Taiyo Nippon Sanso will raise the price of helium for cylinders, trailers, liquid and specialty gases with effect from January 1, 2020. The markup will be more than 20% of the current price and the risen portion of transportation cost will be added depending upon the conditions of delivery.　

Helium is a rare resource produced after purification from the natural gas fields abroad. Globally most of the supply depends upon the United States and Qatar. Japan fully depends upon importing.

　In addition, since 2017 the world output of helium has been on the decrease due to the transportation problem caused by the political instability in the Middle East, the aging troubles of the production facilities and the phased output reduction plan of the US Bureau of Land Management. On the other hand, the demand is rapidly booming on account of the growth for the production of semiconductor, optical fiber and medical MRI as well as the development of space industry. The supply and demand imbalance seems to go on for the coming several years.

With the above-mentioned background Taiyo Nippon Sanso has so far taken measures like multiplying the supply sources or developing a new source for stable procurement, but the consequent costs have turned out to be so much to control only by such self-help efforts that there remains no other way than revising the price.