Idk how I got onto this but I was just googling shit and I was wondering how we are running out of helium. I read that helium is the one non-renuable element on this planet because it comes from the result of radioactive decay. But from my memory and the D- I got in highschool chemistry, helium is number 2 on the periodic table of elements and hydrogen is number 1, so why can’t we just take a fuck ton of hydrogen, do some chemistry shit and turn it into helium? I know it’s not that simple I just don’t understand why it wouldn’t work.
Edit: I get it, it’s nuclear fusion which is physics, not chemistry. My grades were so back in chemistry that I didn’t take physics. Thank you for explaining it to me!
In: Chemistry
tl;dr its like trying to smash together 2 magnets that repel each other, it takes a lot of energy to make it happen.
Each Hydrogen nucleus is positively charged because it is just one proton.
Just like 2 normal magnets with similar polarity, hydrogen nuclei repel each other, and the force increases as the magnets get closer together. Unlike normal magnets, hydrogen nuclei are entirely positively charged, there is no “negative side” of the hydrogen nucleus. Imagine trying to push together 2 very tiny and very strong magnets that repel each other.
In advanced physics terms, the amount of energy needed to get the 2 nuclei close enough is called the [Coulomb barrier](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Coulomb_barrier). Once the barrier is broken with enough energy, the 2 Hydrogen nuclei smash together, create a Helium nucleus, and actually create a lot of energy – even more than was needed to break the barrier. This is called nuclear fusion. It is hard to control and use all of that energy – the energy either escapes and the reaction fizzles out or increases exponentially and leads to a nuclear explosion.
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