Oct 8 1996
From The Space Library
President William J. Clinton signed legislation ending funding for the federal helium reserve. The United States, through the Bureau of Mines, had bought and stockpiled helium since the 1960s-expending more than US$250 million. Experts estimated that the U.S. government's helium reserve could supply the world for more than 10 years and the federal government for 80. The legislation to end the reserve, spearheaded by U.S. Representative Christopher Cox (R-CA), closed down the helium facility outside Amarillo, Texas. NASA planned to sell the helium slowly, over a period of 18 years, so that the sales would not destabilize the worldwide helium market. The closure had the potential to affect NASA, the federal government's largest user of helium. At the time of the reserve's closure, NASA was using about 70 million cubic feet (2 million cubic meters) of helium annually to pressurize Shuttle fuel tanks, among other uses.
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