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The U.S. just sold its helium stockpile. Here’s why the medical world is worried. (www.nbcnews.com)

submitted 10 months ago by WayeeCool@hexbear.net to c/chapotraphouse@hexbear.net

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Privatizing the US national helium reserve. Gonna laugh when in a few years the government of another nation ends up owning it. Helium is dwindling finite resource that key technological infrastructure relies upon.

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[-] RyanGosling@hexbear.net 77 points 10 months ago

Gonna laugh when in a few years the government of another nation ends up owning it.

https://www.npr.org/2022/08/03/1114964240/new-battery-technology-china-vanadium

A bunch of scrappy engineers made a next generation battery and sold the technology to the US government

The government never bothered to manufacture anything. Instead they sold everything to China and now they’re already releasing public versions of the batteries. Now the US doesn’t have any knowledge on the batteries or even the factories to build them