Helium: A World Without the Chipmunks / Part.1

Helium: A World Without the Chipmunks / Part.1

I recently watched the film Alvin and the Chipmunks, (yeah that’s right Jason Lee) and there is a scene in which Alvin picks up a balloon full of Helium. Alvin takes a hit and his voice goes from his usual delightfully high pitched voice to a booming deep voice, made me chuckle pretty hard. Where am I going with this you say, well the very next day I was on set with a large canister of Helium and we got into a discussion about the rising cost of Helium. It was stated that this increase in price is due to the fact that we are running out of Helium, and that within our lifetime we would run out of precious Helium; this called for an investigation.

After many hours of online research and government findings, and probably one too many cups of espresso, I present to you the Helium report.



Helium (He) is a colorless, odorless, tasteless, non-toxic gas and is one of seven noble gases; the others being neon, argon, krypton, xenon, radon and ununoctium. Helium is the second element on the Periodic table of elements, due to its atomic number. The atomic number, also known as the proton number, has to do with the number of protons found in the nucleus of an Atom. (Sorry if this is getting to scientific.) Helium also has the lowest boiling and melting point amoung all of the elements, and it is most commonly found as a gas except in extreme conditions. Helium is the second most abundant element in the known Universe after hydrogen and constitutes twenty three percent of the elemental mass of the universe.

Helium was first detected by French astronomer Pierre Jassen, on August 18th 1868, during a solar eclipse. It was spotted as a bright yellow line in the chromospheres of the sun, later that year scientist Norman Lockyer theorized that there is an element that is found on the sun that is not found here one earth; thus naming the element Helios the Greek word for the Sun. (For those of you who do not know, all colors coincide with a numerical value, which is measured in nanometers. Sorry I sometimes study wavelengths to know which sort of color correction gel I need to put over a light fixture, to make it match. Yes there is a certain science to filmmaking.) Later in 1903, a Kansas state geologist by the name of Erasmus Haworth, stumbled upon a gas while conducting a routine oil drilling operation. Haworth found that the gas was non-flamable, after further investigation found that helium was present in vast quanties under the American Great Plains. Haworth’s discovery now made the United States the world’s leading supplier of Helium.



Helium has many remarkable properties, it is smaller than any other element and it is the second lightest gas known to man; it is also known for its very stable and symmetrical structure. Due to these properties Helium has many uses. It is an ideal lifting gas, as everyone knows what kind of party would be complete without some balloons. Helium unlike Hydrogen, is non-flammable, so it has many uses in the field of aerial transport. Helium is also has a high thermal conductivity rating, therefore it is able to be used in the heat treatment of optical fibers, with little or no imperfections. On the other end of the spectrum, due to Helium’s low liquefaction temperature it makes it ideal for, rocket propulsion systems, cryogenics and the cooling of superconductors; namely MRI machines. Due to its sable nature, humans have found many uses for Helium in the scientific field, and not to mention birthday parties. So what’s the problem?

Helium in a non-renewable resource,

“Nearly all helium on Earth is a result of radioactive decay. The decay product is primarily found in minerals of uranium and thorium, including cleveites, pitchblende, carnotite and monazite, because they emit alpha particles, which consist of helium nuclei (He2+) to which electrons readily combine. In this way an estimated 3.4 litres of helium per year are generated per cubic kilometer of the Earth's crust. In the Earth's crust, the concentration of helium is 8 parts per billion. In seawater, the concentration is only 4 parts per trillion. There are also small amounts in mineral springs, volcanic gas, and meteoric iron. The greatest concentrations on the planet are in natural gas, from which most commercial helium is derived.”

According to Lee Sobotka, the world’s helium supply may be in danger. Check out the link below for the full article.

Helium supplies endangered, threatening science and technology




Why Your Voices Gets Higher With Helium Gas.

When a series compression waves (your voice) leave the helium in your lungs and hit the denser air, the wave train is suddenly slowed down. The wave in front is slowed first while the wave behind it is still moving fast. Then the second wave is slowed while the third is still moving fast, and so on. It's like fast moving traffic on an open freeway suddenly coming to a slow point in the road, all the cars bunch up close to each other.

Your ear interprets closely bunched sound waves as a higher pitch than widely spaced waves. So when your voice originates in helium and then travels through the air to someone's ear, it sounds higher. If both you and the listener were in a room filled with helium, your voice would get to their ears faster than normal, but there would be no pitch change.