Extract from the U.S. Geological Survey, Mineral Commodity Summaries, January 2020
"Helium resources of the world, exclusive of the United States, were estimated to be about 31.3 billion cubic meters (1.13 trillion cubic feet). The locations and volumes of the major deposits, in billion cubic meters, are Qatar, 10.1; Algeria, 8.2; Russia, 6.8; Canada, 2.0; and China, 1.1. As of December 31, 2018, the BLM had analyzed about 22,300 gas samples from 26 countries and the United States, in a program to identify world helium resources."
Given helium is a critical element to the US they are obviously keen to secure supplies going forward given they literally scoured the world to identify potential helium supply channels. I know for instance the US provided a US$40m OPIC loan to Renergen in 2019. If the US Govt is confident in BNL they may also get some US Govt help to fund their activities.
If 8% helium concentrations are real funding options shouldn't be hard for BNL given average concentrations are only 0.35% for US helium reserves. But as I understand it BNL is yet to drill so helium concentrations are actually unknown at this stage so drilling still needs to occur for BNL to prove the actual helium concentrations?
(20min delay)