t.o.

I learnt from the magazine that people had installed wind generator into a small helium ballon and sent it 100 meters about the ground. It will generate electricity power for two household use. I think it is cool and easier to install for your house. People will not complaint about the noise problem.

justDIY

only problem is we have about 10 years of helium left on the planet, I wonder which we'll run out of first, indium or helium.

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t.o.

Where will the helium gas go?

justDIY

it gets out of the balloon and escapes into the upper atmosphere where it's impossible to recover

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t.o.

Then how do we collect the helium? Should they all gone by now?

justDIY

helium is mainly recovered from natural gas wells, but only a few producers bother, most just vent the helium with the other waste gases during the refining process.

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Hero999

Helium is naturally found in the amptmosphere but extracting it isn't easy as it requires the air to be cooled until it liquifies, then is fractionally distilled.

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Get Opera it's simply a superb browser.

Broz

If I remember from correctly, I believe helium, along with hydrogen, is one of the gases that escapes from the atmosphere into space. The thermal energy in the atmosphere causes the atoms of helium to achieve escape velocity and leave Earth never to return.

Oznog

Helium is not present in large enough quantities to distill out of the air- not unless you invent free cryogenic refrigeration. If you had that, forget about generating electricity with wind power, we've got free air conditioning!

Helium is only generated from nuclear isotope decay inside the earth. It is present in a small amount in all natural gas, however, despite its value there are only a few fields in the world with a great enough concentration to capture. The natural gas fields around Amarillo, Tx has been the primary source of helium, around 7%, for the entire world since 1925, but it's fast running out. There are only a limited number of other sources in the world and when they're gone, they're gone, and being an element there's no way to make more out of something else. Not unless you're going to use a nuclear reaction and that's way too slow.

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I thought what I'd do was I'd pretend I was one of those deaf-mutes.

justDIY

invest in helium futures on the NYSE

__________________
If you don't have a planet, what good are gold bars?

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check out my project website: http://projects.dimension-x.net
Favorite numbers:
09 F9 11 02 9D 74 E3 5B D8 41 56 C5 63 56 88 C0

elfcurry

Use hydrogen then. It's cheap, easily available and lighter.

The only real drawback it its flammability but unless there are people present or a significant fire risk to persons or property, why worry?

Krumlink

Lol?

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Hank Fletcher

This is an excellent idea. If I won the lottery tomorrow, I'd totally pour some of it into bringing back the zeppelin. I think the dangers of hydrogen gas explosions are way out of proportion to what current engineering could make possible in terms of safe use. Given the superior lifting abilities of hydrogen to helium, its greater availability, and now safer manipulation and storage of hydrogen, I'd be really surprised to not see it make a significant comeback in the next two decades.