wouldn't meet our needs.
Yes, the energy produced by nuclear power is huge - which means you don't need to convert much mass and hence you don't wind up with much He.
Something is infinitely better than nothing. Again, take Pu as an example of that - we have very little of the stuff but we are careful with it because of the scarcity (something that we are not with He); if we were forced to we could probably stretch a limited He supply a bit further, just like we do with Pu (e.g. not using it for bloody balloons). He is a great cryogenic for MRIs but possibly it's not the only feasible solution to that specific problem: it might be possible to replace it with a more common element.
Eh, honestly, that's a largely meaningless statement.
Let's say we went from 40 million cubic meters of helium a day to 1.
That would effectively eliminate the vast majority of industrial helium applications due to cost.
So no, "something" isn't better than "nothing" if you go from "abundant" to "very scarce".
And yes, there are absolutely applications (such as welding) where there are alternatives available (argon and xenon, particularly). But that isn't solving the helium shortage problem. It's coping with it. Which we should be doing. But we can't expect fusion to help us along... it's not an answer, here.
I think zamalek is making a point about marginal value - kinda. The vast majority of helium users are screwed. they've just got to figure out something else. But some users, say MRI machine makers, really need it. And people want MRIs. So, they'll mark up the cost of their machines by a million dollars (or whatever). Really, if there's demand at thousands of dollars per cubic meter, we'll find a way.
my guess is harvesting from the moon, rather than fusion. We might also just say fuck it, reserve the last million cubic feet for science experiments and call it a day.
I think your point is, there are tons of industrial uses of helium right now, and if it were to be gone today, it would be a huge problem.
imho, we should probably tax the hell out of its usage right now to force people find alternatives and be more efficient.
The price change is coming even if we don't want it to. it can be gradual or a hockey stick. We both agree cutting the supply by 7 or 8 orders of magnitude one afternoon would really suck.
