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Helium has long been the subject of public policy deliberation and management, largely because of its many strategic uses and because it is a product derived from natural gas. Thus the helium market has several anomalous characteristics. Shortly after sources of helium were discovered at the beginning of the 20th century, the U.S. government recognized the potential importance of helium and placed its production and availability under strict governmental control. In the 1960s, the strategic value of helium in the cold war was reflected in policies that resulted in the accumulation of a large...
Helium has long been the subject of public policy deliberation and management, largely because of its many strategic uses and because it is a product derived from natural gas. Thus the helium market has several anomalous characteristics. Shortly after sources of helium were discovered at the beginning of the 20th century, the U.S. government recognized the potential importance of helium and placed its production and availability under strict governmental control. In the 1960s, the strategic value of helium in the cold war was reflected in policies that resulted in the accumulation of a large helium reserve owned by the federal government. The latest manifestation of public policy is expressed in the Helium Privatization Act of 1996, which directs that substantially all of the helium accumulated as a result of earlier policies be sold off by 2015 at prices sufficient to repay the federal government for its outlays associated with the helium program. The present volume assesses whether the interests of the United States have been well served by the 1996 Act and, in particular, whether selling off the helium reserve has had any adverse effects on U.S. scientific, technical, biomedical, or national security users of helium.