Anonymous ID: 656111 May 11, 2019, 8:57 a.m. No.6471477   ๐Ÿ—„๏ธ.is ๐Ÿ”—kun   >>1499 >>1576 >>1580 >>1630 >>1651 >>1674 >>1725 >>1770 >>1787 >>1823

NOTABLE

This story was actually very interesting. Did not realize we could be out of Helium on our planet by 2040.

 

Party City's future is up in the air: Company announces it's closing 45 stores after helium shortage causes balloon sales to plummet

Party City announced this week that it will close 45 nationwide locations

They say the global helium shortage means they are not able to get enough of the gas to inflate balloons in store - and so they are losing customers and sales

The party store giant says a new contract will help secure additional quantities of helium for the next 2.5 years

Around 75 per cent of the world's helium only comes from three sources

The company ended the first quarter in 2019 with $1,991 million in debt

A helium shortage has been years in the making as 75 per cent of the world's helium only comes from only three sources: ExxonMobil in Wyoming, Ras Laffan Industrial City in Qatar and the National Helium Reserve in Texas, according to USA Today.

But reserves in Texas are being depleted at an alarming rate as overall demand for the gas grows.

Commercial supplies will be stopped from there in 2021, after the authority controlling it fell into debt.

A new reserve was found in Tanzania was discovered in 2017. Helium One began drilling at the Tanzania reserve in 2018.

Even though commonly used for balloons, helium is also used to inflate blimps and pressurize the fuels tanks used in rockets.

Average day items would also be impossible to make without helium. The gas is used to make computer chips, airbags and the cables that carry high speed internet and cable services into homes.

The gas is also crucial for scientists because itโ€™s used to cools atoms to -270C to stop them vibrating, which makes investigating their nature far more straightforward.

Itโ€™s also widely used in medical scanners and exotic machines such as the Large Hadron Collider.

Now, its scarcity is causing alarm bells in the scientific community.

Although helium is the second-most abundant element in the universe, Earth only has a limited supply - and the U.S National Research Council warned in 2012 that the gas could run out by 2040.

The U.S. Department of Interior estimated in 2014 that the Earth only has 1,169 billion cubic feet of helium reserves left.

In fact, itโ€™s now becoming so rare that Nobel prize-winning physicist Professor Robert Richardson of New Yorkโ€™s Cornell University believes that helium-filled party balloons should be on sale for $100.

Previously the U.S had built up a huge stockpile of helium.

But in the 1990s, however, it began selling it off, creating a surplus of supply and driving prices down, which was good news for party-balloon makers, but not for scientists.

Now even party stores are suffering as dwindling supplies have pushed up priced by 250 per cent over the last decade.

 

https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-7015623/Party-Citys-future-air-helium-shortage-causes-balloon-sales-plummet.html

 

Video: Helium is one of the most valuable elements on Earth

Doctors have called for an end to the use of helium in party balloons, warning that supplies could run out for medical use.

 

https://www.dailymail.co.uk/video/news/video-1194841/Helium-one-valuable-elements-Earth.html

Anonymous ID: 656111 May 11, 2019, 9:25 a.m. No.6471662   ๐Ÿ—„๏ธ.is ๐Ÿ”—kun   >>1741 >>1797

DEMS ARE REALLY SPAZZING OUT NOW, KEK

 

Democrats accuse Trump of hijacking Fourth of July plans in DC to hold a campaign-style rally for himself on the National Mall

Democrats in federal and DC government are complaining about Trump's plans

Trump announced his plans for 'A Salute To America' back in February

Is said to have become obsessed with minute details of planning the event

City officials moan over changes to longstanding annual event on National Mall

Democrats in Congress accuse Trump of turning celebration into partisan event

Trump turned attention to the Fourth after plans for military parade fell through

 

Democrats in Washington DC city government and in Congress have accused President Donald Trump of attempting to hijack Fourth of July celebrations on the National Mall for partisan purposes.

Trump announced in February that he was planning 'one of the biggest gatherings in the history of Washington DC' at the Lincoln Memorial for Independence Day, to include 'an address by your favorite President, me!'

Now city officials are grousing about plans to move the fireworks launch site from alongside the Lincoln Memorial reflecting pool to a barge in the Potomac, and Democrats fear the event will become a campaign-style rally.

'It's not about any one person, it's about 'We, the people.' And if the president moves to make this about him, I think he will find the American public disappointed and angered by it,' said Rep. Betty McCollum, a Democrat from Minnesota, in an interview with the Washington Post.

https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-7018061/Democrats-accuse-Trump-hijacking-Fourth-July-plans-DC.html