Looks like Russia might be happy to provide a balancing role to...

Looks like Russia might be happy to provide a balancing role to make sure prices don't collapse.
http://www.gazprom.com/about/subsidiaries/news/2012/december/article151109/

"The Chayandinskoye field, together with other resources owned by Gazprom in the East Siberian region, forms one of the largest reservoirs of helium in the world. By using the appropriate facilities the helium production levels will be set to enable balancing of world supplies and demand for decades. The volume of helium produced by Gazprom will replace the volumes produced by the US Bureau of Land Management (BLM) system for decades to come, as the BLM system depletes."

So presumably CTP/STO could sell a lot of helium over decades without distorting the market.

I also expect customers will be very happy to maintain diversification of supply source.

Here's a Gazprom presentation describing their plans.

http://prezi.com/txczmlqgca_o/he/

A few notables:
- Gazprom's current He production is 176Mscf per year
- their estimate of global consumption is 300-450 mcm per year by 2030 (about 11-17bscf)
- the 2 largest fields will annual He production up to 220 mcm per year (7.7bcf) beginning in 2017 (but presumably production will ramp up to this volume)
- phase 1 liquefaction will be for 2.1 bscf per year
- the two largest Gazprom fields are 4,000km from the closest seaport (pipeline into China may be feasible, although the pipeline would need to be thousands of kms)

Here's another link that gives an estimate of the Russian reserves of Helium (9.2 bn cub.m, roughly 343 bscf).

http://www.creonenergy.ru/en/consulting/detailConf.php?ID=104705

An excerpt: "As a result of growing consumption volumes and depletion of helium reserves in the U.S. storages, the world market may face the shortage of helium equaling to 30-35M cub.m in 2020 and 90-140M cub.m in 2030, thus opening a market niche for additional volumes of helium produced in the Eastern Siberia.
The reserves of helium in the Russian Federation have been identified in 210 hydrocarbon deposits; estimated reserves amount to 9.2 bn cub.m. About 90% of Russian reserves of helium-containing gas are located in the Easter Siberia (38% in Irkutsk region, 42% in the Republic of Sakha-Yakutia, 10% in Krasnoyarsk region)."