Helium-3 Offtake

Helium-3 recovered from tritium decay is supplied to quantum-computing, cryogenic, and neutron-detection users — a scarce material at kg/yr scale.

A rare material, made available

Helium-3 offtake is the purified helium-3 harvested from decaying tritium and delivered to users for whom it is an enabling material. At a coproduct rate near 1.97 kg/yr, the foundry contributes supply on the scale of the entire existing global market for the isotope.

The customers

• Quantum computing: dilution refrigerators cooling superconducting processors
• Cryogenics and low-temperature physics research
• Neutron detection: ³He proportional counters for security and safeguards
• Specialized research and, potentially, hyperpolarized ³He medical imaging

Each customer class has purity and documentation requirements. Quantum and cryogenic users need radiopure helium-3 free of residual tritium; detection users need consistent isotopic and chemical purity. The product is assayed and certified to grade, with provenance traceable to the tritium accountancy system because the helium-3 originates from decayed tritium.

Coupled to inventory

Because helium-3 grows from held tritium, offtake volume depends on inventory-management choices as well as breeding. Holding tritium longer yields more helium-3 but consumes tritium to decay; the balance between tritium and helium-3 offtake is a deliberate operating decision.

This is a strategic-availability statement about a scarce material and its users, with no commercial claim, consistent with Kronos policy. Volumes remain design targets contingent on the breeding and inventory gates until FOAK.

This page describes a design-and-simulation study, not a built machine. Construction begins Q2 2027; first-of-a-kind (FOAK) first tritium is targeted near 2030. No net-gain claim is made before FOAK.