Those are good points. The report from LANL that I edited in after my original rough estimate mentions these issues too. It estimates an electricity requirement

Those are good points. The report from LANL that I edited in after my original rough estimate mentions these issues too. It estimates an electricity requirement of about 170,000 kWh to produce one Mcf (28,317 liters) of helium by atmospheric separation in a dedicated plant. The cost of electricity dominates the overall process cost for helium production via atmospheric separation. In the state with the cheapest industrial electricity, Washington, it would cost nearly 27 cents per liter of helium for the electricity alone. https://www.eia.gov/electricity/monthly/epm_table_grapher.php?t=epmt_5_6_a https://www.eia.gov/electricity/monthly/epm_table_grapher.ph...