No shortage of helium, yet Vaisakhi parade bans it

Citing a global helium shortage, one of B.C.’s largest public events has banned the use of helium balloons — despite the fact that the world helium market seems to be experiencing a bit of a glut.

“You can’t really feel badly about using helium,” said William Halperin, a researcher at Northwestern University in Illinois, and a writer on helium supply.

The Surrey Vaisakhi Parade is the world’s largest non-Indian celebration of the Punjabi harvest festival of Vaisakhi, and is expected to draw more than 300,000 people on April 13.

Last week, a statement from organizers asked businesses and attendees to respect the event’s new policy on helium balloons. “Helium is listed as being classified under a global shortage,” it read.

But parade spokeswoman Laura Ballance said the measure was also done in part to prevent an annual torrent of airborne balloons from disrupting Vancouver air traffic.

“I received calls (from air traffic control) last year that there was a very significant amount of balloons in the airspace above the event,” she said. “And unfortunately, once the event is on, there’s very little you can do to control it.”

Since the balloons inevitably fall to earth, the mass release peppers the region with latex.

The helium market has been volatile in recent years, brought about by a rise in demand for the gas coupled with a yearslong sell-off of the United States helium reserve at artificially low prices.

The helium fire sale depressed prices and discouraged competition, and as the U.S. stockpile reached its end, helium prices surged.

With the element being critical to medical research, such as for cooling the magnets used in MRI machines, at times rising prices have forced scientists to delay or cancel research. In 2012, research had to be suspended for three days at the U.K.’s Rutherford Appleton Laboratory due to difficulties in obtaining helium.

The crisis caused helium balloons to join bottled water and plastic bags in the realm of consumer products discouraged by polite society — particularly since helium is a non-renewable resource that escapes the earth’s atmosphere and bleeds into space once released.

“I can imagine that in 50 years’ time, our children will be saying, ‘I can’t believe they used such a precious material to fill balloons,’” University of Cambridge chemist Peter Wothers said in a televised lecture in 2012 calling for a ban on “frivolous” uses of helium.

But since 2013, the helium market has been bolstered by new producers in Qatar and Russia. And according to a January Global Helium Market Report, released by Technavio market research, the helium market “will have reasonable supplies in the medium term.”

With only a handful of global producers, the helium market is more susceptible to price shocks than most.

The majority of the world’s helium is produced as a byproduct of natural gas production. Half of that is allowed to vent from natural gas wells without being captured.

As a result, Halperin said, it’s safe to assume that a party balloon is not robbing the world of helium that would have been used for medical research.

“It’s unlikely that we’re going to run out of helium,” he said.

Meanwhile, the Vaisakhi balloon ban has been accepted with only a minimum of grumbling in Surrey.

Nick Lau runs Party Express, a Surrey party supplier that typically sells $600 worth of balloons during the Vaisakhi parade.

Although Lau said helium prices have increased by about 30 to 40 per cent in recent years, he still sells helium-filled balloons at only $1.

“People still love balloons,” Lau said.