Since helium purification equipment is only a byproduct, it’s hard for other helium suppliers to step up when something like the Gulf crisis happens. Producing a little bit more helium requires producing a lot more natural gas—and energy companies aren’t going to do that for the sake of their secondary helium businesses.
The industry has been trying to make the helium supply more reliable. That could mean severing the link between helium and natural-gas extraction. Helium makes up a minuscule amount of natural gas. While Qatar’s natural gas doesn’t exactly have high concentrations of helium (0.05 percent), the country produces so much natural gas that its has accumulated helium byproduct for a tidy second business. The U.S., the world’s top helium producer ahead of Qatar, extracts helium from natural-gas fields around the Texas panhandle.
Production resumed around July 2, and helium will probably take a more complex and expensive route via a port in Oman, according to Phil Kornbluth, a helium industry consultant. Furthermore, it’ll take a few more weeks for helium production to get back to normal due to the logistics of getting specialized liquid nitrogen plant helium canisters back to Qatar and slowly cooling them before they can be used again.