MRI machines need thousands of liters of liquid helium to function. Health care workers say they can’t afford any disruptions to the helium supply chain.

Privatizing the US national helium reserve. Gonna laugh when in a few years the government of another nation ends up owning it. Helium is dwindling finite resource that key technological infrastructure relies upon.

  • RyanGosling [none/use name]English
    77•5 months ago

    Gonna laugh when in a few years the government of another nation ends up owning it.

    https://www.npr.org/2022/08/03/1114964240/new-battery-technology-china-vanadium

    A bunch of scrappy engineers made a next generation battery and sold the technology to the US government

    The government never bothered to manufacture anything. Instead they sold everything to China and now they’re already releasing public versions of the batteries. Now the US doesn’t have any knowledge on the batteries or even the factories to build them

    • mushroom [he/him]English
      39•5 months ago

      [Lead Scientist Gary Yang] soon ran into trouble. He said he couldn’t persuade any U.S. investors to come aboard.

      “I talked to almost all major investment banks; none of them (wanted to) invest in batteries,” Yang said in an interview, adding that the banks wanted a return on their investments faster than the batteries would turn a profit.

      Yang acknowledges that he wanted his U.S. engineers to work in China. But he says it was because he thought Rongke Power could help teach them critical skills.

      He said he wanted to manufacture the entire battery in the U.S., but that the U.S. does not have the supply chain he required. He said China is more advanced when it comes to manufacturing and engineering utility-scale batteries.

      “In this field — manufacturing, engineering — China is ahead of the U.S.,” Yang said. “Many wouldn’t believe [it].”