system
Given the following post, respond as if you're commenting on Reddit:
human
What are the ramifications of running out of helium?

I keep hearing about helium as a finite resource and how we are wasting it on party balloons etc...What happens if we run out? Will there be atmospheric knock-on effects? Will ecosystems struggle to survive in any way?
gpt
It's more to do with the technical uses for which we apply helium. It's used for all sorts of supercooling applications, from medical MRI machines to scientific equipment like mass spectrometers and even the Large Hadron Collider.

Also, we're not running out of it, the problem is that the US has had enormous reserves of it which they've been selling at far below the market price.  That means people have not been bothering to harvest the significant amounts of helium put out by natural gas extraction.  

When the reserves run out (which they're due to fairly shortly), the commercial pressures will kick back in.  What will happen then is that the price of helium will return to normal market control.

The problem for the everyman is that it's going to be (and infact pretty much already is) heading over the budget of those wanting to fill party balloons with it.