Russia Set to Top Helium Supply as U.S. Sells Reserve
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Russia, already the largest producer of crude oil and natural gas, is weighing up plans to become the biggest supplier of helium, the inert gas vital for medical scanners, welding tools and rocket fuel, as the U.S. sells reserves from storage.
Russia’s remote, undeveloped gas fields in eastern Siberia are helium rich and could hold a third of the world’s remaining resources, said Vadim Udut, head of OAO Geliymash, a Moscow-based helium research company that advises gas-export monopoly OAO Gazprom. The country may build storage caverns, he said.