I suspect that the frivolousness with which we currently release waste helium will look pretty stupid future generations. Wherever liquid helium is used as a coolant, we should be installing recovery systems to capture and recondense the helium. With the appropriate safety precautions, hydrogen can be used as a lifting gas for blimps and balloons. I can’t think of any applications which require helium to be released into the atmosphere to float away into space forever.
I suspect that the frivolousness with which we currently release waste helium will look pretty stupid future generations. Wherever liquid helium is used as a coolant, we should be installing recovery systems to capture and recondense the helium. With the appropriate safety precautions, hydrogen can be used as a lifting gas for blimps and balloons. I can’t think of any applications which require helium to be released into the atmosphere to float away into space forever.