As previously reported, the first shipment of helium from the new plant in Big Piney, Wyoming arrived at the end of May. The plant is a joint venture between Taiyo Nippon Samso and Air Products, with each putting up 50%. It was inserted into containers and then transported overland to Los Angeles where on June 9 it was then loaded onto a ship bound for Tokyo. It arrived at Tokyo Port Terminal on June 23.

What was transported was 4,400 kg (about 28,000 m3) of liquid helium loaded into 11,000 gallon containers produced by the company. On the morning of the 23rd the containers were quickly unloaded by a large gantry from a 50,000 ton green container ship which had birthed at Pier 4 of the International Container Terminal at Tokyo Port Terminal. One of the 2 containers unloaded was from the new source, while the other one was from the regular Exxon source. They were moved on a truck chassis to a temporary storage area. They were then reloaded onto a Taiyo Nippon Sanso trailer. During the first week of July they were transported to the Tokyo plant in Oume.

A spokesperson from the Project Planning Section of the Technology Department of the Industrial Gas Division of the company reported that the transport by sea had gone smoothly. “While at sea, information regarding the volume and pressure of the liquid helium and liquid nitrogen was reported by e-mail. On the way the vessel made for the port of Auckland. From there it spent 11 days going along the northern route close to Alaska, transporting the containers without any delay or problems. Regarding the status of the operational ratio of the new plant and plans for the future, he noted, “The plant had already been operating, but it continually worked and stopped again and again. The purity level of the gas was not enough, and it could not be purified. Right now the problem of the purity of the crude gas has been resolved, and full-scale production began around April.

The amounted planned by the company for this year is 130 containers but it is not clear as to how many of those will be from the new plant. It has been announced that the production capacity of the new plant amounts to 6 million m3, when operating at full capacity. Taiyo Nippon Sanso would take over about half. This time, 1 container was transported, but no plans have yet been made for after this. If new containers were to come in, they would contact us 1-2 weeks in advance.” His statement shows that the supply of crude gas is uncertain, and unfortunately there is still no outlook as to what will be happening.

Taiyo Nippon Sanso has revealed that it would construct a helium filling station in Indonesia. “It will be completed at the end of this year. It will cope with the rapidly increasing demand for use with the MRI. It has not yet been decided whether we’ll bring in helium from the US or from Qatar. It will probably be from the closer location. In any case, it will not be all that much, and the outlook calls for about 5 containers,” he said.