Free Republic

Arecent discovery in Minnesota has unveiled a helium reservoir with astonishingly high concentrations of the gas, surpassing initial estimations and potentially opening doors for commercial extraction. Pulsar Helium, an exploration company, revealed the discovery of helium reserves in late February 2024, following drilling activities near Babbitt, northern Minnesota, reaching depths of 2,200 feet (670 meters). Initial findings displayed helium concentrations of 12.4%, described by Thomas Abraham-James, the president and CEO of Pulsar Helium, as “a dream” in an interview with CBS News.[1] The discovery represents an unprecedented opportunity to gain access to helium at concentration levels dramatically exceeding the normal...

This month’s announcement from Party City that it’s closing more than 40 stores as it grapples with new challenges, including diminishing helium supplies, likely came as unwelcome news to customers who count on the store for their balloon and event planning needs. But for scientists like Mark Elsesser, the announcement was something of a relief, inflating hopes that the public, and the government, might start paying closer attention. “When it comes to helium, we’re at a tipping point,” said Elsesser, who is the associate director of government affairs at the American Physical Society, a nonprofit association of physicists. “Party City...

On Monday, two companies, Israel’s Delek Drilling Ltd. and Houston-based Noble Energy Inc., announced that together they had reached an agreement with an Egyptian company, to export $15 billion of Israeli natural gas in two 10-year agreements. The natural gas to be exported will come from the Leviathan and Tamar offshore gas fields located in Israel. The 2 partners in Israel’s Tamar and Leviathan offshore gas fields said they would supply the private Egyptian firm Dolphinus Holdings with around 64 billion cubic metres of gas over a decade - with half coming from each field, and the proceeds shared equally.* Delek...