We vent the vast majority of helium by not separating it from natural gas, I still think the "shortage" of helium is still way overblown. We shouldn't be wasting it, but I don't believe the doom and gloom about helium. Basically every gas well has helium, and we aren't going to run out of gas wells anytime soon, it just costs a little more to extract because its a little bit lower percentage than the ideal wells.
The US has subsidized Helium via this mindset for a long time.
Where I get confused is, after all these years, surely others could make a bigger effort? (unless the nature of US reserves put us in a unique position)
