Discover the world's largest helium mine

British scientists discovered the world's largest helium gas mine in Africa with reserves of about 1.5 billion cubic meters.

According to UPI, a team of researchers at Oxford University and Durham University, England, discovered the rift valley area, Tanzania, containing about 1.5 billion cubic meters of helium and real reserves. The more possible.

Currently, helium gas is widely used in magnetic resonance imaging (MRI), welding equipment, nuclear power, balloons and many other applications. The world consumes about 226 million cubic meters of helium gas per year, of which the US Federal Heli Reserve is the largest supplier with a current reserve of 685 million cubic meters. Total US helium reserves are about 4.3 billion cubic meters.

The Rift Valley region, Tanzania, is the site of a helium mine with 1.5 billion cubic meters of reserves.(Photo: Yahoo).

The team collaborated with Helium One, Norway, to explore helium gas near volcanoes. The intense heat emanating from the volcano released helium gas from rocks deep underground, then stored them in more shallow gas fields.

"The helium gas fields can meet the needs of society's helium use next time, and similar findings in the future will not be far away, " said Chris Ballentine, professor at Oxford University, England. .

Typically, helium gas is mainly found during the drilling of oil or gas wells. This is the first time scientists have been actively seeking helium and they have succeeded. The team used their understanding of geochemistry, seismic imagery of underground gas trap structures to search for helium-containing areas not yet mixed with other gases such as carbon dioxide (CO ₂ ).

"We can apply the technology to other parts of the world with similar geological history to find new helium," said Pete Barry, professor of Earth Sciences at Oxford University.