A global shortage of helium, the lighter-than-air gas, has put a stop to the sale of inflatable Mickey Mouse heads at Disneyland in Tokyo, threatened parades during the US Thanksgiving holiday and disrupted university research.
Global production of helium – used in industrial and medical applications, as well as toy dirigibles – has sharply fallen this year in the US and Algeria, the two biggest exporters.
Companies in Japan, the world’s leading helium importer, say they are looking to tap alternative, but more expensive, sources of supply in Qatar, Russia and Poland.
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